In Chapter 17, of A People's History of the United States, how does government respond to the Civil Rights Movement?

Zinn states that the
federal government
responded to the question of Civil Rights in the 20th century by doing very

little to protect the people risking their lives in the movement. For example, during
the
Freedom Rides to New Orleans, the buses were torched in Alabama, and
activists were savagely
beaten. However, state police and the FBI did not
intervene. SNCC, or the Student Nonviolent
Coordinating Committee, asked for
protection from the Department of Justice for their ride from
Nashville to
Birmingham, but they were denied this protection. However, after they were
attacked
in Montgomery, Alabama, the government wanted to avert further
violence. District Attorney
Robert Kennedy agreed that authorities in
Jackson, Mississippi could arrest the protestors in
return for preventing a
mob from developing. 

By passing civil rights laws
in
1957, 1960, and 1964, Congress promised voting and economic equality but did not
necessarily
enforce these laws. As Zinn writes, the federal
government...