Montgomery Bus Boycott - Black History - HISTORY.com Montgomery Bus Boycott A+E Networks Introduction The Montgomery Bus Boycott, in which African Americans refused to ride city buses in Montgomery, Alabama, to protest segregated seating, took place from December 5, 1955, to December 20, 1956, and is regarded as the first large-scale demonstration against segregation in the U.S. On December 1, 1955, four days before the boycott began, Rosa Parks, an African-American woman, refused to yield her seat to a white man on a Montgomery bus. She was arrested and fined. The boycott of public buses by blacks in Montgomery began on the day of Parks’ court hearing and lasted 381 days. The U.S. Supreme Court ultimately ordered Montgomery to integrate its bus system, and one of the leaders of the boycott, a young pastor named Martin Luther King Jr. (1929-68), emerged as a prominent national leader of the American civil rights movement in the wake of the action.

Google Montgomery Bus Boycott: Parks Refuses to Yield Bus Seat In 1955, African Americans were still required by a Montgomery, Alabama , city ordinance to sit in the back half of city buses and to yield their seats to white riders if the front half of the bus, reserved for whites, was full. On December 1, 1955, African-American seamstress Rosa Parks (1913-2005) was returning home from her job at a local department store on the Cleveland Avenue bus. She was seated in the front row of the “colored section.” When the white seats filled, the driver, J. Fred Blake (1912-2002), asked Parks and three others to vacate their seats. The other African-American riders complied, but Parks refused. She was arrested and fined $10, plus $4 in court fees. This was not Parks’ first encounter with Blake. In 1943, she had paid her fare at the front of a bus he was driving, then exited so she could re-enter through the back door, as required. Blake pulled away before she could re-board the bus. Did You Know?

Nine months before Rosa Parks' arrest for refusing to give up her bus seat, 15-year-old Claudette Colvin (1939-) was arrested in Montgomery for the same act. The city's black leaders prepared to protest, until it was discovered Colvin was pregnant and deemed an inappropriate symbol for their cause. Although Parks has sometimes been depicted as a woman with no history of civil rights activism at the time of her arrest, she and her husband, Raymond (1903-77), were, in fact, active in the local chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People ( NAACP ), and Parks served as its secretary. Upon her arrest, Parks called E.D. Nixon (1899-1987), a prominent black leader, who bailed her out of jail and determined she would be an upstanding and sympathetic plaintiff in a legal challenge of the segregation ordinance. African-American leaders decided to attack the ordinance using other tactics as well. The Women’s Political Council (WPC), a group of black women working for civil rights, began circulating flyers calling for a boycott of the bus system on December 5, the day Parks would be tried in municipal court.

Montgomery Bus Boycott: African Americans Mobilize As news of the boycott spread, African-American leaders across Montgomery, Alabama’s capital city, began lending their support. Black ministers announced the boycott in church on Sunday, December 4, and the Montgomery Advertiser, a general-interest newspaper, published a front-page article on the planned action. Approximately 40,000 African-American bus riders–the majority of the city’s black bus riders–boycotted the system the next day. On the afternoon of December 5, black leaders met to form the Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA). The group elected Martin Luther King Jr. (1929-68), the 26-year-old-pastor of Montgomery’s Dexter Avenue Baptist Church, as its president, and decided to continue the boycott until the city met its demands. Initially, the demands did not include changing the segregation laws; rather, the group demanded courtesty, the hiring of black drivers, and a first-come, first-seated policy, with whites entering and filling seats from the front and African Americans from the rear. Ultimately, however, a group of five Montgomery women, represented by attorney Fred D.

Gray (1932-) and the NAACP, sued the city in U.S. District Court, seeking to have the busing segregation laws invalidated. Although African Americans represented at least 75 percent of Montgomery’s bus ridership, the city resisted complying with the MIA’s demands. To ensure the boycott could be sustained, black leaders organized carpools, and the city’s African-American taxi drivers charged only 10 cents–the same price as bus fare–for African-American riders. Many black residents chose simply to walk to work and other destinations. Black leaders organized regular mass meetings to keep African-American residents mobilized around the boycott. Montgomery Bus Boycott: Integration at Last On June 5, 1956, a Montgomery federal court ruled that any law requiring racially segregated seating on buses violated the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. That amendment, adopted in 1868 following the American Civil War (1861-65), guarantees all citizens, regardless of race, equal rights and equal protection under state and federal laws. The city appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, which upheld the lower court’s decision on December 20, 1956.

Montgomery’s buses were integrated on December 21, 1956, and the boycott ended. It had lasted 381 days. Integration met with significant resistance and even violence. While the buses themselves were integrated, Montgomery maintained segregated bus stops. Snipers began firing into buses, and one shattered both legs of a pregnant African-American passenger. In January 1957, four black churches and the homes of prominent black leaders were bombed; a bomb at King’s house was defused. On January 30, 1957, the Montgomery police arrested seven bombers; all were members of the Ku Klux Klan , a white supremacist group. The arrests largely brought an end to the busing-related violence. Boycott Puts King in Spotlight The Montgomery Bus Boycott was significant on several fronts. First, it is widely regarded as the earliest mass protest on behalf of civil rights in the U.S., setting the stage for additional large-scale actions outside the court system to bring about fair treatment for African Americans. Second, in his leadership of the MIA, Martin Luther King emerged as a prominent national leader of the civil rights movement while also solidifying his commitment to nonviolent resistance.

King’s approach remained a hallmark of the civil rights movement throughout the 1960s. Shortly after the boycott’s end, he helped found the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), a highly influential civil rights organization that worked to end segregation throughout the South. The SCLC was influential in the civil rights campaign in Birmingham, Alabama, in the spring of 1963, and the March on Washington in August of that same year, during which King delivered his famous “I Have a Dream” speech. The boycott also brought national and international attention to the civil rights struggles occurring in the U.S., as more than 100 reporters visited Montgomery during the boycott to profile the effort and its leaders. Rosa Parks, while shying from the spotlight throughout her life, remained an esteemed figure in the history of American civil rights activism. In 1999, the U.S. Congress awarded her its highest honor, the Congressional Gold Medal. Tags What If Rosa Parks Didn't Move to the Back of the Bus - The Henry Ford I Don’t Move to the Back of the Bus? I Don’t Move to the Back of the Bus?

Rosa Parks brought together a unique blend of life experiences, a commitment to racial justice, and a flawless reputation to transform a single act of defiance into a defining moment for the modern American civil rights movement. The time had just come when I had been pushed as far as I could stand to be pushed, I suppose. I had decided that I would have to know, once and for all, what rights I had as a human being, and a citizen. Rosa Parks Sparking a Social Transformation It’s one of the most famous moments in modern American civil rights history: On a chilly December evening in 1955, on a busy street in the capital of Alabama, a 42-year-old seamstress boarded a segregated city bus to return home after a long day of work, taking a seat near the middle, just behind the front “white” section. At the next stop, more passengers got on. When every seat in the white section was taken, the bus driver ordered the black passengers in the middle row to stand so a white man could sit. The seamstress refused.

Rosa Parks Bus Details Rosa Parks’ defiance of an unfair segregation law, which required black passengers to defer to any white person who needed a seat by giving up their own, forever changed race relations in America. She was not the first African American to do this. In fact, two other black women had previously been arrested on buses in Montgomery and were considered by civil rights advocates as potential touchpoints for challenging the law. However, both women were rejected because community leaders felt they would not gain support. Rosa Parks, with her flawless character, quiet strength, and moral fortitude, was seen as an ideal candidate. And those community leaders were right: Rosa Parks’ subsequent arrest by local police sparked a collective and sustained community response. As one young Montgomery resident said at the time, city officials had “messed with the wrong one now.” The boycott of public buses by blacks in Montgomery lasted 381 days, marking the country’s first large-scale demonstration against segregation. The boycott ultimately led the U.S. Supreme Court to outlaw racial segregation on public buses in Alabama. It also spurred more non-violent protests in other cities and catapulted a young Baptist minister named Martin Luther King, Jr., into prominence as a leader of the civil rights movement.

The movement and the laws it prompted, including the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965, are one of the greatest social revolutions in modern American history. President Obama, among many others, credits Rosa Parks’ “singular act of disobedience” with launching a civil rights movement that lasts to this day. “Rosa Parks tells us there’s always something we can do,” he said during a 2013 ceremony to unveil a statue of Parks at the U.S. Capitol, where she is honored alongside past presidents, members of Congress, and military leaders. “She tells us that we all have responsibilities, to ourselves and to one another.” Deciphering the Meaning of Uncommon Courage Much has been written and celebrated about Rosa Parks’ courage. Type both her name and that enviable attribute into Google and you’ll turn up more than 500,000 sources—everything from biographies (Courageous Citizen, A Life of Courage, and The Courage to Make a Difference, to name a few) to TV and film documentaries and historical and journalistic accounts. When the U.S.

Postal Service issued a stamp in her honor in 2013, on what would have been her 100th birthday ( an event that took place at The Henry Ford as part of a National Day of Courage celebration), the design prominently featured “courage” alongside her portrait. If we travel back in time to the December evening in 1955 when Rosa Parks boarded that city bus, we can begin to glimpse just why her courage was so extraordinary. We know from her account of the event that she made her defiant decision in an instant. It took tremendous courage. But it took even more courage for her to stand by her decision in the minutes, days, and years that followed. To understand why, board bus No. 2857 assigned to the Cleveland Avenue route that December night. That very bus, painstakingly restored , is now parked inside Henry Ford Museum, and open to everyone. Enter through the front door and picture the scene from years ago: Most of the front 10 seats reserved for whites are occupied, as are the 10 seats at the rear marked with a sign for the “colored” section. See the overhead light shining down on the green-cushioned seat in the middle?

Settle yourself here, just as Rosa Parks did. We know from many accounts that Rosa Parks recognized the bus driver—he had humiliated her and other black riders over the years. Twelve years earlier, in fact, she’d even had a personal confrontation with him when he demanded that she exit the bus and board through the rear door (on that occasion, she had relented; when she stepped off, the driver promptly sped away before she could board in the rear). She also knew that this man, who threatened to have her arrested, carried a pistol in his holster. She was aware of recent racial atrocities, including the mistreatment of another black woman, Claudette Colvin, for not giving up her seat, and the death earlier that summer of 14-year-old Emmett Till from a lynching. Let your imagination revisit the moments that unfolded as the flustered bus driver pointedly asked her, “Are you going to stand up?” As one of her biographers, Douglas Brinkley , observed, Rosa Parks in that moment felt fearless, bold, and serene. She looked straight at the bus driver and said, “No.” Three other black riders sat in the same row, one next to Rosa Parks, the other two across the aisle.

When the bus driver again demanded that all four passengers give up their seats, the three other riders reluctantly got up. All the black riders were now at the back, all the whites at the front. Rosa Parks sat between them, a brave solitary figure marking the painful boundary between races. “As I sat there, I tried not to think about what might happen,” she wrote in her autobiography . “I knew that anything was possible. I could be manhandled or beaten. I could be arrested. People have asked me if it occurred to me then that I could be the test case the NAACP [National Association for the Advancement of Colored People] had been looking for. I did not think about that at all. In fact if I had let myself think too deeply about what might happen to me, I might have gotten off the bus.” The time had just come when I had been pushed as far as I could stand to be pushed, I suppose. I had decided that I would have to know, once and for all, what rights I had as a human being, and a citizen.

Rosa Parks (February 4, 1913–October 24, 2005) In that moment between “might have” and “didn’t,” her courage began to transform into something extraordinary. As Brinkley observed, “A lifetime’s education in justice—from her grandfather’s nightly vigils to the murder of Emmett Till—had strengthened her resolve to act when the time came. What arose in Parks on that fateful evening was her belief in what Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., often said: that ‘some of us must bear the burden of trying to save the soul of America.’” Rosa Parks later put it this way: “When I made that decision, I knew that I had the strength of my ancestors with me." Tracing the Long History of Racial Inequality "To understand the real risks Rosa Parks faced in refusing to give up her seat,” says Donna Braden, Curator of Public Life at The Henry Ford, “we must explore the nature of segregated travel in the ‘Jim Crow South.'" “Jim Crow” laws enforcing racial segregation in southern U.S. states were first enacted in the 1880s by angry and resentful whites against freed African Americans.

Favoring whites and repressing blacks became an institutionalized form of inequality. And, by 1896, with the Plessy v. Ferguson case, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that states had the legal power to require segregation between blacks and whites. "Negro Motorist Green Book, An International Travel Guide," 1949 Details Travel in the segregated South was particularly humiliating for African Americans, beginning with railroads back in the 19th century, where blacks of all economic classes were generally relegated to the most uncomfortable cars just behind the locomotive—and also, should a collision or boiler explosion occur, the most dangerous. With the arrival of affordable automobiles, it seemed southern blacks might escape the indignities of long-distance rail travel. But that didn’t happen: service stations and roadside restrooms were usually closed to them. As a result, black motorists often resorted to stashing buckets or portable toilets in their trunks. They also brought food along with them, since many diners and restaurants turned away black customers. There was similar discrimination with roadside motels, and blacks had to depend on the hospitality of fellow blacks or chance the discovery of a “Negro” rooming house.

From the late 19th through the mid-20th centuries, segregation laws in Southern states separated African Americans and whites in almost every aspect of public life—from railroad cars and schools to restrooms and drinking fountains. Varying from state to state, these laws were supposed to establish facilities that were "separate but equal." In reality, these were almost never equal. The laws on city transit systems separating blacks and whites were equally humiliating—and often arbitrary. By 1905, every southern state had outlawed blacks from sitting next to whites on trolleys and streetcars, while it was left to the whims of individual conductors whether black passengers were ordered to move from this or that seat. By the 1950s, black passengers were enduring the same unjust treatment by city bus drivers. Bus drivers could demand more seats for whites at any time and in any number. And drivers often forced black riders, once they had paid their fare, to get off the bus and re-enter through the back door—sometimes driving away without them, as had happened to Rosa Parks. Those who didn’t comply with these rules could be verbally abused, slapped, knocked on the floor, pushed out the door, beaten, or even killed.

As stories of abusive drivers and humiliating incidents continued to spread, anger in the black community grew. However, most of the time, the indignities went unchallenged. “Expecting African Americans to resist these long-established laws and traditions,” Braden notes, “meant asking them to risk great harm and to summon an extraordinary amount of personal courage.” The Legacy of One Courageous Woman Rosa Parks' awareness of social injustice started at an early age. Growing up in Alabama, where she was born in 1913, she hated the disrespectful way that whites often treated black people. Her grandfather, a former slave, instilled a sense of pride and independence in her. Her life took a radical turn when she married Raymond Parks, a self-educated activist (she once called him the “first real activist I ever met”) who encouraged her to work as a secretary at the local branch of the NAACP. Contrary to early portraits of Parks as a timid, tired seamstress who became an accidental figure in sparking the civil rights movement, she had years of training and experience as a civil rights advocate challenging racial injustice. This famous photograph was taken on December 21, 1956, a day after the U.S.

Supreme Court ruled Montgomery's segregated bus system illegal. As historian Jeanne Theoharis notes in her substantive biography, The Rebellious Life of Mrs. Rosa Parks , “If we follow the actual Rosa Parks—see her decades of community activism before the boycott; take notice of the determination, terror, and loneliness of her bus stand and her steadfast work during the year of the boycott; and see her political work continue for decades following the boycott’s end—we encounter a much different ‘mother of the civil rights movement.’” Not long after that December day in 1955, Rosa Parks told a radio interviewer that she had acted because the “time had just come when I had been pushed as far as I could stand to be pushed, I suppose. I had decided that I would have to know, once and for all, what rights I had as a human being, and a citizen.” She stood alone on that day in her willingness to face great risks, just as she did in the years after as she continued to face great burdens. She and her husband lost their jobs, she received threatening phone calls, and her marriage became strained.

In 1957, she fled Montgomery for Detroit, where she eventually found steady employment working for Congressman John Conyers until her retirement in 1988. It wasn’t until nearly three decades after her bus stand that she was recognized as a significant figure in the civil rights movement, as notable as Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Rosa Parks is not an innovator in the traditional sense, nor would she have considered herself to be one. Yet, her simple, spontaneous act embodies the notion of social transformation—that a new idea or way of doing things can have such far-reaching impact that it renders old ways obsolete and radically alters how people think about themselves, their social interactions, and their place in the larger world. MONTGOMERY BUS BOYCOTT MONTGOMERY BUS BOYCOTT by Aryn Moulton, Nicole Phillips, Sabrina Styza and Sandy Gonzales In this web page we will be telling people about the Montgomery Bus Boycott. Rosa Parks, a black woman, refused to give up her seat to a white man. This triggered the Montgomery Bus Boycott, which ended bus segregation. This web page is to inform people about the events of the Bus Boycott.

Below is a computer simulation to visually show and give an understanding of what happened in the Boycott. We all took John Zola's Protest and Reform History class. With this web page and simulation we would like to share what we have learned. HISTORY OF THE MONTGOMERY BUS BOYCOTT On December 1, 1955 Rosa Parks, a 40 year old black seamstress, was arrested for refusing to give up her seat to a white man on the bus. "...the only tired I was, was tired of giving in," says Rosa Parks. She was lso part of an organization, called the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.) The NAACP played a huge role in trying to stop segregation. The NAACP was looking for someone that would stand up to the court system in a test case. Before Rosa Parks was chosen for the test case, there were two women befor her that were arrested for not giving up their seats, and the NAACP tried to use them for a test case aswell. Neither of these women proved to be suitable candidates for the test case that would end segregation.

The day Rosa Parks was arrested for refusing to give up her seat, the NAACP knew that she was the perfent test case. After Rosa Parks was taken to jail and fingerprinted she was allowed one phone call, which she made to her Reverend, E.B Nixon. He was the president of the NAACP in Montgomery, Alabama. Nixon called the Washington D.C. NAACP, who decided that they needed to "move on it today. " The next calls were to Reverend A. Philip Randolph and Reverend Martin L. King. From there, they decided they were going to hold an eight o'clock meeting at the local Baptist church in Montgomery. That night, they agreed that they were going to start the protest on December 5, the day of Rosa Parks' trial. The next day, flyers were passed out to every black elementary, junior high, and high school in Montgomery, that announced a protest to be held December 5 in front of the court house. There were also signs posted on every bus stop, that read, "Don't ride the bus today, don't ride it for freedom." This was the beginning of the Montgomery Bus Boycott, which effected U.S. history, and specifically rights for blacks, forever.

The protest challenged the policy of bus segregation. On the day of Rosa Parks trial almost the whole black community did not ride the busses at all. The protest really hurt the bus systems. More than 66% of the riders on the busses were blacks, therefore, most of the income for the bus company came from black riders. On the morning of December 5, when they stopped riding the busses, Coretta King looked out her window and yelled to her husband, Martin Luther King, that the busses were empty. They both knew that the Boycott was going to change the way blacks were treated. The black community did not use violence to protest bus segregation, they used a non-violent protest. They simply stopped using the bus system to show that they weren't going to be treated unfairly, by the community , government and bus system. Every week the black community would meet at the First Baptist Church and have a meeting about the protest. These gatherings were the inspiration and the backbone of the Boycott. The white community did not like the protest and tried to stop it many times. The black people would not fight back when white people would try to start a fight with them, and this was very powerful.

When they would be car pooling to their destinations, cops would pull them over and say it was against the law to drive an un-authorized taxi. The K.K.K. would raid through the black neighborhoods and yell and humiliate the black community. In response, the blacks sat on their porches and all clapped together. The K.K.K. then turned to violence for intimidation. They bombed Martin Luther King Jr.'s and E.B. Nixon's house. Then, the police started arresting the blacks for no reason. However, this did not stop blacks from protesting. They remained non-violent and because of this method they won in the end. After 381 days of boycotting the busses they went to the Supreme Court to prove that it was not legal to segregate blacks from whites on public transportation. Eventually, the Supreme Court ruled that it was unconstitutional to separate people based on their race. When the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the blacks, they knew it was going to change their way of life. This victory inspired blacks to challenge other segregation issues all the way to the Supreme Court. This Boycott ended something horrible and started something wonderful. They really accomplished a lot.

The proof of how things have changed is shown in the improved rights of black people today. They stopped segregation on busses, and it gave them a chance to stop segregation in other public establishments. The black community of Montgomery proved that having a non-violent protest can create positive change. They provided a starting point in the fight for racial equality. click here and people can see pictures from the Bus Boycott GUIDE TO GETTING AND USING THE SIMULATION Since our simulation contains videos, you can not run it online (for the time being). You need to have the AgentSheets application on your Mac and then download our project: Visit AgentSheets Inc. to get the AgentSheets Application Click to download our Montgomery Bus Boycott simulation . Please note that this is a huge file (~14.5MB) and it may take a while to download. To begin the simulation, press the Run button at the top left hand side of the worksheet screen. To add new agents in the simulation, select an agent from the Gallery, and then click on the worksheet screen where you'll find the "Pencil Tool" to click on, to draw the agent wherever you like.

To erase an agent, select the "Eraser Tool" and then click on the agent you want erased. To stop the simulation, press the Stop button located to the left of the Run button. Tips for using this simulation: 1. Run the simulation once and see how it works before you manipulate it. 2. Pay close attention to the busses, bus stops and video clips, and their chronology. Try removing Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. 3. Try removing Rosa Parks. What do you observe? 4. Take out the Church and see what changes. DESCRIPTION OF AGENTS Cop The cop agents play the part of the policemen in history that arrested Rosa Parks for not standing up for a white man, on the bus, Thursday, December 1, 1955. Not only that, but the policemen also represent the many obstacles and the people who got in the way of the boycott. Many things were don to disterb the Boycott. Boycotters were arrested on the sidewalks for disterbing public areas, and the KKK, as well as other organizations were all trying to defeat the boycott. Thankfully none succeeded. Bus Stops The bus stop agents explain themselves; they are the places where the bus stops.

In more detail, the bus stop agents represent that after certain events people stoped riding the busses. The bus stops also play a significant role in history. More than 66% of the bus riders were black, yet there were very few bus stops in the black neighborhoods, while there was one on every corner in the white neighborhoods. Many black people had to walk miles to the nearest stop. This was one very significant sign of segregation and discrimination towards the black community. There also were signs placed on the bus stops informing people of the boycott. Bus Driver The bus driver agent plays the specific part of James Blake, the bus driver that got Rosa Parks arrested in 1955. Cars The car agents represent the many people who helped the boycott. Without the busses people had no way of getting around and many people had jobs, school, or some other place to be that was too far to walk to. Those with cars helped these people out. There was a variety of people car pooling. Whites, blacks, the old, the young, college students; everyone was helping. Court House The court house is where the boycott began.

The day after Rosa Parks' arrest, flyers were handed out to every black school in Montgomery informing people to meet at the court house and protest Rosa Parks' arrest. On Monday December 5, 1955 the steps to the court house was filled with protesters. This was the day the black ans white people of Montgomery stopped riding the busses. The same court house agent also represents the Supreme Court, where segregation on busses was ruled in violation of the constitution and was made illegal. Dr. Martin Luther King Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was the young reverend that was asked to lead the bus boycott. He truly set the tone of non-violent resistance. He rejected hate and violence, and embraced self-respect and love. His most powerful influence on this movement was as a result of the speeches he gave every week at the First Baptist Church. He inspired the African-American people to fight for their freedom in a way that didn't destroy the dignity and was carried out with justice and peace. The purpose of having him in our simulation is to symbolize his leadership and impact on the success of the boycott. The people of Montgomery were strong and determined to boycott the busses. Dr.

King held their spirits up with his contagious enthusiasm, allowing them to stand together. From this, they were able to create a positive change in the way society treated them that would impact history. Rosa Parks Rosa Parks plays a big role in the boycott. She is the one who started the whole protest. It all started when Rosa Parks got on a public bus and headed home from work. Back then it was the law that any black person had to give up their seat for any white person that wanted to sit down. Not expecting to cause any trouble, Rosa was asked to move out of her seat and sit in the back of the bus. She refused to give up her seat and then later was arrested. Rosa Parks was part of an organized civil rights movement that was called the N.A.A.C.P. Four days after Rosa Parks was arrested, the group organized and announced the boycott that would last 381 days. The simulation shows how Rosa Parks was arrested by a policeman. Also, there is a video clip of Rosa in an interview explaining what happened when she refused to give up her seat. White People The white people took a big part in causing the boycott to happen.

It was the law that any black person had to give up their seat for a white person. Also, blacks had different schools, drinking fountains, and bathrooms from whites. In the simulation it shows how Rosa Parks gets on the bus, and the bus driver asks Rosa to give up her seat for a white man. She refuses and then is arrested for disobeying the law. Black People In the 50s, white people felt that having dark skin was morally wrong. They made it against the law for blacks to sit in the front kof the bus. For years blacks were trying to stop segregation. Different people attempted different methods to end the segregation. Nothing worked until Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat. The NAACP, organized black people to boycott the busses. The blacks walked and arranged rides rather then ride the bus. The U.S Supreme Court then ended the bus segregation, which led to more protests to end other segregation between blacks and whites. In the simulation it shows how blacks are first getting on and off the busses. After Rosa Parks is arrested the blacks are shown at a church listening to Dr. Martin Luther King speak. During the boycott it shows more car pools involving blacks and fewer people riding the busses and more people walking.

Then, after the boycott, there is a video of Dr. Martin Luther King sitting in the front of the bus while whites are sitting around him, showing that the boycott is over. Busses The busses were a main tool that started and ended the boycott. Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on a public bus while heading home from work. It was known that more blacks than whites rode the busses before the boycott began. The Boycott got fewer people riding the busses, so they lost money and had to raise the bus fee. In the simulation it shows how the bus goes around a couple times and then picks up Rosa Parks. Rosa Parks refuses to give up her seat and then is arrested. Then the bus has three major stops that all show a video of events that took place during the boycott. Church The church was a place where the boycotters would meet and talk about the boycott. That was a place for Dr. Martin Luther King to speak his words of wisdom to the black community. It is shown on the simulation how the bus stops at the church after Rosa Parks is arrested. There is a video of Dr. Martin Luther King talking, and a large crowd appluading at him after he speaks.

Rosa Parks Refuses to Give Up Seat on Bus | World History Project Rosa Parks Refuses to Give Up Seat on Bus “ I did not get on the bus to get arrested; I got on the bus to go home. ” — Rosa Parks Source: From Rosa Parks with Gregory J. Reed, Quiet Strength (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Pub. House, 1994), 23. Added by: Brian Hand On the evening of December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks, an African American, was arrested for disobeying an Alabama law requiring black passengers to relinquish seats to white passengers when the bus was full. Blacks also were required to sit at the back of the bus. Her arrest sparked a 381-day boycott of the Montgomery bus system and led to a 1956 Supreme Court decision banning segregation on public transportation. Rosa McCauley was born on February 4, 1913, in Tuskegee, Alabama. In 1932, she married Raymond Parks and with his encouragement earned a high school diploma.

The couple was active in the Montgomery Chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). While working as a seamstress, Mrs. Parks served as chapter secretary and, for a time, as advisor to the NAACP Youth Council. Denied the right to vote on at least two occasions because of her race, Rosa Parks also worked with the Voters League in preparing blacks to register. Source: Library of Congress Added by: Brian Hand On 1 December 1955, after her day of work as a seamstress at a local department store, Parks boarded a city bus. When she refused to give up her seat to a white man, the bus driver called police, and Parks was arrested and fined. Source: Who2, written and edited by R.F. Holznagel and Paul Hehn, Who2, LLC, Added by: bob armour RECOGNIZING 50TH ANNIVERSARY OF ROSA LOUISE PARKS' REFUSAL TO GIVE UP HER SEAT ON THE BUS AND THE SUBSEQUENT DESEGREGATION OF AMERICAN SOCIETY -- (House of Representatives - September 14, 2005) Mr. SENSENBRENNER.

Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and agree to the concurrent resolution (H. Con. Res. 208) recognizing the 50th anniversary of Rosa Louise Parks' refusal to give up her seat on the bus and the subsequent desegregation of American society. The Clerk read as follows: H. Con. Res.

208 Whereas most historians date the beginning of the modern-day Civil Rights Movement in the United States to December 1, 1955; Whereas December 1, 1955, is the date of Rosa Louise Parks' refusal to give up her bus seat to a white man and her subsequent arrest; Whereas Rosa Louise Parks was born on February 4, 1913, as Rosa Louise McCauley to James and Leona McCauley in Tuskegee, Alabama; Whereas Rosa Louise Parks was educated in Pine Level, Alabama, until the age of 11, when she enrolled in the Montgomery Industrial School for Girls and then went on to attend the Alabama State Teachers College's High School; Whereas on December 18, 1932, Rosa Louise McCauley married Raymond Parks and the two settled in Montgomery, Alabama; Whereas, together, Raymond and Rosa Parks worked in the Montgomery, Alabama, branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), where Raymond served as an active member and Rosa served as a secretary and youth leader; Whereas on December 1, 1955, Rosa Louise Parks was arrested for refusing to give up her seat in

 the ``colored'' section of the bus to a white man on the orders of the bus driver because the ``white'' section was full; Whereas the arrest of Rosa Louise Parks led African Americans and others to boycott the Montgomery city bus line until the buses in Montgomery were desegregated; Whereas the 381-day Montgomery bus boycott encouraged other courageous people across the United States to organize in protest and demand equal rights for all; Whereas the fearless acts of civil disobedience displayed by Rosa Louise Parks and others resulted in a legal action challenging Montgomery's segregated public transportation system which subsequently led to the United States Supreme Court, on November 13, 1956, affirming a district court decision that held that Montgomery segregation codes deny and deprive African Americans of the equal protection of the laws (352 U.S.

903); Whereas, in the years following the Montgomery bus boycott, Rosa Louise Parks moved to Detroit, Michigan, in 1957, and continued her civil rights work through efforts that included working in the office of Congressman John Conyers, Jr., from 1965 until 1988, and starting the Rosa and Raymond Parks Institute for Self Development, a nonprofit 501(c)(3) that motivates youth to reach their highest potential, in 1987; Whereas Rosa Louise Parks has been commended for her work in the realm of civil rights with such recognitions as the NAACP's Springarn Medal in 1979, the Martin Luther King, Jr., Nonviolent Peace Prize in 1980, the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1996, and the Congressional Gold Medal in 1999; and Whereas in 2005, the year marking the 50th anniversary of Rosa Louise Parks' refusal to give up her seat on the bus, we recognize the courage, dignity, and determination displayed by Rosa Louise Parks as she confronted injustice and inequality: Now, therefore, be it Resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate concurring),

 That the Congress-- (1) recognizes and celebrates the 50th anniversary of Rosa Louise Parks' refusal to give up her seat on the bus and the subsequent desegregation of American society; (2) encourages the people of the United States to recognize and celebrate this anniversary and the subsequent legal victories that sought to eradicate segregation in all of American society; and (3) endeavors to work with the same courage, dignity, and determination exemplified by civil rights pioneer, Rosa Louise Parks, to address modern-day inequalities and injustice.

The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Foley). Pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Sensenbrenner) and the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Conyers) each will control 20 minutes. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Sensenbrenner). GENERAL LEAVE Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on H. Con. Res. 208 currently under consideration. The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the gentleman from Wisconsin? There was no objection. Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of H. Con. Res. 208, recognizing the 50th anniversary of Rosa Louise Parks' refusal to give up her seat on the bus and the subsequent desegregation of American society.

Fifty years ago, one individual, through one courageous act, gave strength to the citizens of Montgomery, Alabama, to stand up to the injustice and indignity that had become commonplace among its citizens. Rosa Parks accomplished this heroic feat through the single act of refusing to give up her seat on the bus to a white man. Her single act of defiance and refusal to accept the status quo led to the 381-day Montgomery bus boycott and eventually to the desegregation of Montgomery, Alabama. However, Rosa Parks' courageous act meant much more. It inspired a broader movement that struggled and pushed back against a Nation that had failed to keep its promise to all its citizens to promote equality, justice, and fairness under the laws. It paved the way for this Nation to hold unacceptable the injustices and disparate treatment experienced by many of its citizens. Rosa Parks' courage helped restore to all citizens the dignity and respect that every person deserves. Her single act of courage will forever serve as a constant reminder of the true meaning of equal protection under the laws and the responsibility of each of us to stand up to inequality and injustice. Rosa Parks is an inspiration to all of us and is a reflection of what it means to be an American.

I encourage my colleagues to join me in recognizing Rosa Parks and her important contribution toward helping America realize the freedom and equality envisioned by our Constitution. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time. Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. (Mr. CONYERS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks, and include extraneous material.) Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, this is a proud moment in our history, and I begin by commending the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Sensenbrenner), chairman of the Committee on the Judiciary, for the work he has done in helping me bring this concurrent resolution to the floor today. Why is this historic? Because the impetus to reconnect with this struggle for racial justice in America began with this humble lady, a seamstress in Alabama, who on December 1, 1955, chose to no longer obey the ordinance that blacks sit in the back of the bus and if it was full, then they give up the bus to white passengers. It is hard to conceive of the total segregation that this Nation was immersed in.

On that day, she refused to obey a bus driver's order; and it began the chain of actions and organizations and commitments that led to a resurgence of the civil rights movement as we know it. Her arrest sparked a boycott of the Montgomery city bus lines. It went on for over a year as more and more people of all backgrounds and colors and economic classes joined in. Finally this matter reached, in November of 1956, the Supreme Court of the United States. The Supreme Court of the United States affirmed that desegregation codes deny under the 14th amendment the equal protection of laws to African Americans. This is a great moment because the present is tied to the past. The other body is in the process of determining who the next Chief Justice of that Supreme Court will be. Hurricane Katrina has made us remember how deeply poverty and race have brought most of the hardship upon people of color in New Orleans and in Mississippi where the havoc is still being counted, 400 deaths now known; but the number is sure to go far, far beyond that. Now a word about Rosa Parks herself because I happen to be connected with this, meeting her through my work with Dr.

Martin Luther King as an attorney and then getting to know her when she left Montgomery and came to Detroit. She was so modest. They said she got fired from her job a month after the boycott. Here is what she said in the book she wrote: ``A month after the boycott began, I lost my $25-a-week job when the Montgomery Fair department store closed its tailor shop. I was given no indication from the store that my boycott activities were the reason I lost my job. People always wanted to say it was because of my involvement in the boycott. I cannot say this is true. I do not like to form in my mind something I do not have any proof of.'' That exemplifies this incredible humbleness that marked everything that she did. I said the first person I am going to bring into my congressional office staff is Rosa Parks, and she accepted. Never once have I ever heard her raise her voice in anger. Never once have I heard her speak negative or unkind remarks about anybody, this persona, this modest woman of incredible determination who, by the way, brought Martin Luther King into Montgomery to help lead the Montgomery bus boycott, which was the start of his career as a civil rights leader.

Yet this humble woman, quiet, dignified, always pleasantly composed, was able to bring forward this and other countless acts of civil disobedience which resulted in us changing the way that America operates. It was Rosa Parks that did all of this; and what I wanted to do was let Members know that she, by bringing Martin King into this matter, was able to begin a civil rights movement much, much larger than the boycott itself. She then started the Rosa and Raymond Parks Institute for Self-Development, a nonprofit organization that sought to motivate youth. On this recognition of the 50th anniversary of that refusal to give up her seat, I am very proud that the Congress has chosen to join in with us by way of this concurrent resolution and remember this incredible point in American history. I lift up the name of Ms. Elaine Steele, who has been with Rosa Parks for years and years as her assistant, as her counselor, as her dearest friend, and attorney Gregory J. Reed who has given her the legal background and support that she has needed from time to time. This is a great day in the history of America that we remember.

It is a great day in the Congress that we can remember that Martin King challenged his own country which he loved very much. But when he felt it was wrong, dissent was the highest form of patriotism that he could exemplify what this country stood for. And civil rights pioneer Rosa Parks, by displaying her defiant act of courage 50 years ago, has made this country more of what it ought to be than anyone else that I can think of. So I join with my colleagues in celebrating the ideals of Ms. Parks and the civil rights movement. Today we honor Rosa Parks and her decision to stand up to injustice 50 years ago. On December 1, 1955, Ms. Parks refused to obey a bus driver's order that she give up her bus seat in the black section to a white man because the white section was full. It is the courage, dignity, and determination that Ms. Parks exemplified on this day that allows most historians to credit her with beginning the modern day civil rights movement. Ms. Parks' actions on December 1, 1955 led to the desegregation of American society and enabled all of this Nation's citizens to realize freedom and equality. The arrest of Ms.

Parks led African-Americans and sympathizers of other races to boycott the Montgomery city bus line until the buses in Montgomery were desegregated. The 381-day Montgomery bus boycott encouraged other courageous people across the United States to organize in protest and demand equal rights for all. The fearless acts of civil disobedience displayed by Rosa Parks and others resulted in the United States Supreme Court, on November 13, 1956, affirming a district court decision that held that Montgomery segregation codes deny and deprive African-Americans of the equal protection of the laws. This decision would lead to other landmark Supreme Court decisions in which the Court would rule in the interest of justice and equality. In the years following the Montgomery bus boycott, Ms. Parks moved to Detroit, MI in 1957 and continued her civil rights work by working in my district office. Ms. Parks was with the office from 1965 until 1988. In the more than 20 years that Ms. Parks was in the office, she worked with a tireless spirit for the people of Detroit and other Americans.

In 1987, she started the Rosa and Raymond Parks Institute for Self Development in Detroit, a nonprofit organization which motivates youth to reach their highest potential. So it is with great pleasure and honor that I stand today to recognize not only a civil rights pioneer, but a member of my staff, a constituent, and a friend. It is in this recognition of the 50th anniversary of Ms. Parks' refusal to give up her seat on the bus, that I ask the Congress and the great people of this Nation to work with the same courage, dignity, and determination exemplified by her to address modern day inequalities and injustices. As a result of Hurricane Katrina, these inequalities and injustices are at the forefront of public consciousness and it is our job to do something about it. Ms. Parks has said, ``Until everyone can enjoy the same opportunities, people cannot be equal. I am glad that segregation is no longer considered acceptable, but the fight for equal rights must go on until we have the same privileges and opportunities as those who are in power.'' Civil rights pioneer Rosa Parks displayed a defiant act of courage 50 years ago to better this country for all of its citizens.

I know that this Congress and the people of this Nation can work to further the ideals of Ms. Parks and the civil rights movement. Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H. Con. Resolution 208, recognizing the 50th anniversary of Rosa Parks' refusal to give up her seat on the bus and the subsequent desegregation of American society. Passage of this bill will not only recognize the important anniversary, but also reaffirm the United States' continuing commitment to the legacy of Rosa Parks and the civil rights movement as a whole. On December 1, 1954, Rosa Parks boarded her normal bus home and sat down in one of the ``colored'' aisles toward the back of the bus. Soon, the bus began to fill, and Rosa was ordered to vacate her seat to accommodate the white passengers. She simply but stubbornly refused. This peaceful act of protest sparked a citywide boycott of the bus system by the African American community. Men, women and children of Montgomery, Alabama refrained from riding the bus and instead either walked, rode their bikes or carpooled to work.

In an impressive show of strength and courage, the boycott endured for over a year, and people across the nation joined with those in Montgomery. After 381 days, the City bus line finally relented and desegregated the buses. Four days after the initial incident on the bus, a young man stood up in front of a large audience, having just been appointed as the head of the boycott: ``There comes a time,'' the man said, ``that people get tired. We are here this evening to say to those who have mistreated us for so long, that we are tired, tired of being segregated and humiliated, tired of being kicked about by the brutal feet of oppression.'' The name of that young man spurred to action by Rosa Parks was Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Rosa was found guilty that very same day of breaking the city's segregation law. It was 50 years ago that Rosa Parks chose to peacefully but willfully stand up--or rather sit down--against the abhorrent laws that segregated this country. Let us honor and celebrate what Rosa Louise Parks helped this country accomplish half a century ago, but also remember that her fight is not over.

This anniversary reminds us of the battles against inequality and injustice still being fought here and across the world today. I support H. Con. Res. 208 for the foregoing reasons, and I urge my colleagues to follow suit. Mr. HOLT. Mr. Speaker, I rise today as an original cosponsor of H. Con. Res. 208, a resolution recognizing the 50th anniversary of Rosa Louise Parks' refusal to give up her seat on a city bus in Montgomery, Alabama. On December 1, 1955, Ms. Parks challenged decades of social injustice and inequality; she opposed a racist authority; she initiated a movement of change. It was on that day 50 years ago, that a woman spoke up for not only herself, but for the freedoms of all people, everywhere when she refused to give up her seat. Ms. Parks' service to the civil rights movement began long before that fateful December day. Born and raised in Alabama, Rosa Louise McCauley attended the Alabama State Teachers College before marrying Raymond Parks in 1932. Together, they worked for the Montgomery branch chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). Ms.

Parks took on leadership roles in the organization, serving as a secretary and then as an advisor to the NAACP Youth Council. These efforts to improve the lives of those in segregated societies grew into a movement to end segregation outright. That movement found a voice in Rosa Parks. On December 1, 1955, Ms. Parks boarded a Montgomery city bus through the rear entrance. She sat in the section designated for ``colored.'' She obeyed the ludicrous segregation laws until a white man, wanting a seat, demanded hers. It was then that Ms. Parks decided that her compliance would end. Ms. Parks was arrested for her civil disobedience. The arrest incited a reaction. Ms. Parks, Martin Luther King Jr., and others channeled that reaction to form one of the most powerful and positive movements in world history. The following day, civil rights advocates organized a boycott of the bus system that lasted for 381 days. On November 13, 1956, the Supreme Court ruled that segregation on the transportation system was unconstitutional and this provided one of the first victories for desegregation. We recognize the many people responsible for the effective boycott and the tremendous support of civil rights leadership.

But, today, we celebrate the woman who imbued the movement with such dedication, dignity, and courage. Rosa Parks' commitment to civil rights continued with her work in the office of my colleagues, Representative JOHN CONYERS, Jr., from 1965-1988. In 1987, she established the Rosa and Raymond Parks Institute for Self Development to motivate youths. She has been honored for her contributions to society with the NAACP's Springarn Medal in 1979, the Martin Luther King, Jr., Nonviolent Peace Prize in 1980, the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1996, and the Congressional Gold Medal in 1999. Let us honor the 50th anniversary of Ms. Parks' refusal to give up her seat. Let us celebrate the lifetime achievements of a truly incredible woman. I urge my colleagues to join me in supporting H. Con. Res. 208. Ms. LEE. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of the resolution commemorating Rosa Parks on the 50th Anniversary of her refusal to give up her seat on a Montgomery, Alabama bus and comply with an unjust law.

I also want to thank my colleague from Michigan, Mr. CONYERS, for offering this important amendment and for his courage, leadership, and vision as the ranking member on the House Judiciary Committee and the Dean of the Congressional Black Caucus. Without question, Rosa Parks, was a pivotal force in the struggle for civil rights in America. Ms. Parks' courageous action touched millions of lives, serving as a catalyst for the legendary bus boycott in Alabama and acting as a critical turning point in the African-American civil rights movement. With the support of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and other civil rights activists, Rosa Parks demonstrated the power of individuals and communities to tear down injustice and bring about social change. Her spark ignited a fire that helped to reverse segregation, raise public consciousness, and challenge our democracy to guarantee and secure liberty and justice for all. Rosa Parks is a true shero. But as we commemorate Rosa and her actions today, let us not forget that we still have much more work to do.

It is our job as representatives of the people to pick up the banner carried by Rosa Parks, Martin Luther King, Medger Evers, and others and ensure that our children and our children's children can live in a world free of ignorance, prejudice, discrimination and racism. Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time. Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time. The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the motion offered by the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Sensenbrenner) that the House suspend the rules and agree to the concurrent resolution, H. Con. Res. 208. The question was taken; and (two-thirds having voted in favor thereof) the rules were suspended and the concurrent resolution was agreed to. A motion to reconsider was laid on the table. Rosa Parks and the Montgomery Bus Boycott | Holidays.net Contact Us Rosa Parks and the Montgomery Bus Boycott On the 1st of December 1955, Mrs. Rosa Parks, an African-American seamstress, was arrested in Montgomery, Alabama for not standing and letting a white bus rider take her seat.

It was an “established rule” in the American south (at that time) that African-American riders had to sit at the back of the bus. African-American riders were also expected to surrender their seat to a white bus rider if it was needed. When asked to move to let a white bus rider be seated Mrs. Parks refused. She did not argue and she did not move. The police were called and Mrs. Parks was arrested. Mrs. Parks was not the first African-American to be arrested for this “crime.” But she was the first to be arrested who was well known in the Montgomery African-American community. She was once the secretary to the president of the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People). Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was pastor of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery. He and other African-American community leaders felt a protest of some kind was needed. A meeting was called and an overflowing crowd came to the church to hear his words. Dr. King told the crowd that the only way they could fight back would be to boycott the bus company. On the morning of Dec. 5, the African-American residents of the city refused to use the buses.

Most walked, those few with cars arranged rides for friends and strangers, some even rode mules. Only a very small number of African-Americans rode the bus that day. Dr. King and the other African-American community leaders held another meeting to organize future action. They named their organization the Montgomery Improvement Association and elected Dr. King as its president. As the boycott continued the white community fought back with terrorism and harassment. The car-pool drivers were arrested for picking up hitchhikers. African-Americans waiting on street corners for a ride were arrested for loitering. On January 30, 1956 Dr. King’s home was bombed. His wife and their baby daughter escaped without injury. When Dr. King arrived home he found an angry mob waiting. Dr. King told the crowd to go home. “We must learn to meet hate with love” he said. The boycott continued for over a year. It eventually took the United States Supreme Court to end the boycott. On November 13, 1956 the Court declared that Alabama’s state and local laws requiring segregation on buses were illegal. On December 20th federal injunctions were served on the city and bus company officials forcing them to follow the Supreme Court’s ruling.

The following morning, December 21, 1956, Dr. King and Rev. Glen Smiley, a white minister, shared the front seat of a public bus. The boycott had lasted 381 days. The boycott was a success. UPDATE: Rosa Parks passed away on the evening of October 24th 2005. She was 92 years old. Civil Rights Movement 1955-1965: The Montgomery Bus Boycott -- Mother Pollard [1] The Montgomery Bus Boycott officially started on December 1, 1955. That was the day when the blacks of Montgomery, Alabama, decided that they would boycott the city buses until they could sit anywhere they wanted, instead of being relegated to the back when a white boarded. It was not, however, the day that the movement to desegregate the buses started. Perhaps the movement started on the day in 1943 when a black seamstress named Rosa Parks paid her bus fare and then watched the bus drive off as she tried to re-enter through the rear door, as the driver had told her to do.

Perhaps the movement started on the day in 1949 when a black professor Jo Ann Robinson absentmindedly sat at the front of a nearly empty bus, then ran off in tears when the bus driver screamed at her for doing so. Perhaps the movement started on the day in the early 1950s when a black pastor named Vernon Johns tried to get other blacks to leave a bus in protest after he was forced to give up his seat to a white man, only to have them tell him, "You ought to knowed better." [2] The story of the Montgomery Bus Boycott is often told as a simple, happy tale of the "little people" triumphing over the seemingly insurmountable forces of evil. The truth is a little less romantic and a little more complex. The simple version of the story leaves out some very important people, such as Jo Ann Robinson, of whom Martin Luther King, Jr., would later write, "Apparently indefatigable, she, perhaps more than any other person, was active on every level of the protest." [3] She was an educated woman, a professor at the all-black Alabama State College, and a member of the Women's Political Council in Montgomery.

After her traumatic experience on the bus in 1949, she tried to start a protest but was shocked when other Women's Political Council members brushed off the incident as "a fact of life in Montgomery." After the Supreme Court's Brown decision in 1954, she wrote a letter to the mayor of Montgomery, W.A. Gayle, saying that "there has been talk from 25 or more local organizations of planning a city-wide boycott of buses." By 1955, the Women's Political Council had plans for just such a boycott. Community leaders were just waiting for the right person to be arrested, a person who would anger the black community into action, who would agree to test the segregation laws in court, and who, most importantly, was "above reproach." When fifteen year old Claudette Colvin was arrested early in 1955 for refusing to give up her seat, E.D. Nixon of the NAACP thought he had found the perfect person, but Colvin turned out to be pregnant. Nixon later explained, "I had to be sure that I had somebody I could win with." [4] Enter Rosa Parks.

Rosa Parks is probably the most romanticized personage in the Montgomery cast of characters. She is often portrayed as a simple seamstress who, exhausted after a long day at work, refused to give up her seat to a white person. While this is not untrue, there is more to the story. Parks was educated; she had attended the laboratory school at Alabama State College because there was no high school for blacks in Montgomery at that time, but had decided to become a seamstress because she could not find a job to suit her skills. She was also a long-time NAACP worker who had taken a special interest in Claudette Colvin's case. When she was arrested in December 1955, she had recently completed a workshop on race relations at the Highlander Folk School in Monteagle, Tennessee. And she was a well-respected woman with a spotless record. On Thursday, December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks boarded a city bus and sat with three other blacks in the fifth row, the first row that blacks could occupy. A few stops later, the front four rows were filled with whites, and one white man was left standing.

According to law, blacks and whites could not occupy the same row, so the bus driver asked all four of the blacks seated in the fifth row to move. Three complied, but Parks refused. She was arrested. When E.D. Nixon heard that Parks had been arrested, he called the police to find out why. He was told that it was "[n]one of your damn business." He asked Clifford Durr, a sympathetic white lawyer, to call. Durr easily found out that Parks had been arrested for refusing to give up her seat on a bus. [5] Nixon went to the jail and posted bond for Parks. Then he told her, "Mrs. Parks, with your permission we can break down segregation on the bus with your case." [6] She talked it over with her husband and her mother, then agreed. That night, Jo Ann Robinson put plans for a one-day boycott into action. She mimeographed handouts urging blacks to stay off the city buses on Monday, when Parks' case was due to come up. She and her students distributed the anonymous fliers throughout Montgomery on Friday morning. That evening, a group of ministers and civil rights leaders had a meeting to discuss the boycott. It did not go well.

Many ministers were put off by the way Rev. L. Roy Bennett took control of the meeting. Some left and others were about to leave. [7] Those remaining, however, agreed to spread word of the boycott through their sermons on Sunday, then meet again on Monday night if the boycott went well to decide whether or not to continue it. [8] Martin Luther King, Jr., minister at Dexter Avenue Baptist Church, thought that "if we could get 60 percent cooperation the protest would be a success." He was pleasantly surprised when bus after empty bus rolled past his house that morning. "A miracle had taken place," King would later write. "The once dormant and quiescent Negro community was now fully awake." [9] The group from Friday night met again that afternoon and decided to call themselves the Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA). They elected King as president. The next decision was whether or not to end the boycott. Some ministers wanted to end it as a one-day success. Then E.D. Nixon rose to speak: What's the matter with you people? Here you have been living off the sweat of these washerwomen all these years and you have never done anything for them.

Now you have a chance to pay them back, and you're too damn scared to stand on your feet and be counted! The time has come when you men is going to have to learn to be grown men or scared boys. [10] The MIA decided to let the people vote on whether or not to continue the boycott at the mass meeting that night. There, the decision was unanimous. The boycott would continue. When the boycott began, no one expected it to last for very long. There had been boycotts of buses by blacks before, most recently in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, in 1953. A one-day boycott, followed three months later by a week-long boycott, resulted in buses that were more desegregated but that still had some seats reserved for whites as well as some for blacks. On Thursday, December 8, the fourth day of the boycott, King and other MIA officials met with officials and lawyers from the bus company, as well as the city commissioners, to present a moderate desegregation plan similar to the one already implemented in Baton Rouge and other Southern cities, including Mobile, Alabama.

The MIA was hopeful that the plan would be accepted and the boycott would end, but the bus company refused to consider it. In addition, city officials struck a blow to the boycott when they announced that any cab driver charging less than the 45 cent minimum fare would be prosecuted. Since the boycott began, the black cab services had been charging blacks only 10 cents to ride, the same as the bus fare, but this service would be no more. Suddenly the MIA was faced with the prospect of having thousands of blacks with no way to get to work, and with no end to the boycott in sight. In response, the MIA worked out a "private taxi" plan, under which blacks w ho owned cars picked up and dropped off blacks who needed rides at designated points. The plan was elaborate and took a great deal of planning; consequently, the MIA appointed a Transportation Committee to oversee it. The service worked so well so quickly that even the White Citizens Council (whose membership doubled during one month of the boycott) had to admit that it moved with "military precision." [11] Whites tried to end the boycott in every way possible. One often-used method was to try to divide the black community.

On January 21, 1956, the City Commission met with three non-MIA black ministers and proposed a "compromise," which was basically the system already in effect. The ministers accepted, and the commission leaked (false) reports to a newspaper that the boycott was over. The MIA did not even hear of the compromise until a black reporter in the North who received a wire report phoned to ask if the Montgomery blacks had really settled for so little. By that time it was Saturday night. On Sunday morning Montgomery newspapers were going to print the news that the boycott was over and the city's blacks were going to believe it. To prevent this from happening, some MIA officials went bar-hopping to spread the word that the stories were a hoax, that the boycott was still on. Later, the black ministers told King that they hadn't understood the proposal. When that effort to break up the boycott failed, whites turned to violence. King's home was bombed on January 30, and Nixon's home was bombed on February 1. Next, whites turned to the law. On February 21, 89 blacks were indicted under an old law prohibiting boycotts. King was the first defendant to be tried.

As press from around the nation looked on, King was ordered to pay $500 plus $500 in court costs or spend 386 days in the state penitentiary. Whites also tried to break down the "private taxi" system that many blacks relied on as their only means of transportation to and from work. Some churches had purchased station wagons, usually called "rolling churches," to be used in the private taxi service. Liability insurance was canceled four times in four months before King found insurance through a black agent in Atlanta, underwritten by Lloyd's of London. The police also arrested drivers for minor traffic offenses. When King dropped by a pickup point to help transport blacks waiting there, he was arrested for driving thirty miles per hour in a twenty-five mile per hour zone. Despite all the pressures to end the boycott, blacks continued to stay off the buses. One white bus driver stopped to let off a lone black man in a black neighborhood. Looking in his rear view mirror, he saw an old black woman with a cane rushing towards the bus. He opened the door and said, "You don't have to rush auntie.

I'll wait for you." The woman replied, "In the first place, I ain't your auntie. In the second place, I ain't rushing to get on your bus. I'm jus' trying to catch up with that nigger who just got off, so I can hit him with this here stick." By this point, some members of Montgomery's business community were becoming frustrated with the boycott, which was costing them thousands of dollars because blacks were less likely to shop in downtown stores. Although they were as opposed to integration as the next white Montgomery resident, they realized that the boycott was bad for business and therefore wanted the boycott to end. They formed a group called the Men of Montgomery and tried negotiating directly with the boycotters. Eventually, however, these discussions broke down, and the boycott continued. But blacks had already begun to fight to end the boycott in court. They would no longer settle for the moderate desegregation plan that they had first proposed. Now, they would accept nothing less than full integration. The city was fighting a losing battle. The blacks were armed with the Brown decision, less than two years old, which said that the "separate but equal" doctrine had no place in public education.

Surely it must follow that the doctrine had no place in any public facilities. In addition, the city was not in the prejudiced local courts but in federal court, where even a black man could hope to have a fair trial. When the city defended segregation by saying that integration would lead to violence, Judge Rives asked, "Is it fair to command one man to surrender his constitutional rights, if they are his constitutional rights, in order to prevent another man from committing a crime?" [12] The federal court decided 2-1 in favor of the blacks, with the lone dissent coming from a Southern judge. The city, of course, appealed the ruling, but on November 13, 1956, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the federal court's ruling, declaring segregation on buses unconstitutional. The Montgomery Bus Boycott was officially over. Blacks continued, however, to stay off the city buses until the mandate from the Supreme Court arrived. During that time, MIA officials tried to prepare blacks as best they could for integrated buses.

But, as Martin Luther King, Jr., noted wryly, "not a single white group would take the responsibility of preparing the white community." [13] Blacks returned to the buses on December 21, 1956, over a year after the boycott began. But their troubles were not over. Snipers shot at buses, forcing the city to suspend bus operations after 5 P.M. A group tried to start a whites-only bus service. There was also a wave of bombings. The homes of two black leaders, four Baptists churches, the People's Service Station and Cab Stand, and the home of another black were all bombed. In addition, an unexploded bomb was found on King's front porch. Seven white men were arrested for the bombings, and five were indicted. The first two defendants, Raymond D. York and Sonny Kyle Livingston, were found not guilty, even though they had signed confessions. The remainder of the bombers were set free under a compromise that also canceled the cases of blacks arrested under the anti-boycott laws, although King still had to pay his $500 fine. The KKK also tried to scare the blacks, but "it seemed to have lost its spell," King wrote.

"...[O]ne cold night a small Negro boy was seen warming his hands at a burning cross." [14] The violence died down after several prominent whites spoke out against it, and the integration of the Montgomery buses was ultimately successful. On January 10 and 11, 1957, ministers from the MIA joined other ministers from around the South in Atlanta, Georgia. They founded the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and elected Martin Luther King, Jr., as president. SCLC would continue to work in various areas of the South for many years, continuing the nonviolent fight for civil rights started in Birmingham. Although the gains of the Montgomery Bus Boycott were small compared with the gains blacks would later win, the boycott was important start to the movement. The lasting legacy of the boycott, as Roberta Wright wrote, was that "It helped to launch a 10-year national struggle for freedom and justice, the Civil Rights Movement, that stimulated others to do the same at home and abroad." [15]

Question: In what US city did seamstress Rosa Parks refuse to give up her seat on a bus to a white man, thereby getting arrested and starting a year long bus boycott?
Answer: Montgomery, AL