‘The civil rights movement had the most impact at the grassroots.’ Discuss.

The civil rights movement was initiated at the ‘grassroots’ level, by which I mean by the mass of ordinary black Americans who came together to protest at the dire and systemic inequalities of their lives. The movement was unprecedented in this respect and as such gave birth to a mass awakening of consciousness within black communities. People who had previously been disenfranchised from politics and public life came together to demand equal rights. Black Americans, after hearing radical preachers at their churches in Alabama or engaging in ‘sit-ins’ at Greensboro in 1960 reported that their confidence and feeling of racial empowerment had never been higher. As such, the civil rights movement can definitely be said to have had its greatest impact at the grassroots.
However, these effects are largely unquantifiable in that they resulted in a ‘feeling’ or mass sentiment, rather than systemic change. The most tangible effects of the civil rights movement were it’s legal and political victories. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 are such evidence of long-term systemic change that was achieved not at the grassroots level, but at the top of America’s political pyramid. The entrenchment of voting rights and legal protections against segregation and discrimination in housing, voting rights and public spaces is arguably a far greater achievement than any psychological benefit because of its longevity. The de jure impact of the civil rights movement was, therefore, greater than its impact on the grassroots of American society.