Blistering Civil Rights Decade

Gren Whitman • November 8, 2022

As the movement for African American equality and freedom unfolded from the mid-1950s into the tumultuous ‘60s, the civil rights movement became unstoppable. From school desegregation to public accommodations to voting rights, Black-led organizations mobilized Americans of all races by the millions to their cause. To a large degree, the crusade succeeded. Here is a brief recollection of that momentous period.

1954

The Supreme Court’s majestic ruling in Brown v. Topeka Board of Education heralded a tectonic shift in the United States. “Separate educational facilities are inherently unequal,” thundered the Court in May. Those six words were the pinnacle of Associate Justice Thurgood Marshall’s lifetime legal battles for racial equality and inclusion. From this moment on, every American knew — to our bones — that racial segregation was dead. The only questions were how long Jim Crow’s funeral would last and how much would it cost.

1955

In August, Emmett Till was murdered in Money, Miss., after the 14-year-old Black youngster from Chicago allegedly whistled at a White woman. Days later, he was pulled from the Tallahatchie River, unrecognizable, bloated, and bound in barbed wire. For his funeral, Till’s mother, Mamie, insisted on an open coffin. Jet magazine published the hideous photos. Till’s two killers were quickly acquitted and written up in Look. Mamie Till said, “Two months ago, I had a nice apartment in Chicago. I had a good job. I had a son. When something happened to the Negroes in the South, I said, ‘that’s their business, not mine.’ Now I know how wrong I was. The murder of my son has shown me what happens to any of us, anywhere in the world, had better be the business of us all.”

In December, Black seamstress Rosa Parks refused to move to the back of the bus in Montgomery, Ala. She later reflected, “The bus was among the first ways I realized there was a Black world and a White world.” She was arrested; the Montgomery Improvement Association was quickly founded; it declared a boycott against the segregated city buses; and at 26, the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., found himself its leader. Solidarity seized the Black community; everyone walked or car-pooled for the next 13 months. The boycott ended when the Supreme Court overruled the bus company’s segregation policy.

1957

After Brown v. Board, President Eisenhower said, “The Supreme Court has spoken, and I am sworn to uphold the constitutional process in the country. And I will obey.” His commitment was tested that September as he found himself compelled to order 101st Airborne troops into Little Rock, Ark., to protect nine Black seniors integrating Central High. The inexorable process of integrating schools across the South was underway.

1960

Demanding equal access to public accommodations and using a labor union tactic, the sit-in movement began quietly on February 1 at the Woolworth’s department store in downtown Greensboro, N.C. Four Black freshmen at North Carolina A&T State University — Joseph McNeil, Franklin McCain, Ezell Blair Jr., and David Richmond — had a simple plan: Ask to be served at the lunch counter and when refused, instead of leaving, just remain sitting. In the next few weeks, the sit-in movement exploded across the South, involving mostly college and high school students. The Greensboro Woolworth’s is now a civil rights museum.

The Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee was formed by Dr. King’s Southern Christian Leadership Conference. Young, brash SNCC militants prodded not only King’s group, but the NAACP and the Congress of Racial Equality as well. The nation was hearing daily about the “big four” civil rights leaders, Roy Wilkins (NAACP), James Farmer (CORE), Dr. King (SCLC), and John Lewis (SNCC).

1961

Segregation on interstate buses in the upper South had been challenged by freedom rides during the 1940s, but on May 4, CORE launched freedom rides into the Deep South. The goal was clear: eliminate racial segregation on interstate buses. A Greyhound with Farmer and Lewis on board departed Washington D.C., bound for New Orleans. Freedom rides quickly involved hundreds of riders. Serious violence erupted in several states, notably in Alabama and Mississippi. After 50-some rides and painful stretches in prison for protesters in Mississippi’s infamous Parchman Farm, the Interstate Commerce Commission ordered that all interstate buses be desegregated. By year’s end, the rides ended.

1962

James H. Meredith enrolled at the University of Mississippi in the fall and violence erupted on the Ole Miss campus. White students battled federal marshals and National Guard and federal troops. Two civilians were killed. Meredith graduated in 1963 with a degree in political science.

1963

In Birmingham, Ala., Public Safety Commissioner Bull Connor’s police, dogs, and firehoses couldn’t suppress schoolchildren courageously filling the city’s jails. Dr. King wrote “Letter from the Birmingham Jail.” The March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, attended by 250,000, was organized and orchestrated by Bayard Rustin and marked for the ages by Dr. King’s “I Have a Dream” speech. Four schoolgirls — Addie Mae Collins, Cynthia Wesley, Carole Robertson, and Carol McNair — were martyred when Birmingham’s 16th Street Baptist Church was bombed. NAACP leader Medgar Evers was assassinated in Jackson, Miss. On Maryland’s Eastern Shore, after militant demonstrations shifted away from non-violence, Cambridge was under martial law and occupied by National Guard troops. Local leader Gloria Richardson’s tenacious refusal to compromise resulted in a signed agreement with Attorney General Robert Kennedy regarding schools, housing, and a human rights committee in Dorchester County.

1964

The Magnolia State took center stage as SNCC and CORE invited 800 volunteers — mostly college-age Whites — into Mississippi for “Freedom Summer.” They were there to help Black citizens register to vote and to set up schools for youngsters. Three rights workers were murdered in Neshoba County, and the hard-core state became the focus of national attention. In July, Congress passed, and President Johnson signed, the 1964 Civil Rights Act, the first major civil rights legislation since the women’s suffrage amendment in 1920. At summer’s end, Black delegates to the Democratic Party’s national convention challenged Mississippi’s all-White delegation in Atlantic City. Sunflower County’s Fannie Lou Hamer announced, “I’m sick and tired of being sick and tired.”

1965

It was Selma’s turn on “Bloody Sunday,” March 7, as Alabama state troopers savagely beat voting rights marchers at the Edmund Pettus bridge. A mass protest march from Selma to Montgomery was quickly organized, and when it ended a week later at the state capitol, President Johnson was ready to sign the Voting Rights Act, the decade’s book end to the Brown ruling.

So, segregation by law was eliminated in American public life. And so, African Americans could vote and hold elective offices. Waiting in the wings, however, were critical items of unfinished business: endemic economic inequality; pervasive, unremitting racism; red-lined and segregated communities; food deserts; mass incarcerations; police brutality; weakened labor unions; women’s rights; LGBTQ rights; the rights of the disabled; Native American, Latino, Asian rights — the list remains long.

Sections of the Voting Rights Act have been invalidated by Supreme Court conservatives. A woman’s right to choose has been rescinded. Minorities everywhere continue to struggle in a nation that seems to be less tolerant, less caring, less ready to help. If people of faith and conscience once fought to move forward, now it seems they’re being forced to fight against moving backward. And that funeral for Jim Crow? It’s still not over, and costs us dearly every day!

Bibliography:

SNCC: The New Abolitionists, by Howard Zinn

Walking With the Wind, by John Lewis

Why We Can’t Wait, by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Civil War on Race Street, by Peter Levy

Freedom Summer, by Doug McAdam

Parting the Waters; Pillar of Fire; At Canaan’s Edge, by Taylor Branch

Waging A Good War, by Thomas E. Hicks

As a community organizer, journalist, administrator, project planner/manager, and consultant, Gren Whitman has led neighborhood, umbrella, public interest, and political committees and groups, and worked for civil rights and anti-war organizations.

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Common Sense for the Eastern Shore

“Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to be free”

By John Christie • February 17, 2026

These are the words from Emma Lazarus’ famous 1883 sonnet “The New Colossus” inscribed on a bronze plaque on the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty. In 1990, Congress reaffirmed this vision of America by establishing the Temporary Protected Status program. TPS is designed to provide humanitarian relief to foreign nationals in the United States who come from disaster-stricken countries. In its present form, the TPS legislation gives the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security responsibility for the program. However, the legislation prescribes the kind of country conditions severe enough to warrant a designation under the statute, the specific time frame for any such designation, and the process for periodic review of a TPS designation which could culminate in termination or extension. All initial TPS designations last from six to eighteen months. Before the expiration of a designation, the statute mandates that the Secretary shall review the conditions in the foreign state to decide if the conditions for the designation continue to be met, following consultation with appropriate agencies of the government. Extension is the default; the designation “shall be extended” unless the secretary affirmatively determines that conditions are “no longer met.” ------------------------------------------------------------- A massive earthquake devastated Haiti in January 2010, and precipitated an unprecedented humanitarian crisis. Shortly after, then-DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano, after consultation with the State Department, designated Haiti for TPS due to “extraordinary conditions.” Haitian nationals in the United States continuously as of January 12, 2010, could thus apply for TPS, and obtained the right to remain and work in the U.S. while Haiti maintained its TPS designation. Napolitano set the initial TPS designation for 18 months. As Haiti’s deterioration worsened, successive DHS secretaries have extended this program. Gang violence and kidnappings have spiked. In 2021, a group of assailants killed Haiti’s then-President Jovenel Moïse. In 2023, another catastrophic earthquake hit Haiti. In 2024, in response to these conditions, then-DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas once again extended and redesignated Haiti for TPS, this time effective through February 3, 2026. During the 2024 election cycle, the GOP candidate, Donald Trump clearly indicated that time had not tempered his views on Haiti, characterized by him as a “shithole country” during his first term. He stated that when elected, he would “absolutely revoke” Haiti’s TPS designation and send “them back to their country.” On December 1, 2025, Kristi Noem, DHS secretary in the second Trump administration, announced, “I just met with the president. I am recommending a full travel ban on every damn country that’s been flooding our nation with killers, leeches, and entitlement junkies. Our forefathers built this nation on blood, sweat, and the unyielding love of freedom, not for foreign invaders to slaughter our heroes, suck dry our hard-earned tax dollars, or snatch the benefits owned to Americans. We don’t want them, not one.” So says the official responsible for overseeing the TPS program. And one of those (her word) “damn” countries is Haiti. Three days before making the above post, Secretary Noem announced she would terminate Haiti’s TPS designation as of February 3, 2026. Five Haitian TPS holders filed suit in federal court in Washington initially seeking an injunction against the termination of the Haitian TPS program pending the completion of the litigation. These plaintiff TPS holders are not “killers, leeches, or entitlement junkies.” They are instead a neuroscientist researching Alzheimer’s disease, a software engineer at a national bank, a laboratory assistant in a toxicology department, a college economics major, and a full-time registered nurse. The case was assigned to district court judge Ana Reyes who granted the plaintiffs’ injunction request on February 2, 2026, by way of an 83-page opinion. The plaintiffs charge that Secretary Noem preordained her termination decision because of hostility to non-white immigrants. According to Judge Reyes, “This seems substantially likely. Secretary Noem has terminated every TPS country designation to have reached her desk — twelve countries up, twelve countries down.” Judge Reyes also decided that Noem’s conclusion that Haiti (a majority non-white country) faces only “merely concerning” conditions cannot be squared with the “perfect storm” of “suffering and staggering” humanitarian toll described in page after page of the record in the case. In Judge Reyes’ view, Noem also ignored Congress’s requirement that she review the conditions in Haiti “after consulting with appropriate agencies.” Indeed, the record indicates she did not consult other agencies at all. Her “national interest” analysis focuses on Haitians outside the United States or here illegally, ignoring that Haitian TPS holders already live here and legally so. And though Noem states that the analysis must include “economic considerations,” Judge Reyes concluded Noem ignored altogether the billions that Haitian TPS holders contribute to the economy. The administration’s primary response in the litigation has been to assert that the TPS statute gives Secretary Noem “unbounded” discretion to make whatever determination she wants, any way she wants. Yes, Judge Reyes acknowledges, the statute does grant Noem some discretion. But, in Judge Reyes’ opinion, “not unbounded discretion.” To the contrary, Congress passed the TPS statute to standardize the then ad hoc temporary protection system; in Judge Reyes’ words, "to replace executive whim with statutory predictability.” The administration also argued that the harms to Haitian TPS holders were “speculative” if they are forced to return to Haiti. Because the State Department presently warns, “Do not travel to Haiti for any reason,” the administration asserts that harm is “speculative” only because DHS “might not” remove them. However, according to Judge Reyes, this argument fails to take Secretary Noem at her word: “We don’t want them. Not one.” The public interest also favors the injunction, in the opinion of Judge Reyes. Secretary Noem complains of the strains that unlawful immigrants place on our immigration-enforcement system. Noem’s answer is to turn 352,959 lawful TPS Haitian immigrants into unlawful immigrants overnight. Noem complains of strains to our economy; her answer is to turn employed lawful immigrants who contribute billions in taxes into the legally unemployable. Noem complains of strains to our health care system. Noem’s answer is to turn the insured into the uninsured. “This approach is many things – but the public interest is not one of them,” according to Judge Reyes. The opinion of Judge Reyes concludes: “Kristi Noem has a First Amendment right to call immigrants killers, leeches, entitlement junkies, and any other inapt name she wants. Secretary Noem, however, is constrained by both our Constitution and the law to apply faithfully the facts to the law in implementing the TPS program. The record to-date shows she has yet to do that. The administration has already appealed. John Christie was for many years a senior partner in a large Washington, D.C. law firm. He specialized in anti-trust litigation and developed a keen interest in the U.S. Supreme Court about which he lectures and writes.

Gov. Moore Signs Legislation to Prohibit Md. Jurisdictions from Deputizing Officers for Federal Civil Immigration Enforcement

By Office of the Governor • February 16, 2026

Gov. Wes Moore signed legislation on February 17, 2026, to prohibit State and local jurisdictions from deputizing officers for federal civil immigration enforcement activity. The law, created under SB 245/HB 444 , is effective immediately. “In Maryland, we defend Constitutional rights and Constitutional policing — and we will not allow untrained, unqualified, and unaccountable ICE agents to deputize our law enforcement officers,” Moore said. “This bill draws a clear line: we will continue to work with federal partners to hold violent offenders accountable, but we refuse to blur the lines between state and federal authority in ways that undermine the trust between law enforcement and the communities they serve. Maryland is a community of immigrants, and that's one of our greatest strengths because this country is incomplete without each and every one of us.” “As an immigrant, this bill is deeply personal to me,” said Lt. Gov. Aruna Miller. “Immigrants make Maryland stronger every day, and our communities are safer when everyone feels protected and valued. This legislation ensures that our law enforcement resources remain focused on keeping Marylanders safe, not on actions that create fear in our neighborhoods. I thank the bill sponsors and Governor Moore for their leadership in ensuring Maryland remains a place where dignity and opportunity go hand in hand.” U.S. Department of Homeland Security Immigration and Customs Enforcement, also known as ICE, established its 287(g) program to authorize local law enforcement officials to perform federal civil immigration enforcement functions under ICE’s oversight. Under SB 245/HB 444, State and local jurisdictions in Maryland are prohibited from engaging in such agreements. Any local jurisdictions with standing 287(g) agreements must terminate them immediately. The legislation does not: Authorize the release of criminals Impact State policies and practices in response to immigration detainers that are issued by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security Prevent the State or local jurisdictions from continuing to work with the federal government on shared public safety priorities, including the removal of violent criminals who pose a risk to public safety Prevent State or local jurisdictions from continuing to notify ICE about the impending release of an individual of interest from custody or from coordinating the safe transfer of custody within constitutional limits State and local law enforcement will also maintain the ability to work with the federal government on criminal investigations and joint task forces unrelated to civil immigration enforcement. Any individual who is charged with a crime is entitled to due process and, if convicted, must serve their sentence.

Farmers Now Owe a Lot More for Health Insurance

By Sarah Boden and Drew Hawkins, Gulf States Newsroom • February 16, 2026

And now, the enhanced Affordable Care Act subsidies that many Americans, including farmers, relied on to purchase health insurance are gone, having expired at the end of December.

It’s Not Your Grandfather’s Department of Justice

By John Christie • December 16, 2025

When I practiced law, much of my litigation involved issues arising under federal antitrust laws. The Department of Justice (DOJ) was my frequent adversary in court. In some cases, DOJ challenged a client’s conduct as anticompetitive. In others, they claimed an intended client merger would create a monopoly. Some of these DOJ court battles were won, others were not. Overall, I had great respect for DOJ lawyers. They were professional, well prepared, and dedicated to their mission of seeing justice done. They were courteous, honest, and forthright with the courts before which we argued our cases. In those days, without resorting to social media or press conferences, the DOJ spoke entirely through its court filings. Although as an advocate I took issue with various DOJ investigatory decisions as well as decisions to initiate litigation, I never thought politics was involved. Post-Watergate internal rules strictly limited communication with any figures at the White House. Not so, it seems, anymore. Beginning last January 20, all of this changed rapidly and spectacularly . On March 14, Trump triumphantly arrived at the main DOJ building in D.C. to be welcomed by a group of carefully selected VIPs. He was greeted by Pam Bondi, his chosen new attorney general, who exclaimed, “We are so proud to work at the directive (sic) of Donald Trump.” Bondi’s boast that the DOJ now worked at the president’s behest was something never said before and, in effect, surrendered the department’s long and proud independence. And Bondi’s comment was not an empty gesture. As chronicled by reporters Carol Leonnig and Aaron Davis in their new book, Injustice: How Politics and Fear Vanquished America’s Justice Department , within hours of being sworn in, Trump and his lieutenants began punishing those at the Justice Department who had investigated him or those he considered his political enemies. Career attorneys with years of experience under many administrations were fired or reassigned to lesser work, or they resigned. As Leonnig and Davis report, what followed was “the wholesale overthrow of the Justice Department as Trump insert[ed] his dutiful former defense attorneys and 2020 election deniers atop the department.” [Source: Injustice , p. xix.] In the place of years of experience, the new team appears credentialed simply by loyalty to the president’s causes. The DOJ’s conduct in court has since caused damage to judicial and public faith in the integrity and competence of the department. Just Security is an independent, non-partisan, daily digital law and policy journal housed in the Reiss Center on Law and Security at the New York University School of Law. Since January 20, it has documented federal judicial concerns about DOJ conduct. In 26 cases, judges raised questions about DOJ non-compliance with judicial orders and in more than 60 cases, judges expressed distrust of government-provided information and representations. This count was taken the day after a federal court dismissed the DOJ cases against former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James. [Source: Just Security , “The ‘Presumption of Regularity’ in Trump Administration Litigation,” Nov. 20, 2025.] As summarized by the Georgetown Law Center’s Steve Vladeck, “It’s one thing for the Department of Justice to so transparently pursue a politically motivated prosecution. But this one has been beset from the get-go with errors that remotely competent law students wouldn’t make. Indeed, it seems a virtual certainty that the Keystone Kops-like behavior of the relevant government lawyers can be traced directly to the political pressure to bring this case; there’s a reason why no prosecutors with more experience, competence, or integrity were willing to take it on.” [Source: One First , Nov. 24, 2025.] Rather than accept criticism and instead of trying to do better, Bondi’s DOJ and the Trump administration lash out in a fashion apparently aimed at demeaning the federal judiciary. At a recent Federalist Society’s National Lawyers Convention, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, one of Trump’s former defense attorneys, attributed the Trump administration’s myriad losses in the lower federal courts to “rogue activist judges.” He added, “There’s a group of judges that are repeat players, and that’s obviously not by happenstance, that’s intentional, and it’s a war, man.” Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller decries each adverse ruling against the Trump administration as just part of a broader “judicial insurrection.” Not to be left behind, Trump himself regularly complains of “radical left lunatic” judges. In addition to the harm these comments inflict on the federal courts, their premise is simply not true. According to a survey by Vladeck, as of Nov. 14, there were 204 cases in which federal district courts have ruled on requests for preliminary relief against the Trump administration. In 154 of them, district judges granted either a temporary restraining order, a preliminary injunction, or both. Those 154 rulings came from 121 district judges appointed by seven presidents (including President Trump) in 29 district courts. In the 154 cases with rulings adverse to the Trump administration, 41 were presided over by 30 Republican-appointed judges, fully half of whom were appointed by President Trump. No, it is no longer your grandfather’s Department of Justice. John Christie was for many years a senior partner in a large Washington, D.C. law firm. He specialized in anti-trust litigation and developed a keen interest in the U.S. Supreme Court about which he lectures and writes.

Salisbury City Council Appoints Melissa Holland to Fill District 2 Seat

By CSES Staff • December 16, 2025

The Salisbury City Council has appointed longtime public servant Melissa D. Holland to fill the vacancy in District 2. Holland was selected on Dec. 1 after the council reviewed several applicants. A 27-year resident of Salisbury, Holland brings more than 20 years of experience in government, education, and administration. As executive assistant to the president of the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science, she currently oversees operations, budgeting, communications, and planning. Before joining UMCES, Holland worked for nearly 11 years with the Wicomico County Council, gaining extensive experience in legislative procedure, constituent services, research, and budget preparation. Her background includes positions with the Wicomico County Board of Education, the State of Maryland’s Holly Center, and multiple early-learning programs. Approved by a 3-1 council vote, Holland was selected based on her administrative expertise and long-standing community involvement. (Salisbury’s City Council is now comprised of only women.) She has a bachelor’s degree in legal studies from Post University and an associate degree from Wor-Wic Community College. She has also served as PTA president at East Salisbury Elementary and Wicomico Middle School. In her application, Holland emphasized her commitment to maintaining transparency in city government and ensuring that District 2 residents remain informed and represented. “I plan to be well-informed on the issues that matter to the citizens of Salisbury and to listen to their concerns carefully,” she wrote. “I want to make a positive and lasting impact on our city.” Holland’s appointment restores the City Council to full membership as it faces debates over budgeting, infrastructure planning, and local governance initiatives. She is expected to begin constituent outreach immediately and participate fully in the selection of the next council president.

Democrats Ambushed in Hurlock Election

By CSES Staff • November 4, 2025

Voters in Hurlock have delivered sweeping changes in this year’s municipal election, as Republican and GOP-aligned candidates won key races there. The results mark a setback for Democrats and a significant political shift in a community that has historically leaned Democratic in state and federal contests. The outcome underscores how local organizing and turnout strategies can have an outsized impact in small-town elections. Analysts also suggest that long-term party engagement in municipal contests could shape voter alignment in future county and state races. Political analysts warn that ignoring municipal elections and ceding them to the GOP could hurt the Maryland Democratic Party in statewide politics. Turnout increased by approximately 17% compared with the 2021 municipal election, reflecting heightened local interest in the mayoral and council races. Incumbent Mayor Charles Cephas, a Democrat, was soundly defeated by At-Large Councilmember Earl Murphy, who won with roughly 230 votes to Cephas’s 144. In the At-Large Council race, Jeff Smith, an independent candidate backed by local Republicans, secured a 15-point win over Cheyenne Chase. In District 2, Councilmember Bonnie Franz, a Republican, was re-elected by 40 percentage points over challenger Zia Ashraf, who previously served on the Dorchester Democratic Central Committee. The only Democrat to retain a seat on the council was David Higgins, who was unopposed. The Maryland Republican Party invested resources and campaign attention in the Hurlock race, highlighting it on statewide social media and dispatching party officials, including Maryland GOP Chair Nicole Beus Harris, to campaign. Local Democrats emphasized support for Mayor Cephas through the Dorchester County Democratic Central Committee, but the Maryland Democratic Party did not appear to participate directly.