1. January 18 Incoming Alabama governor George Wallace calls for "segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever" in his inaugural address.
  2. April 3 - May 10 The Birmingham campaign, organized by the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights challenges city leaders and business owners in Birmingham, Alabama, with daily mass demonstrations.
  3. April Mary Lucille Hamilton, Field Secretary for the Congress of Racial Equality, refuses to answer a judge in Gadsden, Alabama, until she is addressed by the honorific "Miss". It was the custom of the time to address white people by honorifics and people of color by their first names. Hamilton is jailed for contempt of court and refuses to pay bail. The case Hamilton v. Alabama is filed by the NAACP. It went to the Supreme Court, which ruled in 1964 that courts must address persons of color with the same courtesy extended to whites.
  4. April 7 Ministers John Thomas Porter, Nelson H. Smith and A. D. King lead a group of 2,000 marchers to protest the jailing of movement leaders in Birmingham.
  5. April 12 Martin Luther King, Jr. is arrested in Birmingham for "parading without a permit".
  6. April 16 King's Letter from Birmingham Jail is completed.
  7. April 23 CORE activist William L. Moore is killed in Gadsden, Alabama.
  8. May 2-4 Birmingham's juvenile court is inundated with African-American children and teenagers arrested after James Bevel launches his "D-Day" youth march, which spans three days to become the Children's Crusade.
  9. May 9-10 After images of fire hoses and police dogs turned on protesters are shown on television, the Children's Crusade lays the groundwork for the terms of a negotiated truce on Thursday.
    1. May 9 An end to mass demonstrations in return for rolling back oppressive segregation laws and practices. MLK and Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth announce the terms of the settlement on Friday.
    2. May 10 Only after MLK holds out to orchestrate the release of thousands of jailed demonstrators with bail money from Harry Belafonte and Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy.
  10. May 13 In United States of America and Interstate Commerce Commission v. the City of Jackson, Mississippi et al., the United States Court of Appeals Fifth Circuit rules the city's attempt to circumvent laws desegregating interstate transportation facilities by posting sidewalk signs outside Greyhound, Trailways and Illinois Central terminals reading "Waiting Room for White Only By Order Police Department" and "Waiting Room for Colored Only By Order Police Department" to be unlawful.
  11. June 9 Fannie Lou Hamer is among several SNCC workers badly beaten by police in the Winona, Mississippi, jail after their bus stops there.
  12. June 11 "The Stand in the Schoolhouse Door": Alabama Governor George Wallace stands in front of a schoolhouse door at the University of Alabama in an attempt to stop desegregation by the enrollment of two black students, Vivian Malone and James Hood. Wallace only stands aside after being confronted by federal marshals, Deputy Attorney General Nicholas Katzenbach, and the Alabama National Guard. Later in life he apologizes for his opposition to racial integration then.
  13. June 11 President John F. Kennedy makes his historic civil rights speech, promising a bill to Congress the next week. About civil rights for "Negroes", in his speech he asks for "the kind of equality of treatment which we would want for ourselves."
  14. June 12 NAACP worker Medgar Evers is murdered in Jackson, Mississippi. (His killer is convicted in 1994.)
  15. Summer 80,000 blacks quickly register to vote in Mississippi by a test project to show their desire to participate.
  16. June 19 President Kennedy sends Congress (H. Doc. 124, 88th Cong., 1st session.) his proposed Civil Rights Act.
  17. August 28 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom is held. Dr. Martin Luther King gives his I Have a Dream speech.
  18. September 10 Birmingham, Alabama City Schools are integrated by National Guardsmen under orders from JFK.
  19. September 15 - 16th Street Baptist Church bombing in Birmingham kills four young girls. That same day, in response to the killings, James Bevel and Diane Nash begin the Alabama Project, which will later grow into the Selma Voting Rights Movement.

Courtesy of Wikipedia