The modern civil rights movement in America was directed and sustained by ministers and churches fervently proclaiming Judeo-Christian religious beliefs. Its leaders were mostly black ministers, who preached religious sermons inside and outside churches, insisting on promised rights. Its organizations were primarily black churches, along with an association of ministers; and the demonstrators were mostly their congregations. Though the movement’s base of support grew to include many who acted on other impulses, and its approach adopted tactics from Gandhi and others, the civil rights movement remained primarily a product of Judeo-Christian faith and its religious speech. Its religious speech was evident in the leadership by Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. He was "first and foremost ’a clergyman, a Baptist preacher,’ a Christian," and he led by the religious speech of sermons, addresses, books, interviews, and demonstrations. That can be seen in each of King’s major campaigns in the modern civil rights movement. Other leaders also advocated Judeo-Christian principles and nonviolence, through speeches and pamphlets, marches, and church rallies. The triumph of the modern civil rights movement came mostly from the religious speech of the larger religious wing of ministers and congregations, not of the much smaller secular wing.

Judeo-Christian faith and religious speech are increasingly excluded from the public square and from equal treatment compared to other belief systems. Challenges directed at religious faith and speech include arguments that speech relying on them should be excluded from the public square, that religious speech should not be protected by government, that religious speech should not be treated the same as other speech, and that instead it may be subjected to special restrictions. Similar challenges are increasingly aimed at freedom of speech generally. Yet Judeo-Christian faith and associated speech have given many valuable legacies to the world. The most acknowledged ones are much of freedom of religious exercise and other human rights, great art and architecture, great music and literature, hospitals and charities, and education and science. However, it is not widely acknowledged that Judeo-Christian faith and religious speech growing out of it were major forces behind at least six other expansions of human rights or freedoms: freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedoms of accused criminals, higher education, abolition of slavery, and the modern civil rights movement. These legacies came from various segments of Judeo-Christian faith: Puritans and Levellers, Roman Catholics, Evangelical Protestants, and Liberal Protestants and African-American Churches.