The 1950s and 60s were a turbulent era for the United States, and many other issues were affecting the country while Carl Stokes fought for each vote.
As the race between Carl Stokes and Seth Taft became closer and more heated, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. came to Cleveland in order to show his support for Stokes.
Unfair police practices, racial discrimination in the housing and job markets, and lack of government representations caused blacks to riot across the nation. In July of 1967, riots in Newark and Detroit caused sixty-six to be killed, thirty-five hundred to be injured, and six thousand to be arrested.
Footage of the Hough Riots in Cleveland- 1966