List of civil rights leaders
Civil rights leaders are influential figures in the promotion and implementation of political freedom and the expansion of personal civil liberties and rights. They work to protect individuals and groups from political repression and discrimination by governments and private organizations, and seek to ensure the ability of all members of society to participate in the civil and political life of the state.
Civil rights include individual rights to equal protection and service, privacy, freedom of thought, freedom of expression, freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, freedom to travel, freedom of worship, protection of civil liberties, the right to vote, and the right to freely share ideas and opinions through all forms of communication and media. People who motivated themselves and then led others to gain and protect these rights and liberties include:
- Ralph Abernathy (1926–1990) - American activist, Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) official
- Jane Addams (1860-1935) - American reformer, co-founder of the Hull House and American Civil Liberties Union, Nobel Peace Prize winner
- Jawaharlal Nehru (1889–1964) - was the first Prime Minister of India and a central figure in Indian politics before and after independence. He stood for Free Press in India . He was open to public criticism and didn't controlled Press in India. “Don't spare me, Shankar,” is what he said to his journalist friend.
- B.R. Ambedkar (1891–1956) - Indian activist for caste abolition, writer, philosopher, economist, co-wrote and influenced Indian ,drafted constitution which focused on social rights.
- Susan B. Anthony (1820–1906) - American Women's suffrage leader, speaker, inspiration
- Ella Baker (1903–1986) - American SCLC activist, initiated the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC)
- James Baldwin (1924–1987) - American essayist, novelist, public speaker, SNCC activist
- Daisy Bates (1914–1999) - American organizer of the Little Rock Nine school desegregation events.
- Dana Beal (1947– ) - American pro-hemp activist, organizer, speaker, initiator
- Jeremy Bentham (1748–1832) - British philosopher, writer, and teacher on civil rights, inspiration
- James Bevel (1936–2008) - American organizer and Direct Action leader, SCLC's main strategist, movement initiator, and movement director.
- Claude Black (1916–2009) - American civil rights activist
- Antoinette Brown Blackwell (1825–1921) - founded American Woman Suffrage Association with Lucy Stone in 1869
- Julian Bond (1940–2015) - American activist, politician, scholar, NAACP chairman
- Richard C. Boone (1937 - 2010) - American Activist, Direct Action with James Bevel and SCLC, SNCC, Alabama Action Committee Director, Chaplain (MAJ, USA), Pastor, CME, UMC
- Lenny Bruce (1925–1966) - American free speech advocate, comedian, political satirist
- Lucy Burns (1879–1966) - American women's suffrage/voting rights leader
- Stokely Carmichael (1941–1998) - American SNCC and Black Panther activist, organizer, speaker
- Carrie Chapman Catt (1859–1947) - suffrage leader, president National American Woman Suffrage Association, founder League of Women Voters and International Alliance of Women
- Cesar Chavez (1927–1993) - Chicano activist, organizer, trade unionist,inspiration
- Benjamin Chavis - (1948-) American activist, chemist, minister, author, leader of Wilmington 10, Director Commission for Racial Justice of the United Church of Christ, campaigner against Environmental Racism, Executive Director of NAACP, National Director of the Million Man March
- Claudette Colvin (1939–) - American Montgomery Bus Boycott pioneer, independent activist
- Marvel Cooke (1903–2000) - Americn civil rights leader
- Humberto "Bert" Corona (1918–2001) - labor and civil rights leader
- Dorothy Cotton (1930–) - American SCLC official, activist, organizer, and leader
- Eugene Debs (1855–1926) - American organizer, campaigner for the poor, women, dissenters, prisoners
- Andre DiMino (1950–) - Italian-American civil rights activist
- Getúlio Vargas ( 1882-1954) Brazilian civil leader, was President of Brazil, first as dictator, from 1930 to 1945.
- Frederick Douglass (1818–1895) - American abolitionist, women's rights and suffrage advocate, writer, organizer, black rights activist, inspiration
- W. E. B. Du Bois (1868–1963) - American writer, scholar, founder of NAACP
- Charles Evers (1922–) - American civil rights activist
- Medgar Evers (1925–1963) - American, NAACP official in the Mississippi Movement
- James Farmer (1920–1999) - Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) leader and activist
- Louis Farrakhan (1933–) - American, Controversial Minister and National Representative of the Nation of Islam
- James Forman (1928–2005) - American SNCC official and civil rights activist
- Marie Foster (1917–2003) - American voting rights activist, a local leader in the Selma Voting Rights Movement
- Elizabeth Freeman (1744–1829) also known as Mum Bett - first former slave to win a freedom suit in Massachusetts.
- Frankie Muse Freeman (1916-) American civil rights attorney, and the first woman to be appointed to the United States Commission on Civil Rights
- Golden Frinks (1920–2004) American civil rights organizer in North Carolina and field secretary of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference.
- Betty Friedan (1921–2006) - American writer, women's rights activist, feminist
- Kasturba Gandhi (1869–1944) wife of Mohandas Gandhi, activist in South Africa and India, often led her husband's movements in India when he was imprisoned.
- Mohandas Gandhi (1869–1948) - Indian activist, movement leader, writer, philosopher, and teacher.
- William Lloyd Garrison (1805–1879) - American abolitionist, writer, organizer, feminist, initiator
- Steven Goldstein (1962- ) - American gay rights activist, professor, political activist, congressional staffer
- Olympe de Gouges (1748–1793) - French women's rights pioneer, writer, beheaded during French Revolution
- Dick Gregory (1932- ) - American free speech advocate and activist in the civil rights movement, comedian
- Tenzin Gyatso (1935- ) - Tibetan, 14th Dalai Lama, spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhists, advocate for nonviolence, compassion, and Tibetan autonomy
- Prathia Hall (1940–2002) - American SNCC activist, a leading speaker in the civil rights movement
- Fred Hampton (1948–1969) - American NAACP youth leader and Black Panther activist, organizer, speaker
- Fannie Lou Hamer (1917–1977) - activist in Mississippi movements
- Harry Hay (1912–2002) - early leader in American LGBT rights movement, founder Mattachine Society
- Lola Hendricks (1932–) - activist, local leader in Birmingham Movement
- Jack Herer (1939–2010) - American pro-hemp activist, speaker, organizer, author
- Gordon Hirabayashi (1918–2012) - Japanese-American civil rights hero
- Myles Horton (1905–1990) - American teacher of nonviolence, pioneer activist, founded and led the Highlander Folk School
- T.R.M. Howard (1908–1976) - founder of Mississippi's Regional Council of Negro Leadership
- Julia Ward Howe (1818–1910) - American writer, organizer, suffragette
- Dolores Huerta (1930– ) - American labor and civil rights activist, initiator, organizer
- John Peters Humphrey (1905–1995) - author of Universal Declaration of Human Rights
- Harish Iyer (1979–) - Indian gender and sexuality rights activist, campaigns against child sexual abuse and for animal rights, inspiration.
- Jesse Jackson (1941–) - American civil rights activist, politician
- Nellie Stone Johnson (1905–2002) - labor and civil rights activist
- Rebiya Kadeer (1946-) - Ethnic Uyghur civil right activist, independence right activist, businesswoman
- Toyohiko Kagawa (1888–1960) - Japanese labour activist, Christian reformer, author
- Ashok Row Kavi (1947–) - Indian LGBT rights activist, pioneer Indian gay rights movement, founder of Humsafar Trust
- Abby Kelley (1811–1887) - American abolitionist and suffragette
- Coretta Scott King (1927–2006) - American SCLC leader, activist, inspiration
- Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929–1968) - SCLC co-founder/president/chairman, activist, author, speaker, inspiration
- Fred Korematsu (1919–2005) - American, Japanese internment resister during WWII
- James Lawson (1928–) - American minister and activist, SCLC's teacher of nonviolence in civil rights movement
- Bernard Lafayette (1940–) - American SCLC and SNCC activist, organizer, and leader
- John Lewis (1940–) - American Nashville Student Movement and SNCC activist, organizer, speaker, congressman, inspiration
- Sigmund Livingston (1872–1946) - Jewish rights activist, founder of the Anti-Defamation League
- Joseph Lowery (1921–) - American SCLC leader and co-founder, activist
- Clara Luper (1923–2011) - American sit-in movement leader in Oklahoma, activist
- Phyllis Lyon (1924-) - American co-founder of first social and political organization for lesbians in the US
- James Madison (1751–1836) - American founding father, introduced and lobbied for the U.S. Bill of Rights
- Nelson Mandela (1918–2013) - South African statesman, leading figure in anti-apartheid movement, inspiration
- Del Martin (1921–2008) - American co-founder of first social and political organization for lesbians in the US
- George Mason (1725–1792) - American who wrote the Virginia Declaration of Rights and influenced U.S. Bill of Rights
- Rigoberta Menchú (1959) - Guatemalan indigenous rights leader, co-founder Nobel Women's Initiative
- James Meredith (1933–) - American independent student leader and self–starting Mississippi activist
- Mamie Elizabeth Till-Mobley (1921-2003) - American who held an open casket funeral for her son, Emmett Till; speaker, activist
- Charles Morgan, Jr. (1930–2009) - American attorney, established principle of "one man, one vote"
- Harvey Milk (1930–1978) - American politician, gay rights activist and leader, inspiration
- Bob Moses (1935–) - leader, activist, and organizer in '60s Mississippi Movement
- Diane Nash (1938–) - American SNCC and SCLC activist and official, strategist, organizer
- Edgar Nixon (1899–1987) - Montgomery Bus Boycott organizer, civil rights activist
- James Orange (1942–2008) - American SCLC activist and organizer, a voting rights movement leader, trade unionist
- Emmeline Pankhurst (1858–1928) - founder and leader of the British Suffragette Movement
- Rosa Parks (1913–2005) - American NAACP official, activist, Montgomery Bus Boycott inspiration
- Vallabhbhai Patel (1875–1950) Indian activist, movement leader
- Alice Paul (1885–1977) - American 1910s Women's Voting Rights Movement leader, strategist, and organizer
- Thomas Paine (1737–1809) - English-American activist, author, theorist, wrote Rights of Man
- Elizabeth Peratrovich (1911–1958) - Alaska activist for native people
- A. Philip Randolph (1889–1979) - American labor and civil rights movement leader
- Amelia Boynton Robinson (1911–) - Selma Voting Rights Movement activist and early leader
- Jo Ann Robinson (1912–1992) - Montgomery Bus Boycott activist.
- Eleanor Roosevelt (1884–1962) - women's rights and human rights activist both in the United States and in the United Nations
- Josephine St. Pierre Ruffin (1842-1924) - suffragist, editor, co-founder of the first chapter of the NAACP
- Bayard Rustin (1912–1987) - American civil rights activist
- Aung San Suu Kyi (1945-) - Burmese Politician, former political prisoner, democracy and human rights activist
- Sonia Schlesin (1888–1956) - worked with Mohandas Gandhi in South Africa and led his movements there when he was absent.
- Al Sharpton (1954–) - American clergyman, activist, media
- Charles Sherrod (1937-)- American civil rights activist, SNCC leader
- Judy Shepard (1952–) - gay rights activist, public speaker
- Kate Sheppard (1847–1934) - New Zealand suffragist in first country to have universal suffrage
- Fred Shuttlesworth (1922–2011) - American clergyman, activist, SCLC co-founder, initiated the Birmingham Movement
- Lysander Spooner (1808–1887) - American abolitionist, writer, anarchist, proponent of Jury nullification
- Winifred C. Stanley (1909-1996) - First member of Congress to introduce legislation prohibiting discrimination in pay on the basis of sex
- Elizabeth Cady Stanton (1815–1902) - American women's suffrage/women's rights leader
- Gloria Steinem (1934–) - American writer, activist, feminist
- Thaddeus Stevens (1792-1868) American Senator from Pennsylvania, Anti-slavery leader, originator of the 14th Amendment of the US Constitution
- Lucy Stone (1818–1893) - American women's suffrage/voting rights leader
- Charles Sumner (1811-1874) - American Senator from Massachusetts, Anti-slavery leader
- Thich Quang Duc (1897–1963) - Vietnamese monk, freedom of religion self-martyr
- Harriet Tubman (1822-1913) - African American abolitionist and humanitarian
- Desmond Tutu (1931–) - South African anti-apartheid organizer, advocate, inspiration
- Karl Heinrich Ulrichs (1825–1895) - German writer, organizer, and the pioneer of the modern LGBT rights movement
- Edison Uno (1929–1976) - American, leader for Japanese-American civil rights and redress after WW II
- C.T. Vivian (1924–) - American student civil rights leader, SNCC and SCLC activist
- Wyatt Tee Walker (1929-) - American activist and organizer with NAACP, CORE, and SCLC
- Booker T. Washington (1856–1915) - American educator, founder of Tuskegee University, and advisor to Presidents Theodore Roosevelt and William Howard Taft.
- Ida B. Wells (1862–1931) - American journalist, early activist in 20th Century Civil Rights Movement, women's suffrage/voting rights activist
- Willa Brown (1906–1992) - American pilot, early Civil Rights activist, first African American lieutenant in the US Civil Air Patrol, first African American woman to run for United States Congress.
- Kayode Ajulo (1974- ) - Nigerian lawyer, Civil Right activist, founded Egalitarian Mission for Africa to promote, equity, equality and rule of law in class conscious African societies.
- Walter Francis White (1895–1955) - American NAACP executive secretary
- Elie Wiesel - (1928–) - American, writer, Holocaust survivor, Jewish rights leader
- William Wilberforce (1759–1833) - leader of the British abolition movement
- Roy Wilkins - (1901–1981) American NAACP executive secretary/executive director
- Frances Willard (1839–1898) - American women's rights activist, woman suffrage leader
- Hosea Williams (1926–2000) - American civil rights activist, an SCLC organizer and strategist
- Victoria Woodhull (1838–1927) - American suffragette organizer, women's rights leader
- Malcolm X (1925–1965) - American author, speaker, activist, inspiration
- Andrew Young (1932–) - American SCLC activist and executive director
- Whitney M. Young, Jr. (1921–1971) - Exec. Director National Urban League, advisor to U.S. Presidents
- Malala Yousafzai (1997-) - Pakistani, Nobel Peace Prize laureate, advocate for education for girls
- Thomas Clarke (11 March 1858 – 3 May 1916) - Signator of the Irish Procolamation. Advocate for equality and freedom for Irish men and women.
- Seán Mac Diarmada (27 January 1883 – 12 May 1916) - Signator of the Irish Procolamation. Advocate for equal rights for Irish men and women.
- Thomas MacDonagh (1 February 1878 – 3 May 1916) - Signator of the Irish Procolamation. Advocate for equal rights for Irish men and women.
- Pádraig Pearse (10 November 1879 – 3 May 1916)) - Signator of the Irish Procolamation. Advocate for equal rights for Irish men and women.
- Éamonn Ceannt (21 September 1881 – 8 May 1916) - Signator of the Irish Procolamation. Advocate for equal rights for Irish men and women.
- James Connolly (5 June 1868 – 12 May 1916) - Signator of the Irish Procolamation. Advocate for equal rights for Irish men and women.
- Joseph Mary Plunkett (21 November 1887 – 4 May 1916) - Signator of the Irish Procolamation. Advocate for equal rights for Irish men and women.
See also
External links
|
|---|
| | Basic topics | |
|---|
| | By country | |
|---|
| | Events | |
|---|
| | Related | |
|---|
|
|
|---|
| | | Fundamental concepts
and philosophies | |
|---|
| | Organizations | |
|---|
| | By continent | |
|---|
|
-
 Category:Rights
-
 Portal:Human rights
|
|
|
|---|
| Note: What is considered a human right is controversial and not all the topics listed are universally accepted as human rights. | | | Civil and political | |
|---|
| | |
|---|
| | Sexual and reproductive | |
|---|
| | Violations | |
|---|
| | War and conflict | |
|---|
|
|
|---|
| Notable
events
(timeline) | | 1954–1959 | |
|---|
| | 1960–1963 | |
|---|
| | 1964–1968 | |
|---|
|
|---|
| | Related | |
|---|
| Activist
groups | |
|---|
| | Activists | |
|---|
| | Influences | |
|---|
| Noted
historians | |
|---|
|
|
|---|
| | | | | | | | Context, limitations and duties |
|---|
| | | | Article 30: |
- Nothing in this Declaration may be interpreted as implying for any State, group or person any right to engage in any activity or to perform any act aimed at the destruction of any of the rights and freedoms set forth herein.
|
|---|
|
| |
- Human rights category
- Human rights portal
|
|
|
|---|
| | Types | |
|---|
| | International institutions | |
|---|
| | Regional bodies | |
|---|
| | Multi-lateral bodies | |
|---|
| | Major NGOs | |
|---|
|
.jpg)