Civil Rights & Society

He bought a first-class ticket, sat down in the wrong car on purpose, and told the conductor he was a colored man. The arrest was the plan. What it set in motion was fifty-eight years of “separate but equal” — and, eventually, the argument that brought it down.

He was 43 when he took the oath. He was 46 when he was killed. In between, he faced down nuclear war, sent Americans to the moon, and asked a generation to give something back. Fifty years later, the question he asked has not expired.

At 1:20 a.m. on June 28, 1969, plainclothes officers raided the Stonewall Inn on Christopher Street. The patrons fought back. Six nights of protest followed.

A. Philip Randolph called for it in 1941; Bayard Rustin organized it in 1963. Two hundred and fifty thousand people gathered on August 28. King delivered his speech that afternoon.

On May 17, 1954, the Supreme Court ruled unanimously that “separate but equal” had no place in public schools. Linda Brown was in third grade. Implementation took decades.

On January 1, 1863, Lincoln declared enslaved people in rebellious states “forever free.” The proclamation freed no one immediately. The army that came after did.

On July 19, 1848, three hundred delegates met in upstate New York and demanded the vote. Seventy-two years later, the Nineteenth Amendment was ratified.