Why America feared communism

After 1945 the USA and the USSR became Cold War enemies. Many Americans feared communists were secretly working inside the USA. This wave of fear (c.1947-54) is called the Red Scare.

• The House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) questioned people about communist links.
• In 1947 HUAC targeted Hollywood; the Hollywood Ten refused to answer and were jailed and blacklisted.
• The Rosenbergs (Julius and Ethel) were convicted of passing atomic secrets to the USSR and executed in 1953.

Interpretation tip: historians argue whether the fear was justified (some spies were real, like Alger Hiss) or whether it was hysteria that ruined innocent lives. Both sides use the same events — that is why interpretations differ.

Senator Joseph McCarthy

In 1950 Senator Joseph McCarthy claimed he had a list of communists in the government. He made accusations with little evidence — a "witch-hunt" — and this abuse of power became known as McCarthyism.

Who were the Hollywood Ten?

Name the year

Segregation & Jim Crow

In the southern states, Jim Crow laws forced black and white Americans apart: separate schools, buses, restaurants, toilets and water fountains. This legal segregation was called de jure segregation.

It was justified by the 1896 Plessy v Ferguson ruling of "separate but equal" — but the facilities were almost never equal.

Key distinction: de jure segregation = separation by law (mostly the South). de facto segregation = separation by circumstance, e.g. poverty and housing (common in northern cities). The North was not free of racism.

Brown v Board of Education, 1954

In 1954 the Supreme Court ruled in Brown v Board of Education of Topeka that segregated schools were unconstitutional — "separate educational facilities are inherently unequal." This overturned Plessy.

Misconception: Brown did not end segregation at once. The Court said "with all deliberate speed" but gave no deadline. Many southern states resisted for years — Little Rock (1957) shows how fierce that resistance was.

What did Brown actually do?

Montgomery Bus Boycott, 1955-56

In December 1955, Rosa Parks was arrested in Montgomery, Alabama, for refusing to give up her bus seat to a white passenger. Black residents began a boycott of the buses.

• The boycott lasted over a year (1955-56) and was led by a young minister, Martin Luther King.
• It was non-violent and hit the bus company financially.
• In 1956 the Supreme Court ruled bus segregation unconstitutional — a clear victory.

Emmett Till (1955): the brutal murder of 14-year-old Emmett Till, and his mother's open-casket funeral, shocked the nation and fuelled the growing movement.

Little Rock, 1957

In 1957, nine black students (the "Little Rock Nine") tried to enrol at Central High School in Arkansas. Governor Faubus used the state National Guard to block them.

President Eisenhower sent federal troops to escort the students in — showing the federal government would now enforce desegregation against the states.

Why it matters: Little Rock proved Brown was real. National TV coverage of screaming mobs put the ugliness of segregation on screens worldwide — a Cold War embarrassment for the USA.

Who sent in the troops?

Civil rights timeline, 1954-70

Before we go on, here is the run of milestones. Notice how the movement builds momentum through the 1960s:

Sit-ins & Freedom Rides

Young activists took non-violent direct action into everyday spaces:

• Sit-ins (from 1960): black students sat at "whites-only" lunch counters (Greensboro, North Carolina) and refused to leave.
• Freedom Rides (1961): mixed-race groups rode buses into the South to test desegregation of terminals. At Anniston, Alabama, a bus was firebombed by a mob.

The violence against peaceful protesters was filmed and shamed the USA — turning public opinion in the North against segregation.

MLK & the March on Washington, 1963

Martin Luther King preached non-violent, peaceful protest inspired by Christian teaching and Gandhi. His aim was integration — black and white living together as equals.

In August 1963, about 250,000 people joined the March on Washington. King gave his "I have a dream" speech at the Lincoln Memorial.

Significance: the march built huge pressure on Congress and President Kennedy (and, after his assassination, Johnson) to pass strong civil rights law.

The March on Washington

Two laws that changed America

Pressure from the movement produced the two great legal victories of the era:

Both were signed by President Lyndon B. Johnson (LBJ). The 1965 Act followed the Selma marches, where marchers were beaten crossing the Edmund Pettus Bridge ("Bloody Sunday").

Name the year

Why the civil rights movement grew

No single cause explains the movement's growth — several factors combined:

Match the event to its significance

Tap an event/date on the left, then tap its significance on the right.

Black Power & Malcolm X

Not everyone accepted King's patient, peaceful approach. Some wanted faster change and black self-reliance — this was Black Power.

• Malcolm X (Nation of Islam) argued for black pride and self-defence "by any means necessary", and rejected integration. He was assassinated in 1965.
• The Black Panthers (founded 1966) armed themselves, monitored police, and ran community programmes like free breakfasts for children.
• Frustration in northern ghettos exploded into urban riots (e.g. Watts, Los Angeles, 1965).

MLK vs Black Power — different methods

Misconception: MLK and Malcolm X were not simply "good vs bad". They disagreed on methods, not on wanting justice. Later, Malcolm X's views moved closer to King's before both were killed.

MLK vs Malcolm X

The women's movement

The 1960s also saw a wave of feminism. Many women wanted equal pay, equal opportunities and an end to being treated as second-class.

• Betty Friedan's book The Feminine Mystique (1963) challenged the idea that women should only be housewives.
• The Equal Pay Act (1963) made it illegal to pay women less than men for the same job.
• NOW — the National Organization for Women (founded 1966, Friedan a co-founder) campaigned for women's equality.

Link it up: the Civil Rights Act 1964 also banned discrimination by sex, so the black civil rights movement helped the women's movement too.

Protest movements of the 1960s

By the late 1960s, protest was everywhere. The civil rights struggle inspired others to challenge authority:

• Student protests — a growing youth "counter-culture" questioned traditional values.
• Anti-Vietnam War protests — marches and campus sit-ins against the draft and the war.
• Women's and other rights movements — demanding equality and freedom.

These movements shared tactics: marches, sit-ins, media coverage and mass mobilisation — the toolkit civil rights activists had proven worked.

Put the events in order

Tap the events in chronological order, earliest first. Get one wrong and that pick resets — think about the dates!

Quick recap

Exam skill: for interpretation questions, remember historians read the same events differently — always support a judgement with specific facts and dates.