Freedom Summer

Freedom Summer
Part of the Civil Rights Movement
SNCC advert for the Freedom Summer
DateJune – August 1964
Location
Caused by
Resulted in
Parties
Lead figures

State of Mississippi

Congressman

MSSC member

Klan member

Freedom Summer, also known as Mississippi Freedom Summer (sometimes referred to as the Freedom Summer Project or the Mississippi Summer Project), was a campaign launched by American civil rights activists in June 1964 to register as many African-American voters as possible in the state of Mississippi. Blacks in the state had been largely prevented from voting since the turn of the 20th century due to barriers to voter registration and other Jim Crow laws that had been enacted throughout the American South. The project also set up dozens of Freedom Schools, Freedom Houses, and community centers such as libraries, in small towns throughout Mississippi to aid the local Black population.

The project was organized by the Council of Federated Organizations (COFO), a coalition of the Mississippi branches of the four major civil rights organizations (SNCC, CORE, NAACP, and SCLC). Most of the impetus, leadership, and financing for the Summer Project came from SNCC. Bob Moses, SNCC field secretary and co-director of COFO, directed the summer project.[1]

  1. ^ Clayborne Carson, In Struggle (Harvard University Press, 1981), p. 114.