Gandhi And The Civil Rights Movement

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In 1963, Birmingham, Alabama, was one of the nuclei of American industry in the South, in addition to being the most segregated city in the United States of America. In the spring of the same year, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) launched one of the most important and influential campaigns of the Civil Rights Movement: the Birmingham Campaign, also known as Project C. This campaign was a nonviolent attempt to cease discrimination towards the African American population; however, the city responded violently to the manifestations by using police dogs and fire hoses against the pacifist activists. Nevertheless, the violence adopted by the white portion of the population resulted in a great win for the protesters: the creation …show more content…
Regardlessly of the work they did together, the two started off with completely opposite approaches to activism. In fact, during college, King thought that the only way to succeed in solving social problems was through an armed uprising and felt that the Christian ethic of love was only relevant in personal relationships. Notwithstanding, Gandhi and his philosophy of pacifism and nonviolence restored his faith and his belief in human nature. Gandhi was also an important figure for Rustin, who had been raised following his beliefs. In fact, in February 1949, Gandhi himself invited the African American Quaker to an international pacifist conference in India. Therefore, when they founded the SCLC they were both on the same mindset, which made them become an important and strong asset for the civil rights movement. Their hope was to create alliances and unite enough nonviolent protestors to change the system. They especially focused on poverty, racism and worker's rights. Being pacifist, the protesters never attacked anyone, but the violence they received helped them togain sympathy. The first episode of violence persuaded King to generate creative tension through direct-action tactics. Hence, nonviolence was probably used as a successful strategy to achieve their goal, rather than to stand for their …show more content…
Sit-ins are a tactic created in the 1960s by some students in Greensboro, North Carolina. They consisted in entering in "whites-only" premises and demanding for service and, when denied, sit down and wait patiently. This was a very common and important technique for the civil rights movement. The first sit-ins during Project C happened on February, lead by the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights (ACMHR) and the Southern Christian Leadership Council (SCLC) and were soon followed by many others during the following days. Other significant maneuvers for the Civil Rights Movement were boycotts and kneel-ins. Boycotts are the action of abstaining from purchasing or encouraging in any way a certain activity for protest, whereas kneel-ins were visits to white churches from black individuals. The aim of kneel-ins was to urge the worshipers and ministers to open their churches to African- American believers. All of these smaller acts of rebellion contributed to their win against segregation, yet were not the trigger of
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