Did you know that Martin Luther King Jr.’s first official White House visit was in 1958, when he met with President Dwight D. Eisenhower? He later visited presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson there, as well. All of these presidential meetings, featured in these photos, were important steps toward desegregation and voting rights for Black Americans.
In 1958, King and other prominent civil rights activists met President Eisenhower in the Oval Office to discuss his administration’s efforts to desegregate public schools in the South. The act created what it called a “Commission on Civil Rights” in the federal government and increased protections for voting rights.
Five years later, King, along with other members of civil rights organizations such as the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) met with President Kennedy and Vice President Johnson on the same day as the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. In their meeting, the committee of men, including King, future U.S. Representative John Lewis, and activist A. Philip Randolph, discussed their goals and demands.
Less than one year after the march, King joined President Johnson in the East Room as he signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964, originally proposed by President Kennedy before his assassination. The new act, building off the Civil Rights Act of 1957, prohibited discrimination and segregation based on race, class, sex, or religion in the workplace, public buildings, and the polls.
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