The MIA(Montgomery Improvement Association) was formed with Martin Luther King as president. Leaflets were passed around the black community urging them to stop using the bus services. The effect was immense, with countless buses in Montgomery empty. An MIA meeting of 7000 was held in Holt Street Baptist Church, where it was decided that the boycott would continue. At that meeting Martin Luther King gave an inspiring speech that spread the boycott further among blacks.
The story is often told with that being the day when the black people of Montgomery, Alabama, democratically 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. What many people do not know is that day was not the day that the movement to desegregate the buses started. Of all the people who played a role in the Montgomery Bus Boycott, Rosa Parks is the most known. The simple story we are taught in elementary school leaves out many significant people such as Jo Ann Robinson, who absentmindedly sat in the front of an empty bus only to be sent off in tears from the bus driver yelling at her. After Jo’s traumatic experience on the bus in 1945 she tried to start a protest but was turned down when the other woman of the Woman’s Political Council brushed off the incident as “a fact of life in Montgomery.” (Cozzens, 1997) About nine years later, after the Supreme Court ruled that segregation in public schools was unconstitutional, Jo wrote a letter to W.A.
This developed out of an incident where a black woman was arrested for refusing to sit in the 'blacks only' area of a bus in Montgomery, Alabama. The NAACP organised a boycott of buses by black people. Eventually, the bus company faced bankruptcy and the bus service was desegregated.
Parks and Colvin: The Icon and Non-Celebrity Darryl R. Barkley ENG 220 December 22, 2014 Professor Marie Loggia-Kee Parks and Colvin: The Icon and Non-Celebrity Throughout the Jim Crow era, many African Americans rebelled against segregated seating in public transportation, but their number vastly increased after World War II (Schwartz, 2009). In 1955, racial segregation on buses in Montgomery, Alabama, ignited what is historically known as the Montgomery Bus Boycott. While the boycott lead to a decision by the Supreme Court to end segregated seating, it would not have been possible without the sacrifices made by Rosa Parks and Claudette Colvin. Both Parks and Colvin, upon boarding the National City Lines Bus
One such protest was the Montgomery Bus Boycott that occurred from 1955-56. This protest challenged the policy of bus segregation in the south. On the day of Rosa Parks trial almost the whole black community did not ride the busses. More than 66% of the riders on the busses were blacks, therefore, economically the protest hurt the bus company as the majority of the income came from black riders. Southern blacks simply stopped using the bus system to show that they weren't going to be treated unfairly, by the community, government and bus system.
On December 1, 1955 in Montgomery, Alabama one of America’s most famous protests went down in history. After a long day of work, rosa parks refusing to give up her seat in the front if the bus eventually lead to a Bus boycott, leading her into becoming an activist. She started out with an indivisual protest that led to a large social protest and a Supreme Court case. The small protest led to a change in American life. The Rosa Park’s protest in Montgomery Alabama was on of the most important event of the Civil Rights Movement because it was one of the first victories for African-Americans in the movement, it changed the everyday lives of both African-American and White-American people, it helped Martin Luther King Jr. become one of the movements
Hate groups and hate crimes cast alarm among African American families of the Deep South. The promise of owning land had not materialized. Most blacks toiled as sharecroppers trapped in debt. In the 1890s, a boll weevil blight damaged the cotton crop throughout the region, increasing the despair. All these factors served to push African Americans to seek better lives.
In the late 19th century, state and local governments imposed restrictions on voting qualifications which left the African community economically and politically powerless and passed segregation laws, known as Jim Crow laws. Therefore the movement focused on three main areas of discrimination to address, racial segregation, education, and voting rights. Racial segregation is the separation of humans into ethnic groups. Segregation affected many African-Americans day-to-day life, forcing them to go to separate restaurants, water fountains, public toilets, schools, and even making them ride the back of the bus. In 1955 African-Americans in Montgomery, Alabama formed a boycott in protest of the segregated seating on the city buses, In response to Rosa Parks, an African-American woman, getting arrested for refusing
This helped fight against segregation, and discrimination because bus companies began to lose a large amount of money, since a majority of the passengers were black. Another form of working against segregation was sit-ins. Sit-ins was not a practice that was new during the civil rights movement; it just became more popular during the movement. African Americans weren’t allowed to eat in public places where whites were served. So blacks began to actually sit-in at public places to get the equal opportunities like other whites.
Rosa Parks, also a member of the NAACP, was an African American civil rights activist. Segregation has been challenged in education, but not in public places yet. In 1955, Rosa Parks got on one of Montgomery, Alabama’s busses. The buses in Montgomery were segregated and the rules stated that blacks had to sit at the back of the bus. If the bus was crowded, African Americans were expected to give up their seats.