Overview

The Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) is an American civil rights organization established in 1957 by Black ministers, civil rights leaders, and allied organizers. It emerged from the success of the Montgomery Bus Boycott and was created to coordinate nonviolent civil rights campaigns throughout the American South.

The organization drew heavily upon the leadership, meeting spaces, communication networks, financial support, and moral authority of Black churches. Under the presidency of the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., the SCLC became one of the principal organizations of the modern Civil Rights Movement.

Historical Conditions

The SCLC was formed during a period in which racial segregation, Black disenfranchisement, discriminatory policing, unequal public services, and racial violence remained entrenched throughout much of the United States. In the South, Jim Crow laws and local customs separated Black and White residents in transportation, education, housing, employment, voting, and public accommodations.

Although legal organizations had secured important court victories, many civil rights leaders concluded that litigation alone could not dismantle segregation. They sought a regional organization capable of supporting mass participation, coordinated protest, voter registration, economic pressure, and nonviolent direct action.

Formation

1955–1956: The Montgomery Bus Boycott

The immediate foundation for the SCLC was the Montgomery Bus Boycott. The boycott began in December 1955 after Rosa Parks was arrested for refusing to surrender her seat under Montgomery's segregated bus system. The Montgomery Improvement Association organized the protest and selected Martin Luther King Jr. as its president.

The boycott lasted more than a year and demonstrated that disciplined, church-supported, nonviolent mass action could sustain community participation and force institutional change. Its success encouraged movement leaders to consider how the Montgomery model could be coordinated across the South.

January 10–11, 1957: Atlanta Conference

Martin Luther King Jr., C. K. Steele, and Fred Shuttlesworth issued a call for Southern Black leaders to meet at Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta. The gathering was known as the Southern Negro Leaders Conference on Transportation and Nonviolent Integration.

Participants discussed common problems, regional coordination, integrated transportation, mutual assistance, and the use of nonviolent action. They agreed that a continuing organization was needed to connect local protest movements and to expand the struggle beyond Montgomery.

February 13–14, 1957: New Orleans Meeting

The leaders reconvened at New Zion Baptist Church in New Orleans. They established a more permanent organization, adopted the shortened name Southern Leaders Conference, and elected Martin Luther King Jr. as president.

August 1957: Adoption of the SCLC Name

At a meeting in Montgomery, the organization adopted the name Southern Christian Leadership Conference. The word “Christian” reflected its roots in Black churches, its moral interpretation of the civil rights struggle, and its commitment to nonviolence.

The organization established its headquarters in Atlanta and developed a regional network of churches, local movements, ministers, and affiliated organizations rather than relying primarily upon individual memberships.

Founding Members and Organizational Architects

The SCLC was created through a coalition of ministers, local movement leaders, strategists, and organizers. Historical accounts may differ in how they define a “founder,” because the organization developed through several meetings during 1957. The following individuals were among its principal founders and early architects.

Principal Founders and Officers

Key Organizational Architects

Other Early Leaders

Other early officers, participants, advisers, and movement partners included A. L. Davis, I. M. Augustine, E. D. Nixon, Septima Poinsette Clark, Dorothy Cotton, Kelly Miller Smith, Wyatt Tee Walker, and leaders of local organizations affiliated with the new conference.

Stated Purpose

Original Purpose

The SCLC was formed as a coordinating body for local civil rights organizations using nonviolent protest. Its original purpose was to unite Southern movement leaders, share resources and strategy, support local campaigns, challenge segregation, and expand the democratic participation of Black citizens.

Its founding objectives included:

Moral and Religious Purpose

The organization framed racial injustice as both a political problem and a moral crisis. It sought to awaken the conscience of the nation, expose the contradiction between segregation and democratic principles, and build what King described as the Beloved Community.

SCLC leaders frequently described their mission as an effort to redeem the soul of America through disciplined nonviolent resistance, reconciliation, justice, and social transformation.

Modern Stated Identity

The National SCLC describes itself as a civil rights organization rooted in the Black church and the Christian tradition of nonviolence. It states that its continuing work is guided by the principles of Legacy, Leadership, and Love and directed toward justice, voting rights, economic access, education, public policy, leadership development, human dignity, and the construction of the Beloved Community.

Structure and Operating Model

Unlike a conventional organization built chiefly around individual national memberships, the SCLC initially operated as a conference of affiliated local organizations, churches, ministers, and protest movements. This structure allowed local leaders to retain control of their campaigns while receiving regional coordination, training, publicity, fundraising assistance, and national leadership.

The Black church served as the organization's principal institutional base. Churches supplied meeting places, trusted leaders, transportation networks, financial contributions, mass audiences, and a language of moral obligation that could sustain participation under dangerous conditions.

Methods and Strategy

Major Campaigns and Historical Development

Crusade for Citizenship

The SCLC's first major program was the Crusade for Citizenship, launched in 1957 and 1958. It sought to expand Black voter registration and develop local volunteers capable of conducting political education and registration campaigns.

Citizenship Schools

Through the work of educators and organizers including Septima Clark and Dorothy Cotton, the SCLC expanded citizenship schools that taught literacy, civic knowledge, voter-registration skills, and community leadership.

Albany Movement

In 1961 and 1962, the SCLC joined local activists and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee in Albany, Georgia. Although the campaign did not produce an immediate comprehensive victory, it provided operational lessons about leadership, objectives, media strategy, negotiation, and the selection of campaign targets.

Birmingham Campaign

In 1963, the SCLC joined Fred Shuttlesworth's local movement in Birmingham, Alabama. Demonstrations, boycotts, mass arrests, and the violent response of local authorities attracted national attention and increased pressure for federal civil rights legislation.

March on Washington

The SCLC participated with other major civil rights, labor, and religious organizations in the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, where King delivered his “I Have a Dream” address.

St. Augustine and Selma

The SCLC supported the 1964 campaign against segregation in St. Augustine, Florida, and became a central participant in the 1965 Selma voting-rights campaign. The Selma movement and the violent attack known as Bloody Sunday helped build national support for the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

Chicago Freedom Movement

In 1966, the SCLC expanded its work into Chicago to confront housing discrimination, residential segregation, poverty, and unequal urban conditions.

Poor People's Campaign

King and the SCLC organized the Poor People's Campaign to address poverty, employment, housing, and economic inequality across racial and regional lines. The campaign continued in Washington, D.C., after King's assassination in 1968.

Memphis Sanitation Strike

In 1968, King and the SCLC supported striking Black sanitation workers in Memphis, Tennessee. King was assassinated in Memphis while assisting the campaign.

Leadership After Martin Luther King Jr.

Following King's assassination, Ralph Abernathy became president and continued the Poor People's Campaign. Joseph Lowery later led the organization for two decades and expanded its work on voting, economic justice, peace, and public policy. Subsequent leaders continued the SCLC as a civil rights and human rights organization.

Institutional Significance

The SCLC transformed the organizational resources of Black churches into a regional system for coordinated civil resistance. Its principal contribution was not merely the leadership of one individual, but the integration of moral authority, mass participation, nonviolent discipline, local organization, national publicity, and political pressure.

The organization helped demonstrate that local campaigns could be connected to a national strategy and that civil rights protest could alter public opinion, institutional behavior, federal policy, and the enforcement of constitutional rights.

Selected References