Module 5: Resistance

Civil Disobedience played a central role in the Civil Rights Movement, serving as a powerful tool to challenge unjust laws and promote social change. Inspired by the writings of Henry David Thoreau, who argued that individuals have a moral duty to resist laws that conflict with their conscience, leaders like Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. embraced nonviolent civil disobedience as a means of protest. King, deeply influenced by Thoreau’s philosophy, believed that nonviolent resistance—such as sit-ins, boycotts, and marches—was the most effective way to fight racial segregation and inequality. King argued that breaking unjust laws peacefully, without violence or hatred, would expose their immorality and awaken the conscience of the nation. His philosophy of nonviolence emphasized that the ultimate goal was not to destroy the law but to create a more just and humane society, demonstrating that breaking a law was a moral act when that law upheld injustice. Through civil disobedience, the Civil Rights Movement was able to challenge deeply entrenched systems of oppression and make significant strides toward racial equality. 

Sit-ins became a powerful form of nonviolent protest during the Civil Rights Movement, with one of the most notable examples being the Greensboro Sit-In in 1960. Four African American college students—Ezell Blair Jr., David Richmond, Franklin McCain, and Joseph McNeil—sat at a segregated lunch counter at Woolworth’s in Greensboro, North Carolina, where they were denied service simply because of their race. Their act of civil disobedience was a direct challenge to the Jim Crow laws that enforced racial segregation in public spaces. The Greensboro Sit-In quickly inspired similar protests across the South, with protesters using the tactic to demand equal access to facilities and challenge discriminatory practices. The sit-ins were characterized by their discipline; participants would quietly sit at "whites-only" counters, enduring verbal abuse and even physical violence, all while maintaining a commitment to nonviolent protest. This method of civil disobedience proved to be an effective strategy in raising awareness of racial inequality and pushing for change, eventually leading to the desegregation of many public establishments. 

The Freedom Riders were a group of interracial activists who rode buses through the South in 1961 to challenge segregated interstate bus travel, which had been declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in Boynton v. Virginia (1960). Their goal was to test the enforcement of this ruling and to bring attention to the persistent segregation of public transportation. The Freedom Riders faced violent opposition, particularly in the deep South. In Alabama, they were attacked by white mobs, and their buses were firebombed. One of the most infamous episodes of violence was the "Mississippi Burning" incident, where two Freedom Riders, James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner, were brutally murdered by members of the Ku Klux Klan with local law enforcement complicity in Mississippi. Despite the danger, the Freedom Riders' courageous actions helped expose the depth of white resistance to civil rights and drew national attention to the need for stronger enforcement of desegregation laws, ultimately leading to increased federal intervention in the South.