1964: Freedom Summer

DHS US History II

In 1964 the number of registered African American voters had been gradually increasing. In most Southern States, about 50-70% of African American citizens were registered to vote on average. However, this number was drastically lower in Mississippi. Unfortunately, less than 7% of African Americans were registered to vote. This means that over 93% could not vote in any elections. This was due to the fact that registering to vote was an extremely discouraging process for African Americans within the state. Those who would register a black voter would be all-white, and most likely be judging the person attempting to register, and would be trying to make it extremely difficult to register. Civil rights activists were aware of this and had been attempting to change it, but their previous efforts were not doing much to change the numbers. Several groups had started to get frustrated with the fact that not much was changing. Groups such as the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, and many others wanted to bring the treatment of African Americans in Mississippi to national attention. The Freedom Summer of 1964 was the result. The main goal of the Freedom Summer was to register as many African Americans to vote as possible. White citizens, along with some African Americans, traveled to Mississippi from the north to help. All of these people were civil rights activists and while they were registering people, they were trying to combat discrimination towards blacks, particularly in the South. There was a lot of support from the black community, but not everyone agreed with what they were doing. In particular, the Ku Klux Klan was prominent in the state and were very vocal about their negative feelings about the freedom summer. The Klan was not only trying to attack African Americans trying to register, but any white people trying to help them as well. That summer Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner, two white men, and James Chaney, a black man, were all helping register voters. One night, the three were arrested and only jailed for a few hours. When they were released that night, they were released into the hands of some Klan members who assaulted and killed them. The FBI tried to convict men who had connection to the crime, but the final verdict was 18 men arrested, and seven charged with federal charged. There were some negative responses from the Freedom Summer, but overall it had a fairly positive response. That year the Civil Rights Act passed and the following year the Voting Rights Act passed. The passing of these acts was in part due to the fact that the country as a whole gained a lot of awareness from the Freedom Summer.