The Civil Rights Movement and Congress
For an overview, read “Exile, Migration, and the Struggle for Representation: 1901–1965” in Black Americans in Congress to learn more about civil rights in the second half of the 20th century. This essay explores the many contradictory experiences of Black Americans on and off Capitol Hill during the first six decades of the twentieth century, a period marked by migration and the struggle to overcome political exclusion.
Revolution
Document: March on Washington Pamphlet
This pamphlet was distributed in advance of the 1963 March on Washington and provided logistical and ideological information to marchers. This copy of the pamphlet ended up in the records of the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), which monitored the actions of and participants in the civil rights movement.
Oral History: Representative John Lewis Recounts Bloody Sunday
On Sunday, March 7, 1965, John R. Lewis led hundreds of marchers across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama, to oppose voting restrictions against African Americans in the South. When the peaceful protestors refused to disperse, state troopers advanced on foot and on horse, brutally assaulting the crowd using tear gas and batons. Lewis suffered violent blows to the head from a trooper. Congress’ swift but overdue legislative response to what became known as “Bloody Sunday” produced the landmark Voting Rights Act of 1965. Lewis recounts the event in his oral history interview.
Blog: The Fight for Fair Housing in the House: A “Long, Tortuous and Difficult Road”
Between 1966 and 1968, President Lyndon B. Johnson’s new housing measure—known as the Fair Housing Act—traveled what he called a “long, tortuous and difficult road,” exposing the limits of his Great Society agenda and forcing Congress to consider more expansive civil rights protections.
About this object In January 1967, legendary civil rights leader and Congressman Adam Clayton Powell, Jr., issued this recording as a retort to his House colleagues, who stripped him of his committee chairmanship that month following a series of legal problems. The former preacher used call-and-response oratory and a full choir to take jibes at the House and exhort African-American voters to guard their political and economic freedom closely.
People: Adam Clayton Powell of New York
An unapologetic activist, Adam Clayton Powell Jr. of New York left his mark on Congress during his 12 terms in the U.S. House of Representatives. Powell earned the support of many African Americans in his Harlem district and across the nation for his legislative battles against racial discrimination. Never one to shun the spotlight, the New York minister and politician relished his position as a spokesperson for the advancement of African-American civil and political rights. Powell fought tirelessly to pass civil rights legislation and harness the power of the federal government to combat segregation. Speaking in Chicago in 1965, Powell reflected on his position in the House, where he had become chair of the Committee on Education and Labor with jurisdiction over legislation related to schools, job programs, and anti-poverty efforts. “This is legislative power. This is political power.” Powell insisted. “I use myself as an example because this is the audacious power I urge every black woman and man in this audience to seek.”
Highlight: John Lewis Testifies on the Need to Extend the Voting Rights Act
In 1975, future Georgia Representative John Lewis testified before the House Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Civil and Constitutional Rights in support of renewing the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
Reaction
Document: Telegram to Martin Luther King Jr.
House Judiciary Committee Chairman Emanuel Celler sent this telegram to Reverend Walter Fauntroy on March 18, 1965. Fauntroy later served as a Delegate in the House, representing the District of Columbia, but in 1965, he was director of the Washington bureau of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. In the telegram, Celler notified Fauntroy that he wanted Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr., to attend a hearing on civil rights before Subcommittee No. 5 on March 25, 1965. The subcommittee was holding hearings regarding H.R. 6400, the House’s version of the bill that became the Voting Rights Act.
Oral History: Ronald V. Dellums of California
A founding member of the Congressional Black Caucus, Ronald V. Dellums of California discusses the diversity within the civil rights movement in the Bay Area he came to represent.
Document: Discharge Petition for the Civil Rights Act of 1964
In December 1963, Judiciary Committee Chairman Emanuel Celler used this discharge petition to attempt to force H.R. 7152, known as the Civil Rights Act of 1964, to the House Floor for consideration.
About this object New York Representative Shirley Chisholm became the first Black woman to run for a major political party nomination for president in 1972.
Document: Letter Opposing Voting Rights
In this 1965 letter, Charles Geiser criticizes Representative Emanuel Celler’s support of H.R. 6400, a measure designed to uphold the right to vote regardless of race or color. The legislation also abolished the literacy test requirement that had been imposed by many jurisdictions as a way to deny African Americans the right to vote.
People: Shirley Chisholm of New York
A new Brooklyn congressional district with a slight Black majority and a large Puerto Rican population out of her New York neighborhood—convinced Shirley Chisholm to run for Congress. The influential Democratic political machine declared its intention to send an African-American candidate from the new district to the House. Chisholm received the support of community organizers with whom she had worked for more than a decade. Chisholm roamed the new district in a sound truck that pulled up outside housing projects while she announced: “Ladies and Gentlemen . . . this is fighting Shirley Chisholm coming through.” Chisholm capitalized on her personal campaign style. “I have a way of talking that does something to people,” she noted. “I have a theory about campaigning. You have to let them feel you.”
Oral History: G.K. Butterfield Jr. of North Carolina
In his oral history, North Carolina Representative G.K. Butterfield Jr. reflects on how his father's activism aligned with passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and inspired him to participate in civil rights demonstrations.
Reform
Highlight: The Civil Rights Act of 1957
Propelled by advocacy groups like the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, as well as the Dwight D. Eisenhower administration, Congress took up the issue of civil rights in sweeping legislation for the first time since 1875.
About this record Longtime House Reading Clerk Joe Bartlett read from this call book and made appropriate notations as each vote was cast on the bill which became the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
Highlight: The Civil Rights Act of 1964
With momentum building for congressional action on the issue of civil rights, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Emanuel Celler of New York and Ranking Member William McCulloch of Ohio led a bipartisan coalition to shepherd landmark legislation through the House. On July 2, 1964, the House passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and President Johnson signed it into law hours later.
Highlight: The Voting Rights Act of 1965
Bloody protests in Selma, Alabama, where local law enforcement viciously attacked marchers encouraging African-American voter registration, outraged public opinion and built support for new legislation. In response, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 suspended voter qualification devices, such as literacy tests and poll taxes, permitted the Justice Department to dispatch federal examiners into regions where voter registration lagged, and required the U.S. Attorney General to clear all new state and county voting practices.
Blog: "I'm Not Going to Waste It"
From February 1959 to June 1961, James Johnson attended the Capitol Page School, a one-of-a-kind learning environment for high schoolers working for the House, Senate, and Supreme Court. Johnson was one of the first African-American students admitted to the school.
Blog: The Fight for Fair Housing in the House: “To Guarantee a Basic American Right”
On April 5, 1968, President Lyndon B. Johnson sent a letter to Speaker John W. McCormack of Massachusetts concerning a pending legislative package that outlawed discrimination in the sale or rental of housing nationwide. For years, the Johnson administration had been waging what it called a “War on Poverty” as part of the President’s Great Society agenda. Johnson reminded McCormack that fair housing legislation, one of his key promises designed “to guarantee a basic American right,” had long been obstructed in Congress. But only a day earlier, the fair housing proposal took on sudden urgency on Capitol Hill.