​Freedom Summer, or the Mississippi Summer Project, was a 1964 voter registration drive aimed at increasing the number of registered black voters in Mississippi. Over 700 mostly white volunteers joined African Americans in Mississippi to fight against voter intimidation and discrimination at the polls. The movement was organized by civil rights organizations like the Congress on Racial Equality (CORE) and the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and run by the local Council of Federated Organizations (COFO). Freedom Summer volunteers were met with violent resistance from the Ku Klux Klan and members of state and local law enforcement. News coverage of beatings, false arrests and even murder drew international attention to the civil rights movement.  (History Channel)

b o b  m o s e s  |  L e a d e r  o f  s n c c 

Moses began working with civil rights activists in 1960, becoming field secretary for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). As director of the SNCC's Mississippi Project in 1961, Moses traveled too Pike County and Amite County to try to register black voters.

White Democrats had disfranchised Mississippi's blacks in their 1890 constitution, which required poll taxes, and other barriers, such as residency requirements, and subjective literacy tests. It was nearly impossible for blacks to register and vote. After decades of violence and repression under Jim Crow, by the 1960s most blacks did not bother trying to register. In 1965, only one African American among 5500 in Amite County was registered to vote.

Moses faced nearly relentless violence and official intimidation, and was beaten and arrested in Amite County. He was the first African American to challenge white violence, and filed assault charges against his attacker.

By 1964 Moses had become co-director of the Council of Federated Organizations (COFO), an umbrella organization for the major civil rights groups working in Mississippi. A major leader with SNCC, he was the main organizer of COFO's Freedom Summer project, which was intended to achieve widespread voter registration of blacks in Mississippi, and ultimately, end racial disfranchisement. They planned education and organizing, and a simplified registration system, to demonstrate African-American desire to vote. Moses was one of the calm leaders who kept the group focused.
How does leadership make a difference in a movement?  What was the importance of Bob Moses' role in Freedom Summer?  
Watch the following documentary  and then complete a journal entry.
In this Journal Entry, reflect on the emotions, reactions, responses you have to the documentary you watched above.  What was the impact or importance of Freedom Summer - and how do you think the events of this summer impacted the Civil Rights movement at large?