Civil Rights: Government or people?
The rights of citizens to political and social freedom and equality, what does that mean to us? It should mean everything. The Civil Rights were created in the place of discrimination against blacks. They earned their rights to personal liberty. Many U.S. citizens seemed to be very concerned with the idea itself, but, not in a negative way. Citizens from all over the country addressed Congressman Harold Johnson on this specific subject. I read an extensive amount of letters concerning the Civil Rights movement and many surprised me. Although we want to believe that back then everyone was associated with racism towards people of different color, there were quite a few, in fact many that were routing for these law to be passed.
The letter I have posted above was written by a fifteen-year-old high school student. This letter although not completely nostalgic, still had somewhat of a sentimental feel to it. This young girl writes in behalf of her colored peers expressing that she believes they cause no trouble and are all like us. She goes as far as explaining how when they first came to the U.S. we used them as slaves. It warms my heart immensely because we wanted to believe that many people were just racist but in reality there were many warm and pure hearts out there that felt the need to take a stand to this. Although no one really knew what the Civil Rights Act was going to say or do to help anyone they were all for it. Equality has always been a big thing in this country, The land of the free and the home of the brave right?
This letter warms my heart because it proves how many people were truly concerned with the way equality was working in the country. Even this young student that many may want to believe is still an age of “incompetence” speaks out. As I read these many letters from all types of people, I started to understand that as a country the citizens of the U.S. were united together without the encouragement of any government or anything else. I read in one letter from a mother of three children that she believed she raised her children to be kind to everyone no matter the color of their skin. The things they experienced through the government, on the television and all over the news exposed them to the prejudice people and ideas of this country. This was kind of hard to think about because although she has a point, the government does represent us as a whole and the things we believe.
There were many events leading up to the act. Maybe these events influenced the way many people thought. Or maybe some people already thought a certain way about the equality among us all but in the end it really didnt matter because there were people willing to stand up and fight for equality and fight for what this country was founded on. Trust, freedom, and bravery.
