Montgomery Bus Boycott Research Paper

On December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks, one of the leaders of the local branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People [NAACP] refused to give up her seat to a white person on a segregated city bus in Montgomery, Alabama, despite being reprimanded by the driver (Schulke 166). Montgomery, Alabama was known for its terrible treatment of blacks. The buses in particular had been a source of tension between the city and black citizens for many years (Schulke, 167). As a result of refusing to give up her seat, Rosa Parks was arrested. Rosa Parks' popularity among the black community, proved to be the spark that ignited the non-violent Civil Rights Movement (Norrell 2).

As a few white passengers boarded the bus and the white sections were already full so the driver shouted back at four black people including Rosa Parks “Move y'all, I want those two seats”. As this demand was made by the driver 3 of the bus riders obeyed to what was shouted back, however Rosa Parks remained in her seat and was determined not to move. She was arrested following the bus drivers order and fined ten dollars. This, however small incited a great wave of bus boycotts which in Montgomery black people chose not to ride the bus for a period of 381 days. This still to date is known as the moment in which the civil rights movement started to gain headway. It was the will of one woman who decided it was time for black people to take a stand and from this point on Martin Luther King was assigned to take this boycott on. Although he was assigned to take this on people also felt as he was young, fresh and people had not formulated enough of an opinion of him, there was little room for him to be hated yet so he posed as the right figure to lead this. After the many days of boycotting the case of this transport issue in Alabama went to the Supreme Court. Here it was decided that segregation was declared as unconstitutional so segregation by law was no

At this time, other local activists have been looking for an occasion to start a boycott of the Montgomery buses, where segregation was especially hurting black people. Most of the teachers of Montgomery, called for a one-day protest against the bus line, asking the blacks to stay at home or find another way to get to work or school. This strike hurted the bus system. The success of that one-day protest persuaded Montgomery civil rights leaders to organize a larger scale boycott of the buses.

On the morning of parks trial buses rumbled nearly empty through the streets of Montgomery. By the next morning the council led by Jo Ann Robinson had printed 52,000 fliers asking, Montgomery blacks to stay off the buses. It was an important and an accepted rule that whites sit in the front and the African American riders had to sit in the back of all buses. A group of about 50 African American leaders and one white minister, Robert Graetz, gathered in the basement of Dr. King?s church to endorse the boycott and begin planning a massive rally.

The Montgomery Bus Boycott was successful because the protesters used nonviolence, the community helped each other, and the car pool was a major step in outcome. First of all, on March 22, 1956, Martin Luther King Jr. gives a speech and he states, “Democracy gives us this right to protest and that is all we are doing. We can say honestly that we have not advocated violence, have not practiced it, and have gone courageously on with a Christian movement”. This statement exemplifies that the protesters have done nothing wrong and they don’t plan on using violence. To continue, in a letter by Virginia Foster Durr written on January 30, 1956, she writes,“I think it is the first time that a whole Negro community has ever stuck together this way and

The montgomery Bus boycott is a major milestone in civil rights history because it was a civil rights movement international resistance for radical segregation and helped changed the view of disorderly conduct toward African American people in America In document # 6 Malcolm X says “ The Black man should take control of the politics of his own community and control the politicians who are in his own community”. This situation was successful because African American men did start to take control of things like the Civil Rights revolution. Although it wasn’t enough it was still there for

“For many years now Negroes in Montgomery and so many other areas have been inflicted with the paralysis of crippling fears on buses in our community. On so many occasions, Negroes have been intimidated and humiliated and impressed-oppressed-because of the sheer fact that they were Negroes.”

The Montgomery Bus Boycott began with the public arrest of an African American woman and civil rights activist named Rosa Parks. As stated in Document A,”Rosa Parks boarded a city bus and sat down in the closest seat. It was one of the first rows of the section where blacks were not supposed to sit… The bus driver told Rosa Parks that she would have to give up her seat to a white person. She refused and was arrested.” Rosa’s arrest sparked a number of radical events that fought against racial inequality and segregation over the span of thirteen months. The Montgomery Bus Boycott was successful because it led to the U.S. Supreme Court ruling that racial segregation among public transportation (especially buses) was unconstitutional. The Montgomery

Because African-Americans did not take the bus, taxi drivers offered to pick up African-Americans to take them to their destination. The people in political positions in Montgomery did not like this. So, any taxi driver that was caught transporting African-Americans were arrested. In 1956, Bayard Rustin wrote in his diary about the success of the Montgomery Bus Boycott. He stated that 42,000 African-Americans stopped riding the buses.

Two months after Emmett Till’s murderers were acquitted, Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on a bus, which sparked the three hundred eighty one day Montgomery bus boycott. The fight for civil rights became a mass

“In 1955, Reverend George Lee, vice president of the Regional Council of Negro Leadership and NAACP worker, was shot in the face and killed for urging blacks in the Mississippi Delta to vote” (Austin, “ On Violence and Non-violence”). The perpetrators were never charged for the murder of Lee. With many assassinations of African American liberation leaders and organizers along with the police frame ups and imprisonment of African American protestors had a devastating impact on the struggle against racism and national oppression. In addition to these murders, violence was portrayed in mass arrest, jail beatings, lynching’s, and church bombings (Austin, “On Violence and Non-violence”). African American’s believed it was time to take matters into their own hands. The non-violence approach was not improving anything for them. A lot of the protest resulted in deaths for African Americans. African Americans along with their supporters felt it was necessary to use force in order to advance in their struggle for freedom, equality, and justice.

In Alabama, there used to be a segregation law where African Americans had to sit in the back of the bus. If a white person happens to be on a bus where the seats are full, an African American would have to stand and allow that person to have the seat instead. In December 1955, Rosa Parks refused in a calm manner when the bus driver asked her and other passengers of colour to give up their seats, she was then arrested and sent to jail. After this, Martin Luther King Jr. arranged a bus boycott. After 13 months of boycotting, the U.S. Supreme Court to finally ruled the bus segregation law as unconstitutional, the act of civil disobedience was ultimately successful.

The Montgomery Bus Boycotts had an influential purpose by boycotting the transportation system in order to create equality for those who were denied the right to sit where they pleased. Parks courageous act allowed others to speak up as well, resulting in protests against the busses. The compromise came about when thousands refused to use the public transportation, and companies began to lose money. The boycotting of busses resulted into many forms of protests for equality amongst schools, jobs and other activities that were made segregated. Eventually, on November 13th, 1956, segregation was ruled illegal on public transportation.

In the late eighteen hundreds, the Reconstruction by Congress was overturned by the Supreme Court. Segregation or separation by skin color was made a law which was adopted by private organizations, institutions and businesses (loc.gov). Physical violence and mental harassment was imposed upon those whom were deemed inferior in color. Some citizens accepted the law, as is, without question while others believed it was their supreme right to remain separate without modification. Human activists, that opposed this way of living, pursued an extensive battle to abolish racial inequity and segregation from American life (loc.gov). During the nineteen hundreds, many understood this treatment as an offense to human beings and activists began

As said by Rosa Parks,“You must never be fearful about what you are doing when it is right”.This means that when she sat in the front of the bus she was not fearful to get arrested and move because she wanted equal rights.The Civil Rights Movement was a mass popular movement for African Americans equal access to opportunities for the basic privileges and rights of U.S. citizenship. The African Americans were fighting for equal rights, and they wanted to be treated the same as everyone else. Martin Luther King Jr. was a Baptist minister and social activist, who led the Civil Rights Movement in the United States. A boycott is to stop using a product for example, the African Americans boycotted so they could stop riding the buses.The boycott was in Montgomery, Alabama. African Americans wanted to be equal to the whites because they were treated differently than the whites for everything. They wanted to be treated the way whites were being treated.The boycott took place in Alabama in 1955 and ended 1956.The Montgomery Bus Boycott was a successful protest because there were many ways besides the bus for African Americans to get around, the the bus companies lost money, and the protest were covered by the news.