Who Was Martin Luther King, Jr.?

Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of racism and death.

The civil rights movement was a struggle for racial equality and social justice in the United States during the 1950s and 1960s. Despite the abolition of enslavement almost a century ago, Black Americans continued to face racism and violence, particularly in the South, where Jim Crow laws legitimized racial discrimination. These laws enforced racial segregation in public spaces. Disenfranchised and marginalized at all levels of society, Black people were often excluded from education or attended poorly equipped schools and limited job opportunities, often working as domestic workers and laborers. In the postwar US, however, Black people’s developing race consciousness helped incite grassroots initiatives and activist groups that sparked the civil rights movement.

In the South, acts of civil disobedience like sit-ins, boycotts, marches, and mass protests highlighted the issues of racial oppression and discrimination nationally. The political actions of activists Rosa Parks, Medgar Evers, Fannie Lou Hamer, and many others challenged Jim Crow laws and the lack of voting rights for African Americans. Martin Luther King, Jr., a Baptist minister and the founder and head of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), emerged as a leader and emblematic figure in the struggle.