Social Welfare History Project Civil Rights

Colored Conventions Movement

From Colored Conventions Project, 2022. Starting in 1830 and continuing until well after the Civil War, free, freed and self-emancipated Blacks came together in state and national political conventions. Tens of thousands of Black men and women from different walks of life traveled to attend meetings publicly advertised as “Colored Conventions.” where they strategized about how they might achieve educational, labor, and legal justice.

Fellowship of Reconciliation USA

The Fellowship of Reconciliation USA (FOR-USA) was founded in 1915 by pacifists opposed to U.S. entry into World War I. Open to men, women, and people of all classes and races, its membership would include Jane Addams, Bishop Paul Jones, Grace Hutchins, A. J. Muste, and Bayard Rustin.

Segregation. Color Pattern from the Past–Our Struggle to Wipe it Out. Survey Graphic, January 1947

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Music & Social Reform

Written by Catherine A. Paul. “Throughout the history of the United States, music has been used to bring people together. By singing together, people are able to form emotional bonds and even shape behavior…Therefore, it is unsurprising that social movements have similarly interwoven music and action to create and sustain commitment to causes and collective activities.”

Disability Rights & Universal Design

Disability rights originated in Boston, Massachusetts in 1846 with Samuel Gridley Howe. Howe was an advocate for education of the blind, and a supporter of the “feeble-minded.”

The March (1963) Film

The March (1963) Film Directed by James Blue. Introduction by Carl Rowan. Courtesy of the National Archives (National Archives Identifier 47526) Note: The audio from 23:13 to 29:44 in this film has been redacted due to a copyright restriction by Dr. King’s family. In 2008, The Motion Picture Preservation Lab completed a full digital restoration of James…

Shuttlesworth, Rev. Fred

As Birmingham goes, so goes the nation. That belief was the driving force behind Shuttlesworth’s crusade for equality. “He was the soul and heart of the Birmingham movement,” Georgia Rep. John Lewis said. It was Birmingham, he said, that brought the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

“Fred Shuttlesworth had the vision, the determination never to give up, never to give in,” Lewis said. “He led an unbelievable children’s crusade. It was the children who faced dogs, fire hoses, police billy clubs that moved and shook the nation.”

Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC)

SCLC is a now a nation wide organization made up of chapters and affiliates with programs that affect the lives of all Americans: north, south, east and west. Its sphere of influence and interests has become international in scope because the human rights movement transcends national boundaries.

The Women Who Went to the Field – A Poem

The Women Who Went to the Field Editor’s Note: Clara Barton (founder of the American Red Cross) wrote the following poem as a toast to women who served in the Civil War. It was first presented at a gala dinner held in 1892 by the Woman’s Relief Corps and was later printed in many…

Villard, Oswald Garrison

Oswald Garrison Villard (1872 – 1942): Civil Rights Activist and Editor of the The Nation and the New York Evening Post Oswald Garrison Villard (1872–1949) was an American journalist, pacifist, and civil rights advocate. The son of railroad tycoon Henry Villard and and suffragist Fanny Villard (the daughter of abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison) and…