Civil Rights Champion

When she left the White House, ER shed the constraints it imposed on her civil rights activities. In 1945, she joined the boards of the NAACP and the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE). Soon she was lobbying President Truman to end the poll tax and establish a permanent Fair Employment Practices Commission. ER used her My Day column to criticize segregated schools and other racial injustices and to rally support for civil rights activists and court challenges. She helped raise money during the Montgomery bus boycott and drafted a civil rights platform plank at the 1956 Democratic Convention.

During her last years, ER became impatient with the pace of racial reform. The violence against the Freedom Riders in 1961 provoked her anger. She began identifying more strongly with activists who were struggling to end segregation through direct action.