The 1955 Montgomery Bus Boycott may be sometimes characterized as furious African Americans who wanted equal rights to whites. Blacks began to get tired of the treatment they had been receiving throughout the years. The laws stated that blacks should never sit to the front of the bus and if whites wanted to sit, then the blacks should move to the back. African Americans of Montgomery, Alabama were tired of segregation and being mistreated and they wanted to do something about it. The Montgomery Bus Boycott is still known to be an important civil rights movement in history, and it came about by the arrest of Rosa Parks, the organization of boycotts by Martin Luther King Jr, and the organization of a protest.
Rosa Parks, a brave woman of the Civil Rights movement had gotten tired of segregation and decided to take a stand. Rosa Parks became tremendously well known for her major role of the bus system in Montgomery, Alabama in 1955 (Garrow n.p.). Parks was a strong minded person and never weak willed. Rosa Parks had violated the city law and was arrested for refusing to giver up her seat to a white man that wanted to sit down (Garrow n.p.). After Parks had been arrested, many African Americans were highly distraught. The actions of Rosa Parks had been a vital topic during the struggle of African Americans (“The Montgomery Bus Boycott” 89). Just like Montgomery buses, many other buses in other cities were segregated as well (The Montgomery Bus Boycott” 89). Soon after the arrest, citizens were fed up with being mistreated and demanded equal rights (Garrow n.p.). Parks had been weary of being tired so on that day; she decided that a change was going to be made.
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr decided that a change was going to be made for...
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...his people out of segregation and on board with equality. Both Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King Jr made a huge change in 1955-56 and is still remembered today.
Works Cited
DeGegory, Crystal A. “King, Martin Luther Jr. (1929-1968). “Freedom Facts and Firsts: 400 years of African American Civil Rights Experience (2009): 302-303. History Reference Center. Web. 4 Feb. 2014.
Garrow, David J. “Parks, Rosa Louise.” World Book Advanced. World Book, 2014. Web. 31 Jan. 2014.
Marsico, Katie. Perspectives on the Montgomery Bus Boycott: Milestone of the Civil Rights Movement. New York: Marshall Cavendish, 2012. Print.
Murphy, Bruce Allen. “The Montgomery Bus Boycott.” World Book Advanced. World Book, 2014. Web. 14 Feb. 2014.
“The Montgomery Bus Boycott. The American Scene: Events: World War II and the Cold War: 1942-1958. Vol 7. Danburry, CT: Grolier, 1999. Print. 9 Vols.
The black people of Montgomery decided that the best way to show their anger at what had happened and how they were being treated would be by boycott, not use, the local bus service. One the first day of the boycott the buses were almost empty. The black community worked together and arranged another forms of transport such as car pool, or waling. Black taxi companies only charged back passengers the price of the bus fair and some white people who could do without their servants even when to pick them up form their homes. During the boycott the bus company lost 65% of their earnings. This showed people who powerful non-violent protest could be, by challenging black segregation laws without committing a crime. It also showed the black people how powerful they could be if they worked together.
This source is an excellent source. It is an extract from the biography of Rosa Parks. It is a primary source, therefore it is reliable. It is about Rosa Parks, who was physically part of the boycott. It is very accurate and reliable, because it states exactly what happened to her when she refused to move for a white male. It also clearly shows how the Montgomery Bus Boycott started and what an impact it had on the segregation laws.
Williams, Donnie, and Wayne Greenhaw. The Thunder of Angels: The Montgomery Bus Boycott and the People Who Broke the Back of Jim Crow. Chicago: Lawrence Hill, 2006. Print.
Parks, the Montgomery Bus Boycott of 1955-56 was actually a collective response to decades of intimidation, harassment and discrimination of Alabama's African American population. By 1955, judicial decisions were still the principal means of struggle for civil rights, even though picketing, marches and boycotts sometimes punctuated the litigation. The boycott, which lasted for more than a year, was almost 100 percent effective.
(3) Montgomery Bus Boycott (1955): After the supreme court decided to end segregation, African Americans started to speak out more about their racial opinions. In Montgomery, Alabama, a bus boycott ended with a victory for the African Americans. The Supreme Court ruled that the Alabama segregation laws were unconstitutional. During the boycott a young African American Baptist minister, Martin Luther King, Jr. became well known. Throughout the long contest he advised African Americans to avoid violence no matter had badly provoked by whites. Rosa Parks tired of sitting in the back of the bus, and giving up her seat to white men. One weary day she refused to move from the front of the bus, and she became one of history's heroes in the Civil Rights Act movement.
On December 5, 1955, thousands of African Americans in Montgomery, Alabama walked, carpooled, or hitchhiked to work in an act of rebellion against segregation on buses. This bus boycott was not the first of its kind – black citizens of Baton-Rouge, Louisiana had implemented the same two years prior – but the bus boycott in Montgomery was a critical battle of the Civil Rights Movement. Though the original intent of the boycott was to economically cripple the bus system until local politicians agreed to integrate the city’s buses, the Montgomery Bus Boycott impacted the fabric of society in a much deeper way. Instead of only changing the symptoms of a much larger problem, this yearlong protest was the first step in transforming the way all Americans perceived freedom and equality. Though the boycott ended when the Supreme Court ruled bus segregation unconstitutional, this was not directly caused by the refusal to ride buses, and thus cannot be defined as the primary triumph of the boycott. Instead, the Montgomery Bus Boycott succeeded in changing the consciousness of millions of Americans, specifically southern blacks. A revolution of the mind was the greatest success of the Montgomery Bus Boycott, and this transformation occurred due to the small validations throughout the boycott that African Americans, as unified, free citizens, had power.
In Martin Luther King Jr’s book, Stride Towards Freedom, he sums up the whole boycott very nicely. “The Story of Montgomery us the story of 50,00 Negroes who were willing to substitute tired feet for tired souls and walk the streets of Montgomery until the walls of segregation were finally battered by the forces of justice.”5
The Montgomery bus boycott was caused when Rosa Parks, an African American woman on December 1, 1955 refused to obey the bus driver James Blake’s that demanded that she give up her seat to a white man. Because she refused, police came and arrested her. During her arrest and trial for this act of civil disobedience, it triggered the Montgomery Bus Boycott, one of the largest and most successful mass movements against racial segregation in history. Her role in American history earned her an iconic status in American culture, and her actions have left an enduring legacy for civil rights movements around the world. Soon after her arrest, Martin Luther King Jr. led a boycott against the public transportation system because it was unfair. This launched Martin Luther King, Jr., one of the organizers of the
“Montgomery Bus Boycott.” UXL Encyclopedia of U.S History.Sonia Benson,Daniel E. Brannen,Jr. and Rebecca Valentine. Vol.5. Detroit: UXL, 2009 1023-1026 student resources in Context, Web.7 Apr,2014
Kennedy, Randall. “Martin Luther King’s Constitution: A Legal History of the Montgomery Bus Boycott.” Yale Law Journal 98 (1989 1988): 999.
Despite the great efforts put forth during the Montgomery Bus Boycott of 1955 in which the black community and its supporters refused to use public transportation, transport segregation still remained in some southern states. As a result the civil rights group, the Congress on Racial Inequality (C.O.R.E.), began to organize what they called “freedom rides.” In 1961, the group began sending student volunteers on bus trips to test the implementation of new laws prohibiting segregation in interstate travel facilities (Peck, 161). Most notable was a trip they took from Washington, D.C., making stops in Georgia, Alabama, and Mississippi. Upon arrival the group was met with violence and brutality from the Ku Klux Klan and others, but this did not deter them from getting their voice heard. In September 1961, the Attorney General petitioned the Interstate Commerce Commission to draft a policy making racial segregation in bus terminals illegal, and in November this was put into effect. The Freedom Riders gave national publicity to the discrimination that black Americans were forced to endure and, in doing so, helped bring about change not only in bus terminals but in the nation as a whole.
Blacks walked miles to work, organized carpools, and despite efforts from the police to discourage this new spark of independence, the boycotts continued for more than a year until in November 1956 the Supreme Court ruled that the Montgomery bus company must desegregate it's busses. Were it not for the leadership of Rosa Parks and Jo Ann Robinson, and the support the black community through church congregations, these events may have not happened for many years to come.
...ivil rights in America, galvanized by the landmark Brown vs. Board of Educa2tion of Topeka decision of 1954.” The Montgomery bus boycott happened on “December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks... who refused to give up her sear to a white passenger on a bus” she was arrested. Later, the Supreme Court ruled “segregated seating on public buses unconstitutional in November 1956.”
Robinson, Jo Ann Gibson, and David J. Garrow. The Montgomery Bus Boycott and the Women Who Started It: the Memoir of Jo Ann Gibson Robinson. Knoxville: University of Tennessee, 1987. Print.
Shortly after the Montgomery Bus Boycott the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) was created, in which Dr. King was a leader of. The SCLC gave King...