The Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s shows a strong parallel to the years of Apartheid in South Africa. In both cases, Blacks in the United States and Blacks in South Africa were being discriminated against simply because of the color of their skin.
In the last decade of the nineteenth century in the United States, racially discriminatory laws and racial violence aimed at African Americans and other minority groups began to flourish and expand. Elected, appointed, or hired government authorities began to require or permit discrimination. There were a number of acts that were permitted that discriminated against African Americans. Segregation was upheld by the United States Supreme Court in the case of, Plessy v. Ferguson. In 1896, legally mandated by Southern states and nationwide at the local level of government, voter suppression or disfranchisement in the southern states, denial of economic opportunity or resources nationwide, and private acts of violence and mass racial violence aimed at African Americans, were unhindered or encouraged by government authorities. Although racial discrimination was present nationwide, the combination of law, public and private acts of discrimination, marginal economic opportunity, and violence directed toward African Americans in the southern states became known as Jim Crow laws or acts.
Peaceful protests against the discrimination of African Americans voting rights were demonstrated in Selma, Alabama in 1965 and led by Martin Luther King, Jr. Brutality erupted from the state police towards the peaceful protesters and Congress was awestruck. The Voting Rights Act of 1965 was the new civil rights bill that was used to combat such brutality. The new law guaranteed the right to vote with notations of severe penalties if anyone obstructed another citizen’s right to vote. The Voting Rights Act of 1965 is the most prominent