Freedom Riders

A group of people risked their life to obtain equality for African Americans in the south. The Freedom Riders were a group of around 13 people. Most of them were African Americans but there were always a few white skinned people in the group as well. There was no set leader for the Freedom Riders. The Freedom Riders rode interstate buses into the Southern United States. The south was referred to as the most segregated part of the U.S. The main goal of the Freedom Riders was to desegregate and become “separate but equal.” They had also set out to defy the Jim Crow Laws. The Freedom Riders had a little bit of help from two court cases: Irene Morgan v. Commonwealth of Virginia and Boynton v. Virginia. These court cases ruled that it was

42. Freedom Riders tried to draw attention to the South’s refusal to integrate bus terminals.

While in jail, the Freedom Riders were mistreated by policemen; they were cursed at and humiliated. To get through the constant interrogations, they sang songs like: “We Shall Overcome”, “Ain’t Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me Around”, and “Back of The Bus.” More Freedom Riders were sent to jail and each member ended up having a year sentence. James Farmer urged members to remain in jail for at least 40 days before bail. I, personally, don’t

Who are the Freedom Riders you may ask? They were a courageous and daring group, which originally consisted of seven African Americans and six Whites.They fought for the equality and justice for their race. They fought against the racist South during the early 1960’s. Their goal was to make a safer and more fair world for current and future African Americans in the United States. They went through hardship and violence from things such as, angry mobs and racist law enforcement through a period of several months. The Freedom Riders risked their safety and put their lives in danger to impact the way society viewed African Americans and to make the United States fair and equal for all races not just white. There were many events that happened during the Freedom Rider’s protest throughout the deep South. But, the hardship payed off because the Freedom Riders made a huge impact on U.S. History and they also impacted the greater justice and equality for African Americans. The Freedom Riders also have an amazing story with major events and a very positive end result which helped out African Americans in the United States and they also help change how the government treated African Americans unfairly and did give them equal rights as White people had in the United States. The Freedom Riders changed everything for African Americans and gave them a positive future to look forward to.

Occurring before the time of the KKK’s start of their attacks were the Freedom Rides looking for racial equality on the transportation services. Raymond Arsenault discusses in his book Freedom Riders 1961 and the Struggle for Racial Justice that the Freedom Rides began after the blacks were forced to give up their bus seat, so that whites could sit, Irene Morgan first experienced this when she was forced by the driver to remove herself from the seat in 1944 (14). Arsenault finds that the rides made their way all of the south of the United States going from Florida to Northern Virginia toward the west in Illinois and through Missouri and heading as west as Texas and California (220-221). John A. Kirk writes in his article “Battle Cry of Freedom: Little Rock, Arkansas and The Freedom Riders at Fifty” that the riders were surged on by the Congress of Racial Equality(CORE). The riders route was planned to ride from St, Louis, Little Rock, Shreveport, and finally stopping in New Orleans. They would later leave New Orleans headed

Along the way, there were those who decided at some point along the journey that the cost of freedom was too high. The fear of the flight to freedom became too great. They would rather turn back to the plantation life of slavery. Well, somebody should have told them about our ancestor Tubman. As one of the original conductors of the Underground Railroad, the passage on her train was a one-way ticket. No stop overs and no return tickets.

Stanley Nelson chronicles the journey of a group of individuals, known as the Freedom Riders, whom fought for the rights of African Americans to have the same amenities and access as the Caucasians. The purpose of the Freedom Rides was to deliberately violate the Jim Crow laws of the south that prohibited blacks and whites from mixing together on buses and trains. Expectedly, many of the Freedom Riders were beaten and the majority was imprisoned. This carried on for the majority of 1961 and culminated with the Interstate Commerce Commission issuing an order to end the segregation in bus and rail stations. Nelson encapsulates this entire movement in about two hours. At the end of the two hours, the viewer is emotionally tied to the

The Freedom Rides garnered the attention of the whole nation with its non-violent means. Even though the Freedom Riders met with violent acts against them, they continued their journey without ever physically fighting back. During their ride through Alabama, the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) teamed up with Police Sergeant Tom Cook in their efforts to end the Rides. Together, they planned an attack by slashing the tires of the buses. The KKK-led mob forced the bus to stop several miles outside of town and then firebombed it. Luckily, the Freedom Riders escaped the bus but they were badly hurt and wounded by the mob. The second bus traveled to Birmingham, Alabama, that day, and those riders were also beaten by an

On May 20th, the Nashville riders went back to Birmingham where there were no incidents. Then, all of the Freedom Riders traveled to Montgomery where a mob of men, women, and children carrying baseball bats, tire irons, and bricks met them at the bus terminal. The angry mob swarmed the riders and they were walking off the bus and beat the passengers. They attacked SNCC activists John Lewis and Jim Zwerg, who were both severely injured in this act of violence.

It is hard to wrap my head around the fact that riding the bus can get one hurt and killed and how non-volient acts can lead to so much hate and violence. The Freedom Rides help bring attention to national level. The level of violence is extreme in response to a non-violent movement. The white supremacy was trying its best to make the colored population inferior. The segregation is a symbol of fear and hate. The press and television is a big part in the success of the movement. They help shape the public opinion toward segregation. The media brought the problem to our attention through dramatic and often disturbing photos and reports.

“Freedom Riders” were a group of people, both black and white, who were civil rights activists from the North who “meant to demonstrate that segregated travel on interstate buses, even though banned by an I.C.C. Ruling, were still being enforced throughout much of the South” (The South 16). The Riders attempted to prove this by having a dozen or so white and black Freedom Riders board buses in the North and travel through Southern cities. This was all “a coldly calculated attempt to speed up integration by goading the South, forcing the Southern extremists to explode their tempers” ('Freedom Riders' 20). The author of the Newsweek article stated this as the Southern opinion of the reason for the Freedom Riders. The

Using metal pipes, baseball bats, sticks, and fists, the mob surged on the small group of Freedom Riders, clubbing, punching, chasing, and beating both whites and Negroes. When some of the bus riders began to

Often times, they were taking advantage of. Often times, they weren’t respected. Often times they were told they'd never be as good. But as this movement went on, they realized that they don’t only want the freedoms that all other americans had, but needed it.

On May 4, 1961 The freedom riders started their journey from Washington D.C. to Louisiana. Thirteen African Americans And White civil rights activists. They were doing this to try to end segregation. There is no more segregation and there are still whites and black that do not like each other.

The Freedom Riders encountered violence as they rode the bus. When the Freedom Riders were attacked, the police took their time to respond