Civil Rights Leaders
Visit Our Photo Gallery
Rate Our Site!
Visit our Sponsor!
Take our Survey!
NATIONAL ASSOCIATION for the ADVANCEMENT of COLORED PEOPLE
The National Association for the Advancement of
Colored People NAACP was formed after a 1908 lynching of two blacks in
Springfield, Illinois led to a call by Mary Ovington, a white woman, for a
conference to discuss ways to achieve political, and social equality for blacks.
The conference led to the founding of the NAACP the following year.
In 1910, the organization was finally organized with Du Bois as the
director of publicity and research and the editor of CRISIS,
the official magazine of the NAACP. William Du Bois called together twenty-nine black people on the Canadian
side of Niagara Falls to avoid racial discrimination.
This was called the Niagara Falls Movement. Du Bois left his teaching job in Atlanta to become the
Director of Publications and Research for the NAACP.
Walter Francis White was another significant leader for the NAACP; leader
of investigating lynches for the group. By
1921, the organization had many major victories in the U.S. Supreme Court and it
had more than 350 branches.
One of the NAACP's most famous victories was the landmark 1954 U.S.
Supreme Court was the Brown vs. the Board of Education.
By employing the legal talents of William Hastie, Charles Horsten, and
Thurgood Marshall. Although the
fall impact of the landmark decision would not be felt for years to come, it was
still the most important civil rights court case in the twentieth century. The ruling reversed the racist "Separate but Equal"
doctrine established by the landmark 1896 Plessy vs. Ferguson supreme court
decision and laid the ground work for the future integration of the segregated
schools systems of the South.
William Du Bois called together 29 black people on the Canadian ride of
the Niagra movement. Du Bois left his teaching job in Atlanta to become the
Director of Publications and Research for the NAACP. Walter Francis White was
another big leader for the NAACP; leader of investigating lynches for the group.