George Dorsey and three companions are murdered by a white mob in Georgia, sparking national outrage.

President Truman issues Executive Order 9981, formally desegregating the United States military.

The Supreme Court rules in Shelley v. Kraemer that property covenants barring Black buyers from purchasing homes are unconstitutional.

The Supreme Court rules in Henderson v. United States that racial segregation on interstate railroad dining cars violates federal law.

The Supreme Court rules in Brown v. Board of Education that racial segregation in public schools is unconstitutional.

Governor Faubus orders the Arkansas National Guard to block nine Black students from enrolling at Little Rock's Central High School.

President Eisenhower orders federal troops to restore order and enforce desegregation at Little Rock's Central High School.

The Supreme Court unanimously rules in Cooper v. Aaron that school desegregation in Little Rock must proceed without delay.

The Congress of Racial Equality organizes the Freedom Rides, sending interracial groups on interstate buses through the South.

James Meredith's application to the University of Mississippi is rejected due to his race, and riots erupt when a federal court rules in his favor.

Civil rights demonstrators in Birmingham, Alabama are attacked by police using fire hoses and police dogs.

President Kennedy delivers a nationally televised speech calling for sweeping civil rights legislation.

The Civil Rights Act of 1964 is signed into law, outlawing racial discrimination in public accommodations and employment.

Voting rights protestors in Selma, Alabama are beaten by police, prompting President Johnson to call for voting rights legislation.

Congress passes the Voting Rights Act, ending Jim Crow practices like poll taxes and literacy tests used to suppress Black voters.

After World War II, racial violence against Black Americans forced the Truman administration to take executive action, including desegregating the military and backing key Supreme Court rulings against discriminatory laws. The landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision declared school segregation unconstitutional, setting off a fierce battle in Little Rock, Arkansas that compelled President Eisenhower to deploy federal troops. In the early 1960s, civil rights activists escalated their campaigns through Freedom Rides and nonviolent protests, drawing violent responses that demanded federal intervention. President Kennedy was pushed to call for sweeping legislation, and the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was eventually signed into law under President Johnson. Voting rights protests in Selma then led directly to the Voting Rights Act of 1965, dismantling the core legal machinery of Jim Crow. Together, these headline events trace the arc from post-war racial violence to the passage of the two most transformative civil rights laws in American history.

The landmark legal decisions and government actions that drove American civil rights forward.

The NAACP submits a petition to the United Nations drawing international attention to racial discrimination in the United States.

Eleanor Roosevelt refuses to support the NAACP's United Nations petition out of concern it would harm the US image abroad.

The President's Committee on Civil Rights publishes 'To Secure These Rights,' citing moral, economic, and foreign policy reasons for reform.

A. Philip Randolph threatens to organize African American resistance to military enlistment unless the armed forces end racial segregation.

The USIS publishes 'The Negro in American Life,' a pamphlet arguing the United States has made great racial progress and will continue improving.

The State Department distributes news of the Brown ruling to its embassies worldwide, using it as Cold War propaganda against Communist nations.

Eight Black students attempting to enter Little Rock's Central High School are driven back by a violent pro-segregation mob.

The Soviet Union launches Sputnik, dealing another blow to American international prestige during the ongoing Little Rock desegregation crisis.

Chad's ambassador Malick Sow is refused service at a Maryland diner, creating a diplomatic problem for the Kennedy administration.

President Kennedy dispatches federal marshals to Alabama after Freedom Riders are met with violent mob attacks.

African leaders gathered in Addis Ababa issue a statement of solidarity with civil rights protestors in Birmingham, Alabama.

The March on Washington proceeds peacefully, and the international press praises it as proof of functioning American democratic participation.

A church in Birmingham is bombed, killing four African American girls and undercutting the positive international image created by the March on Washington.

Three civil rights workers—two white and one Black—are murdered in Mississippi, prompting activists to petition the United Nations for intervention.

Malcolm X is assassinated, silencing a prominent voice who had linked African American civil rights to global anti-colonial liberation struggles.

Civil rights organizations immediately after World War II sought international allies, submitting petitions to the United Nations even as figures within the US government worked to suppress them. The government responded by crafting propaganda portraying American race relations as steadily improving, distributing pamphlets and press materials through embassies and information agencies worldwide. Violent scenes in Little Rock and diplomatic incidents involving African ambassadors revealed the mounting cost of segregation in the global competition for influence. In the early 1960s, civil rights activists escalated grassroots campaigns while international observers increasingly linked their struggle to global anti-colonial movements. The March on Washington offered a moment of hope, but the Birmingham church bombing and murders of civil rights workers showed how quickly progress could be undercut by racial violence. As the movement matured, Malcolm X emerged as a voice connecting African American rights to worldwide liberation struggles before his assassination silenced that challenge.

International pressure, government propaganda, and grassroots campaigns that shaped civil rights behind the headlines.

Soviet propaganda exploiting American racial discrimination spreads beyond Soviet borders into Latin America, Germany, and Southeast Asia.

The Truman administration publicly frames civil rights reform as a national security priority essential to defeating Communism abroad.

William Patterson has his passport confiscated by the State Department after submitting a petition calling US treatment of Black Americans genocide.

US embassies deliberately disrupt Josephine Baker's overseas visa applications and performances after she publicly criticizes American racism abroad.

The FBI opens an investigation into Louis Armstrong after he cancels a Soviet concert tour and publicly denounces the US government.

Truman's Justice Department argues before the Supreme Court that racial segregation directly undermines US foreign policy and national security interests.

Governor Faubus breaks an earlier agreement with President Eisenhower and continues using the National Guard to block school desegregation.

An Arkansas judge rules that Little Rock school desegregation can be delayed for years, galvanizing civil rights activists to demand a clear national policy.

Local school boards in Little Rock adopt pupil assignment laws, creating bureaucratic barriers that effectively prevent meaningful racial integration.

President Kennedy is assassinated, causing international fears about US democratic stability and dealing a significant blow to the civil rights cause.

Malcolm X travels internationally and denounces the Civil Rights Act as an empty gesture designed to win favor with African and Asian nations.

The State Department sponsors James Farmer's trip to Africa to counter Malcolm X's influence on international perceptions of American civil rights.

Riots erupt in the Watts neighborhood of Los Angeles after police arrest a Black driver, shifting the US global image toward disorder and unrest.

A USIA report concludes that international criticism of the United States has shifted away from civil rights and toward the Vietnam War.

The Nixon administration embraces a law-and-order narrative rather than civil rights progress, effectively closing the Cold War–civil rights era.

From the outset of the Cold War, Soviet propaganda turned American racism into an international liability, forcing the Truman administration to reframe civil rights reform as a matter of national security. While promoting a positive narrative abroad, the government also moved to silence critics like William Patterson, Josephine Baker, and Louis Armstrong who threatened to expose the gap between that story and reality. Public victories like the Brown ruling masked ongoing failures, as broken agreements and bureaucratic resistance through pupil assignment laws kept real integration out of reach. The Kennedy assassination and the radicalization of the civil rights movement in the mid-1960s created new tensions, as Malcolm X openly challenged the Cold War narrative of gradual democratic progress and the State Department scrambled to counter him. The Watts riots and the escalating Vietnam War then combined to shift both domestic and international attention away from civil rights. When the Nixon administration embraced law and order over civil rights progress, the era that Dudziak argues linked racial reform to Cold War strategy came definitively to a close.

The hidden pressures, uncomfortable compromises, and pivotal decisions that reveal the true complexity of America's civil rights story.