Background Essay: Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights Scrapbook

During the 1950s and early 1960s, Birmingham, Alabama was one of the largest and richest cities in the South. It was also one of the most segregated. African Americans were banned from using city parks, playgrounds, and golf courses; they were refused service at lunch counters and were relegated to using "colored" water fountains and bathrooms; they were forced to sit in the back of buses, even after bus segregation was ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court; and black children were prohibited from attending the same schools as white children. Its police department enforced the status quo by condoning police brutality and refusing to investigate acts of violence against African Americans. In fact, the city was nicknamed "Bombingham", following numerous bombings of black neighborhoods.

White state officials banned the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), a powerful civil rights organization, for its supportive role in the Montgomery Bus Boycott of 1955-1956. To fill the void, the Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth helped organize the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights (ACMHR) in Birmingham, Alabama. Said Shuttlesworth, "They can outlaw an organization, but they cannot outlaw the movement of a people determined to be free." While the group's religious and civil rights values overlapped, the name -- with the cross as its symbol -- was strategically chosen.

The ACMHR organized demonstrations and boycotts to protest segregation in Birmingham's schools and businesses. The group also challenged segregation laws by openly defying them and by filing lawsuits to overturn them. In the first three years of ACMHR activity, the group was under constant attack and won no victories. The attacks included harassment of those attending meetings, arrests on buses, and adverse rulings in court cases. Shuttlesworth in particular was targeted by the Birmingham police and the Ku Klux Klan. On Christmas night, 1956, Shuttlesworth's home and church were bombed in response to his continued efforts to end segregation.

In 1957, Shuttlesworth worked with Martin Luther King Jr. to form the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. By 1959, some changes had started to take place. Federal courts ordered the desegregation of Birmingham's city buses. Immediately 25 members of the ACMHR rode the buses to test compliance, and none were arrested. In 1961, Shuttlesworth won a lawsuit to desegregate the city's 67 parks, but Public Safety Commissioner Eugene "Bull" Connor retaliated by closing the parks. In 1962, the ACMHR worked with student activists who picketed and boycotted downtown stores that discriminated against African Americans. And in 1963, the ACMHR paved the way for King and the SCLC's famous Birmingham campaign that led up to the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, and ultimately, the desegregation of Birmingham.