World War II and the Cold War era: A catalyst for civil rights activism and xenophobia in America

In the past fifty years, the Civil Rights movement has changed America more than any other social movement. The efforts of civil rights activist such as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, Stokley Carmichael, and Jessie Jackson profoundly altered America's treatment of its minorities in a way which represents one of its most powerful domestic accomplishments over the past century.;Yet one aspect of the Civil Rights Movement has always been neglected in the conventional history of the movement. This aspect was the Civil Rights Movement connection to the Cold War. For America to win the Cold War, civil rights were a necessity. The continuing domestic discrimination against non-white minorities would make it impossible to win over the newly free Third World. This research examined the original intent and purpose of America's foreign diplomacy as it relates to decisions, by key figures such as Harry Truman, that were made regarding the Cold War and America's fight against communism.;Furthermore, this research shall point out that America did not just randomly decide to be nicer to people of color in the 1960s, instead of the 1920s or the 1890s. Instead, it ended segregation because not doing so would greatly damage the fight against communism. Civil Rights was therefore not just the right thing to do, but also vitally important to the national interest. I share the opinion with authors such as Manning Marable, Robert Mullen, and William Julius Wilson that the power of the international arena and America's image internationally conjured up reform, conjured up change in an American system that was forced to adhere to such changes.