Mississippi Burning Research Papers

Evelyn Morrey
Mrs. Guerra
English II Honors
4-24-16
Mississippi Burning Research Paper

Civil rights. A topic that has been the cause of endless grief for our country and its many minorities, particularly the black population. Up until the 20th of June, 1964, black civil rights were almost nonexistent. The events that would take place on this day and the following months would make a deep cut in our nation, a cut some are still recovering from today. The murder of three civil rights workers, and one of the biggest FBI cases in history would “Galvanize the nation and provide impetus for the passage of the landmark Civil Rights Act of 1964 on July 2” (“50 years since…”). The Mississippi Burning plays an important part in history as one of the
Freedom summer; a widespread movement in Mississippi to increase the amount of black people registered to vote. The three victims, Michael Schwerner, Andrew Goodman, and James Chaney, were leaders in this movement, putting them at the top of the KKK hit list. Michael was a 24 years old, and had been working for the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) for mere months when he and his wife moved to Meridian, Mississippi to help with the Freedom Summer by organizing boycotts and freedom schools. Schwerner brought his friend and native Meridian James Chaney along with him to help in this endeavor. James was only 21, and one of the only black civil rights workers in Mississippi at the time. Both Schwerner and Chaney were in Ohio to help CORE train new civil rights workers. Among those being trained was a 20-year-old named Andrew Goodman.
While the three were in Ohio, news of serious KKK action in Mississippi reached their ears and they were swift to take action. They piled into a CORE owned blue station wagon and drove to Mississippi to meet the opposition. The KKK is a dangerous foe, but in the end the battle for civil rights was only three-on-three. Schwerner, Chaney, and Goodman versus three formidable KKK members known as Edgar Ray Killen, Cecil Price, and Sam Bowers. When Sam Bowers, the KKK Grand Wizard at the time, heard that Michael Schwerner was working in Mississippi, he took action
Schwerner and Chaney had been there on Memorial Day, 1964, earlier to ask the church for permission to use the building as a Freedom school; a school for educating black people on how to register to vote. This information was leaked to the KKK, who promptly figured out when Schwerner was supposed to return to the church. On June 16th, the multiple Klansmen surrounded Mount Zion Church, armed to the teeth in the hopes of catching Schwerner. Unfortunately for them, they did not know about the training session in Oxford Ohio, where Michael was that day. When the Klansmen stormed the church in the hopes of finding him, they turned up emptyhanded. In rage, they dragged the churchgoers outside the building and began to beat them severely. Within minutes the kerosene was poured and Mount Zion Church went up in