Civil rights movement

=== Soviet Union ===
There was an international context for the actions of the U.S. federal government during these years. The Soviet media frequently covered [[Racism in the United States|racial discrimination in the U.S.]]<ref>{{citation |url=http://www.themoscowtimes.com/news/article/soviet-propaganda-back-in-play-with-ferguson-coverage/511975.html |title=Soviet Propaganda Back in Play With Ferguson Coverage |last1=Quinn |first1=Allison |access-date=December 17, 2016 |date=November 27, 2014 |work=[[The Moscow Times]]}}</ref> Deeming American criticism of [[Human rights in the Soviet Union|its own human rights abuses]] hypocritical, the Soviet government would respond by stating "[[And you are lynching Negroes]]".<ref>{{citation |work=[[The Diplomat]] |access-date=December 17, 2016 |url=https://thediplomat.com/2015/05/the-history-behind-chinas-response-to-the-baltimore-riots/ |title=The History Behind China's Response to the Baltimore Riots |first=David |last=Volodzko |date=May 12, 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160428092343/https://thediplomat.com/2015/05/the-history-behind-chinas-response-to-the-baltimore-riots |archive-date=April 28, 2016 |quote=Soon Americans who criticized the Soviet Union for its human rights violations were answered with the famous tu quoque argument: 'A u vas negrov linchuyut' (and you are lynching Negroes).}}</ref> In his 1934 book ''Russia Today: What Can We Learn from It?'', [[Sherwood Eddy]] wrote: "In the most remote villages of Russia today Americans are frequently asked what they are going to do to the [[Scottsboro boys|Scottsboro Negro boys]] and why they lynch Negroes."<ref name=sherwoodeddy>{{citation |first=Sherwood |last=Eddy |title=Russia Today: What Can We Learn from It? |pages=73, 151 |publisher=Farrar & Rinehar |year=1934 |location=New York |oclc=1617454}}</ref>

In ''Cold War Civil Rights: Race and the Image of American Democracy'', the historian [[Mary L. Dudziak]] wrote that Communists who were critical of the United States accused it of practicing hypocrisy when it portrayed itself as the "leader of the free world," while so many of its citizens were being subjected to severe racial discrimination and violence; she argued that this was a major factor in moving the government to support civil rights legislation.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Cold War Civil Rights: Race and the Image of American Democracy|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=TyT1r03nTCAC&q=Cold+War+Civil+Rights:+Race+and+the+Image+of+American+Democracy|access-date=July 13, 2019|isbn = 978-0-691-15243-1|last1 = Dudziak|first1 = Mary L.|date = July 31, 2011| publisher=Princeton University Press }}</ref>