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us . . . to do all in our power, by word and by deed, to increase the efficiency of our race, the enjoyment of its manhood rights, and the performance of its just duties."³

From long before his time until today, Black Americans have generally followed his prescription for action, pursuing civil rights, economic justice, entrance into the mainstream of American life.

In 1909, DuBois and others founded the NAACP, giving the movement an organized base. The NAACP was born in the black blood spilled in the race riot of Springfield, Illinois. The riot energized the founders of what would become the NAACP. It soon developed an aggressive strategy of litigation aimed at striking down racial restrictions enshrined in law, triumphing in 1954 with Brown v. Board of Education, ending segregation in public schools.

That decision effectively ended segregation's legality; it also gave a nonviolent army license to challenge segregation's morality as well.

From Brown in 1954 forward, the movement expanded its targets, tactics and techniques. Organizations and leadership expanded as well.

The 1955 - 1956 Montgomery Bus Boycott introduced a new leader, Martin Luther King, Jr., and he articulated a new method - nonviolent resistance - of fighting segregation.

The new method required mass participation. Reliance on slower appeals to courts began to subside.

A student-led movement emerged in 1960, aiming at segregated lunch counters, drawing inspiration from Montgomery's methods. In 1961, the movement put nonviolence on wheels with the Freedom Rides, testing segregation at bus terminals across the South. They mounted voter registration campaigns in the deepest heart of the most resistant South.

In this period, gains were won at lunch counters and movie theaters, bus stations and polling places, and the fabric of legal segregation came undone.