Hate Crimes and Groups

Hate crimes, in the Civil Rights movement of the 1950s-60s, were crimes committed against someone solely because of his or her race. These were often committed by violent hate groups, or groups who had dedicated themselves to racist causes and motivations. Hate groups and the hate crimes they caused or that were caused by others were some of the leading causes of the rise of the Civil Rights movement, as racially biased poice and government officials refused to protect black Americans from these groups, sometimes even viewing them as doing the right thing.

Hate Crimes
Hate crimes were frequent in the 1910s and 20s, with infamous crimes like the lynching of Jesse Washington demonstrating the bloodlust and desire for vengeance that many whites felt. While the severity of hate crimes like lynching's died down quickly as the century progressed, helped in part by legal intervention to stop the most violent of the crimes. However, hate crimes of all varieties still continued, especially as a reaction to the protests and marches in the Civil Rights movement. An example of this is the famous photograph of a black protester continuing to walk as a police officer allows a dog to bite into his torso.

Hate Groups
Many hate groups existed in the time of the Cvil Rights movement. The largest and most infamous of these was the Ku Klux Klan, or KKK, a group once numbering in the hundreds of thousands and dedicated to white supremacy. Like the hate crimes they caused, they were not as violent as they had been in their earlier 19th century incarnation, yet still were a force that opressed and often violently retaliated against the Civil Rights movement. The KKK rallied together, often with a cult-like atmosphere, and rode on horses as though they were knights, burning crosses and vandalizing the homes of black families.