Birmingham 16th Street Church Bombing Essay

Luke 23: 24 ,”Then Jesus said, ‘Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do” That was the verse that 16th Street Baptist Church Sunday school lesson for September 15, 1963 was going to be based on (Howard, Betsy Child). Sadly, four very special little girls never got to hear it. The assassination of the four innocent little girls, Addie Mae Collins, Cynthia Wesley, Carole Robertson and Carol Denise McNair during the bombing of 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama was unjust because they were innocent, the main causes for the assassination were racial and political; however, in those days some people thought certain murder was acceptable, therefore making it just.

Resistance to Reconstruction was incredibly aggressive and violent since Southerners were extremely appalled by the radical social transformations that were resulting from Reconstruction, so those Southerners terrorized and killed the Republicans and the black people responsible for the changes. Black people were supposedly guaranteed equality before the law by the 14th amendment, however, their rights were not always upheld. Southerners would kill black people over minor actions, like not yielding to whites on sidewalks or attempting to buy land. A terrorist organization, the Ku Klux Klan (KKK), formed in 1866 to punish people who “defied the norms of white supremacy”. Ordinary black people were killed by the KKK alongside black and white

Political actions taken by the United States in regards to the Vietnam War caused an uproar of controversy in the 1960’s. The city of Madison, Wisconsin became grounds for mass protests against the Vietnam War. Over one million lives were lost in the 20 years of war. Many protested these tragedies at the Capitol in Madison. While their protests were seemingly peaceful and respectful, the retaliation was not. Police officials sent to limit protesting retaliated aggressively, causing even more controversy. The line was crossed, however, when two brothers and their friends planned a more aggressive approach to get the protesters’ point across. This led to the infamous bombing of Sterling Hall..

The tragic event occurred on September 15, 1963. The act was carried out by members of the Ku Klux Klan, people who disliked blacks and did horrible things because of this, in Birmingham, Alabama. Alabama was a Southern state and allowed segregation. The explosion went off at approximately 10:20 A.M., when Sunday school was ending and the service was beginning. The police say that members of the Ku Klux Klan planted a bomb near the church. Four young girls, 11-year-old Denise McNair and 14-year-old Addie Mae Collins, Cynthia Wesley, and Carole Robertson, were crushed by falling debris. Several others were injured in the tragedy.

The bombing was the trigger to many events in the Civil Rights movement. In the aftermath, thousands of black protesters gathered at the scene of the bombing. When the police went to break up the protests, violence broke out across the city. Many people were arrested and two young African American men died before the National Guard was called in and restored order. Also, the bombing impacted the support to end segregation greatly and adding more support from many angry people because of the four innocent little girl’s

They impacted American people and black minorities. The KKK did not allow blacks to vote or get any kind of education. The black people would avoid groups of white people and crowded areas.They struggled with racial discrimination till they had fair and equal treatment. Successful black business were attacked but when protection groups were created they were quickly dealt with. The main opponent of the KKK was the National Association for the Advancement of colored people. The Ku Klux Klan had several methods of promoting their agenda. One of those ways was lynching, which is hanging the people they were

The Ku Klux Klan was established in Tennessee to intimidate African Americans. Another goal was to restore white rule.

“On April 19th, 1995 one of the worst bombings happened on American soil.” Two ex Military Terry Nichols and Timothy McVeigh were planning a terrorist attack in Oklahoma City.(History.com) They had set diesel fuel and bombs in a truck in front of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building by pillars.(JamestownPublisher) McVeigh was angry at the U.S. government with citizens and politics.

He came to represent the troubles of the African Americans as they laughed in public and wept in their souls. This segregation gave way to White Supremacy groups that exist to conserve the social order that was established by the Jim Crow laws. The Ku Klux Klan is the most widely known of all the groups that came about in the period. The “Klan” as it is also known advocated extremist positions in the fields of white supremacy, white nationalism, and also anti-immigration. The first “Klan” flourished in the South of the United States of America in the late 1860s immediately after the Civil War. Its main goal was to overthrow the Republican state governments during the Reconstruction era, it accomplished this goal by perpetuating violence against African American leaders in the South. The Second group was brought together in the mid 1910s, this version of the “Klan” flourished nationwide. This was especially true in the urban areas of the Midwest and West. It opposed not only African Americans but also those of the Catholic and Jewish faiths. It is this version the Klan that was active in the Gilded

“At approximately 2:49 that afternoon, with more than 5,600 runners still in the race, two pressure-cooker bombs–packed with shrapnel and other materials and hidden in backpacks that were placed on the ground amidst crowds of marathon-watchers–exploded within seconds of each other near the finish line along Boylston Street. The blasts instantly turned the sun-filled afternoon into a gruesome scene of destruction and chaos” (“Boston Marathon Bombings”). Soon after the attack a manhunt set out in search for the two suspects. Dzhokhar and Tamerlan Tsarnaev were the Boston Marathon Bombers who caused an unexpected event that led to the manhunt. The bombings, along with the manhunt caused much chaos and destruction to the city as well as to the

The Civil War was the most destructive battle in American history. The hurricane of a battle lasted for four years and is responsible for 785,000-1,000,000 Union, Confederate, and slave casualties. The battle was fought for the overall emancipation of slaves, and the Union succeeded in fulfilling that goal. You would think that after that war and after slavery was abolished once and for all, everyone would be happy and everyone would join together and sing Kumbaya; however, that's not exactly what happened. The Reconstruction Era was more destructive for slaves than the war itself. After the war, freed slaves were denied the right to vote, they were not provided with jobs or a safe place to go once they were free, and there were groups of people

Brown v. Board of Education was a court case to desegregate schools. During this time over one-third of states, mostly in the south, segregated their schools by law. Most people don’t know that the lawsuit actually started off as five, in Kansas, South Carolina, Virginia, Delaware, and the District of Columbia. Unfortunately all the lower court cases resulted in defeat (Greenspan 1). The bigger issue was still at hand though, it wasn’t only the schools being segregated, it was everywhere. Anywhere you would’ve went during this time period you would’ve seen “Whites only” and “Colored only” signs on just about anything and everything; the signs were displayed on stores,

The Ku Klux Klan, or commonly known as the KKK, was a group of violent whites who opposed blacks( Ingalls 1). This group would murder blacks for no real reason. The KKK members wore robes and hoods, burned crosses at meetings, and burned crosses to scare nonmembers away( Ingalls 1). By 1870, the Ku Klux Klan reached nearly every southern state( Ku Klux Klan

The Ku Klux Klan was founded in 1865 by six veterans of the Confederate Army. Over a period of three hundred years of slavery in America White slave owners built a sophisticated structure to sustain their brutally corrupt and immoral system. They founded “The Klan” to protect the interests of the white popularity. Evolving from the Slave Patrol to the Ku Klux Klan. The first generation was known for its brutal and immoral acts against immigrants and former slaves. Even most of the white population restrain themselves and did not join the movement. The Ku Klux Klan gained popularity especially in the South. In the 1920s the Ku Klux Klan experienced an overwhelming growth when the United States went trough a dramatic social and political change.

The Provos operated under a structure strikingly similar to a military chain of command. It had divisions of size in various brigades, battalions, and companies. Each unit was tasked with specific geographical combat areas. In recruitment across the course of the struggle, women make up approximately one in twenty militants. This may be because of the fact that males are more attracted to high-risk behavior and revenge. Recruiter also targeted males. Females were often engaged in support tasks such as providing shelter to male PIRA volunteers, serving as couriers – of IEDs, funds, and information – and acting as look-outs for male operatives. Indiscriminate violence, though less effective than selective violence, is much easier as it