ad received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964 for his leadership role in the movement, was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee in 1968. Race riots erupted in the following week in 125 cities, as black America’s most effective leader was gone. Congress passed the Fair Housing Act, banning racial discrimination in most housing, six days after King’s assassination. This bill corrected the housing discrimination that persisted from the New Deal’s housing programs. However, with its leader gone and unity no longer evident, the civil rights movement’s national thrust faded. The movement had altered the fundamental relationship between state and federal governments and compelled the federal courts to more effectively protect constitutional civil liberties. The federal role in civil rights issues begun in the 1930s was further expanded. Many others soon benefited from the movement’s gains in social justice, including women, the disabled, and other victims of discrimination who had little voice in the 1930s.
Will Alexander (1884-1956)
A white Methodist minister in Tennessee, Alexander became increasingly concerned with rural black poverty. He left the ministry to become executive director of the Commission on Interracial Cooperation in 1919. He then became president of Dillard University in New Orleans in 1930. In 1935 Alexander was appointed assistant administrator of the New Deal’s Resettlement Administration to give aid to poor farmers. When the agency became part of the new Farm Security Administration, Roosevelt appointed Alexander to lead the new agency. Alexander left the agency in 1940.
Marian Anderson (1897-1993)
Anderson was a world famous black American contralto singer. In 1925, early in her career, she appeared with the New York Philharmonic orchestra. Anderson traveled throughout Europe in the early 1930s, earning great praise for her performances. She became recognized as one of the world’s top opera singers. In 1935 she returned to the United States to perform at Carnegie Hall in New York City. In March of 1939, the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) refused to allow Anderson to give a concert in a private hall in Washington, DC. In reaction, Eleanor Roosevelt, along with others, resigned from the organization.
They had federal officials arrange for Anderson to give a free concert on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial on Easter Sunday instead. The denial of Anderson to perform at the private hall triggered a major reaction against racism in the nation. Tens of thousands of letters and telegrams were sent to DAR offices in protest. An estimated crowd of over 75,000 attended the outdoor event. According to a nationwide Gallup poll, Eleanor’s resignation from DAR received a 67 percent approval from the public.
Given that a decade earlier blacks had been roped off across the road at the dedication of the memorial, the integrated concert crowd reflected a major change in public attitudes through the 1930s. In 1955 Anderson became the first black to perform at New York’s Metropolitan Opera. In 1958 President Dwight D. Eisenhower (served 1953-1961) named her as a delegate to the United Nations General Assembly. President Lyndon B. Johnson (served 1963-1969) awarded Anderson the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1963, and she received a Grammy music award for Lifetime Achievement in 1991.
William H. Hastie (1904-1976)
Hastie earned a law degree from Harvard University and taught at Howard University in Washington, DC. He worked on many NAACP legal cases. Roosevelt appointed Hastie to a lawyer position in the Interior Department, and he became part of Roosevelt’s “Black Cabinet.” In 1937 Roosevelt appointed Hastie the first black federal judge in American history, as district court judge in the Virgin Islands. In 1939 he returned to Howard University as law school dean. During World War II he served as a civilian aide to the secretary of war. In 1946 President Harry Truman (served 1945-1953) appointed Hastie governor of the Virgin Islands, and in 1949 he was appointed judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals.
Harold Ickes (1874