What was the civil rights movement

civil rights movement. The national effort made by black people and their supporters in the 1950s and 1960s to eliminate segregation and gain equal rights ... The federal Civil Rights Act of 1964 authorized federal action against segregation in public accommodations, public facilities, and employment.

The civil rights movement in the United States was a decades-long struggle by African Americans to end legalized racial discrimination, disenfranchisement and racial segregation in the United States.