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"We were prepared for the possibility of death" : Freedom Riders in the South, 1961.
- Format:
- Book
- Series:
- Archives unbound.
- Archives unbound
- Language:
- English
- Subjects (All):
- Freedom Rides, 1961.
- African American civil rights workers--History--20th century--Sources.
- African American civil rights workers.
- Civil rights workers--United States--History--20th century--Sources.
- Civil rights workers.
- African Americans--Segregation--Southern States--History--20th century--Sources.
- African Americans.
- Segregation in transportation--Southern States--History--20th century--Sources.
- Segregation in transportation.
- African Americans--Civil rights--Southern States--History--20th century--Sources.
- Civil rights movements--Southern States--History--20th century--Sources.
- Civil rights movements.
- Southern States--Race relations--History--20th century--Sources.
- Southern States.
- Congress of Racial Equality.
- Physical Description:
- 1 online resource (4,285 images)
- Other Title:
- Freedom Riders in the South, 1961
- We Were Prepared for the Possibility of Death, Freedom Riders in the South, 1961-1962
- Place of Publication:
- Farmington Hills, Mich. : Gale, a part of Cengage Learning, 2010.
- Summary:
- Freedom Riders were civil rights activists who rode interstate buses into the segregated South to test the United States Supreme Court decision in Boynton v. Virginia. Boynton had outlawed racial segregation in the restaurants and waiting rooms in terminals serving buses that crossed state lines. Five years prior to the Boynton ruling, the Interstate Commerce Commission had issued a ruling in Sarah Keys v. Carolina Coach Company that had explicitly denounced the Plessy v. Ferguson doctrine of separate but equal in interstate bus travel, but the ICC had failed to enforce its own ruling, and thus Jim Crow travel laws remained in force throughout the South. The Freedom Riders set out to challenge this status quo by riding various forms of public transportation in the South to challenge local laws or customs that enforced segregation. The Freedom Rides, and the violent reactions they provoked, bolstered the credibility of the Civil Rights Movement and called national attention to the violent disregard for the law that was used to enforce segregation in the southern United States. Riders were arrested for trespassing, unlawful assembly, and violating state and local Jim Crow laws, along with other alleged offenses.
- Notes:
- Date range of documents: 1961.
- Reproduction of the originals from the Federal Bureau of Investigation Library.
- Description based on online resource; title from HTML title page (Gale, viewed July 7, 2014)
- Local Notes:
- Acquired for the Penn Libraries with assistance from the Rosengarten Family Fund.
- Acquired for the Penn Libraries with assistance from the Herman V. Ames Fund.
- OCLC:
- 704290642
- Access Restriction:
- Restricted for use by site license.
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