Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC)

The SCLC was founded in 1957 to coordinate the actions of civil rights protest groups in the South. Under Martin Luther King Jr., the organization coordinated black churches to achieve rights for African Americans via nonviolent methods. Following the Montgomery bus boycott, which incited the SCLC’s formation, Bayard Rustin wrote working papers to expand the tactics to other cities. The SCLC coordinated the actions of local committees throughout the South, and is known for the Crusade for Citizenship, its work in Birmingham and Selma, Alabama, and the March on Washington.