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With most members of the US establishment preoccupied with feeding the war machine abroad and suppressing unrest at home, the 1960s ushered in a remarkable era of community-organized groups of activists, revolutionaries, and dissenters. The vast majority of these groups were born in the midst of dire and impoverished circumstances, but grew powerful enough to push through generation-defining changes in the way the country treated its citizens.
This decade of growth, progress, and passion was far from peaceful. Virtually every fight was fought against a conservative ruling class and federal government that resisted the wishes of the people at every turn, not just through words but often through violence as well.
People weren't only rising up for human rights in the United States, however. America's foreign policy during the 1960s was characterized by the long, brutal, and controversial war in Vietnam. Ostensibly fought in the name of democracy between US-allied South Vietnam and Communist North Vietnam, many people saw the war then, as they do today, as a proxy war of ideologies between the Cold War superpowers. Insisting that the use of drafted Americans and Vietnamese commoners as cannon fodder was inexcusable, countless groups of young people and activists from all walks of life vehemently fought to put a stop to the war.
Founded in 1966 by college students Bobby Seale (pictured left) and Huey P. Newton (pictured right) in Oakland, California, the party claimed more than 5,000 members across 38 chapters nationwide just a year later.
While J. Edgar Hoover of the FBI labeled the Black Panthers as the country's greatest threat to national security, they were largely supported in their neighborhoods. Besides attending and organizing rallies, arriving armed to protect protestors from the infamously violent police forces, the Panthers also organized free community lunches, provided education to underprivileged children, and organized community health centers in low-income areas.
Many of these ideological battles for freedom are generally referred to as the civil rights movement. Innumerable communities, grassroots organizations, and activist groups fought in the streets and from the podium for the rights of virtually every oppressed or marginalized demographic in the country, notably people of color, women, and members of the LGBTQ+ community.
The new Young Lords shared many values with their west coast Black Panther comrades, organizing education and health programs across the American Midwest and east coast.
The Young Lords were an organization primarily made up of Puerto Rican-Americans. First formed as a Chicago street gang in 1960, the Young Lords had transformed into a community support and activist organization by 1968.
The National Organization for Women, or NOW, was an expansive women's rights group that championed the 20th century's second wave of feminism, introducing intersectionality and more progressive principles into the movement, separating them from the earlier suffragettes who all too often held racist and segregationist views.
By far the most infamous revolutionary group of the 1960s was the Black Panther Party. Labeled by the government as a criminal organization, the Black Panthers presented themselves as fighters for black liberation, community protectors, and enemies of American racism and capitalism.
The Young Lords "13 Point Platform" called for the self-determination and liberation of Puerto Ricans, Latinos, and all marginalized groups in the US and around the world. On the ground, the group organized street cleanups and neighborhood watches, and fought tirelessly against the white supremacy they saw in the United States and protested the drafting of Puerto Ricans into the Army, on the basis that Puerto Ricans weren't granted equal rights to continental American citizens and weren't represented in Congress.
Founded in 1966, NOW was driven to conception by what many viewed as a total lack of enforcement of the Civil Rights Act, signed into law in 1964, which was meant to prohibit discrimination based on race, gender, and country of origin.
The Young Patriots Organization, although relatively small, stood out amongst the liberation groups of the 1960s due to their predominately white membership. Their leftist and inclusive agenda stands in stark contrast with a majority of white political groups today.
Since its inception, NOW has fought for the legal protections of women of all races and creeds, including the right to abortion and the rights of queer women. Unlike many activist groups of the civil rights era, NOW remains the largest American feminist organization to this day, boasting more than half a million members across 550 chapters in all 50 states.
The overwhelming potential for change that was generated by the Rainbow Coalition was cut short, following the police-led assassination of Fred Hampton (pictured) in 1961. After Hampton's assassination, the coalition was plagued by government interventions, lack of funding, and infighting, eventually leading to the groups dissolution in the early 1970s.
Over the course of their existence, the Young Patriots successfully resisted the development of racial prejudices that so often plague white organizations. They fought for self-determination on the basis of class, not race, and worked towards a more united working class in collaboration with racial liberation groups like the Black Panthers. Although short-lived, the Young Patriots established an incredibly efficient and effective health clinic in the Uptown neighborhood of Chicago, which garnered nationwide attention.
The Young Patriots were mostly southerners of Appalachian descent, a white demographic that has historically faced far greater oppression than other white groups. Founded by Jack "Junebug" Boykin and Doug Youngblood, the Young Patriots Organization united the white working class of Chicago against poverty and police brutality.
A collaboration of the Black Panthers, the Young Lords, and the Young Patriots, the Rainbow Coalition worked towards the common goal of working class liberation and promoted cooperation between racial groups that history had so often pitted against each other.
The Rainbow Coalition was formed in 1969 by Fred Hampton, the prominent and influential deputy chairman of the Black Panther Party. The coalition was a small revolution within a revolution, bringing together racially segregated liberation movements under a common cause and name.
The Poor People's Campaign, one of the largest and most widely supported organizations of the civil rights movement, had none other than Martin Luther King Jr. at its helm. That is, until his assassination on April 4, 1968.
Students for a Democratic Society, or SDS, was the foremost anti-war activist group of the 1960s. Formed in 1960 by college students in Ann Arbor, Michigan, the SDS organized uprisings on college campuses across the nation against the Vietnam War, the draft, and hierarchal power structures both on and off campus.
Following the assassination of Dr. King, civil rights leader and minister Ralph Abernathy took charge of organizing the campaign with the help of Coretta Scott King, MLK's widow. Starting on May 12, 1968, upwards of 3,000 protesters marched on Washington and occupied the Washington Mall for six weeks, where they established a shantytown known as Resurrection City. The protests continued until June 24, when authorities dispersed the occupiers with tear gas and other means of force.
Dr. King organized the Poor People's Campaign in order to stage a massive march of the nation's poor working class in Washington, D.C. The protest was meant to shed light on President Lyndon B. Johnson's abandonment of impoverished Americans, instead choosing to funnel money into the Vietnam War.
Following the infamous Stonewall riots of June 1969, the first Gay Liberation Front was formed in New York City in order to organize and protect members of the city's LGBTQ+ community.
At their height, there were around 30,000 members of the SDS spread across 300 campuses. This strength in numbers enabled them to organize massive walk-outs, sit-ins, and other non-violent protests that put pressure on some of the country's most powerful education institutions.
Tragedy struck the heart of the SDS on May 4, 1970, when officers of the Ohio National Guard fired into a crowd of peaceful student protesters at Kent State University, a traumatic event that left four students dead and an additional nine students gravely wounded. A massive strike consisting of over four million students across the country arose in the aftermath of the Kent State shootings.
The influence of the Gay Liberation Front spread across the United States like wildfire, from coast to coast. The group's popularity is in part thanks to its intersectionality and wide scope of inclusion, fighting for the rights of all marginalized people and often organizing alongside racial and class liberation groups like the Black Panthers.
Sources: (Britannica) (History) (Poor People's Campaign)
See also: Prohibition: America's era of abstinence
New York's Gay Liberation Front fought for the comprehensive protection of everyone in the queer community, in and outside of gender and sexuality binaries. In 1969, weekly protests were held across the city, in Greenwich Village in particular, in order to draw attention to the bias and discrimination that LGBTQ+ individuals faced in the streets and in the media.
The 1960s were arguably the most transformative decade in modern United States history. The first post-World War II, post-bomb generation were coming into their own, fighting tirelessly for human rights (both domestic and international).
The 1960s were indeed a busy decade for the United States. Marked by international controversies, assassinations, and secret government programs, the intensity of the 1960s ran through every walk of life and demographic. While the decade is rightfully remembered as 10 years of bloodshed and violence, it was also a period of remarkable and seemingly unstoppable growth and progress within the citizenry. Some of the most influential grassroots groups and organizations in American history came about in the 1960s, galvanized by unjust warfare and widespread inequality. From women's rights to black liberation, from Betty Friedan to Martin Luther King Jr., the 1960s were at its heart a decade of righteous struggle, heroes, martyrs, and dreams of a better future.
Intrigued? Read on to learn about some of the most impactful American revolutionary groups of the 1960s.
The American revolutionary groups of the 1960s
The liberators and civil rights heroes who defined a decade
LIFESTYLE Revolution
The 1960s were indeed a busy decade for the United States. Marked by international controversies, assassinations, and secret government programs, the intensity of the 1960s ran through every walk of life and demographic. While the decade is rightfully remembered as 10 years of bloodshed and violence, it was also a period of remarkable and seemingly unstoppable growth and progress within the citizenry. Some of the most influential grassroots groups and organizations in American history came about in the 1960s, galvanized by unjust warfare and widespread inequality. From women's rights to black liberation, from Betty Friedan to Martin Luther King Jr., the 1960s were at its heart a decade of righteous struggle, heroes, martyrs, and dreams of a better future.
Intrigued? Read on to learn about some of the most impactful American revolutionary groups of the 1960s.