LEARNING TOGETHER: The Story of America
I want you to imagine that it’s the year 1955. You live in Montgomery, Alabama and you need to take the bus to get to your job, school, grandma’s house, etc. If you’re an African American, you would pay your fare at the front of the bus, exit the bus only to re-enter via the side of the bus. Sometimes, the bus drivers would pull off while the Black passengers (after paying for their ride) were trying to enter the bus from the side. Knowing this you waste no time re-entering the bus.
As you search for a seat, you discover that the Colored Section, which was designated as the last ten seats at the back of the bus, was full. The ten seats in the front of the bus were reserved for white riders only so you can’t seat there. Therefore, you politely take your seat in the first row of the middle section of the bus.
The middle section was unreserved so Black and white riders could share it, equally (sorta). You see, Black and white riders could not sit next to each other. Therefore, if there was an empty seat next to a white person in this middle section, you couldn’t sit there. You either had to move to the back of the bus (the Colored Section) or stand up next to an empty seat (Crazy, I know, but even crazier was the fact that it was illegal for Black and white people to sit next to each other.).
Okay, don’t get too comfortable in your seat because after a couple of stops your bus is now full. And at the very next stop (wouldn’t you know it) a white person entered the bus. You’re seated in a middle seat when the bus driver demands that you get up and give your seat (that you paid for) to a white rider.
Now, (Today, with your modern way of thinking.) you might say to yourself; I ain’t getting up. Who’s gonna make me. Well, in 1955 Montgomery, Alabama (and most of the Deep South) by refusing to surrender your seat to a white bus rider you would be breaking the law of racial segregation and you could be physically removed from the bus, issued a fine and/or thrown in jail. And this was exactly what happened to 15-year-old Claudette Colvin, 18-year-old Mary Louise Smith and countless other Montgomery Black citizens. But it was Rosa Parks’ refusal to yield her seat to a white passenger on December 1, 1955, that sparked the Montgomery Bus Boycott.
As president of the Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA) Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. worked with the Women’s Political Council (WPC) and many other local leaders to create the first large-scale nonviolent civil rights demonstration to challenge racial segregation on the public transit system.
The initial plan called for a one-day boycott of the city buses on December 5th. Ninety percent of the Black citizens refused to ride the buses. (This is what unity, pride and power looks like. Even in the Deep South in the midst of Black Codes, Jim Crow laws, and the United States government turning a blind eye to this level of hatred and discrimination, African Americans stood tall, brave and said, No more! We are Americans, too and we have every right to be treated as full U. S. citizens.).
OUR HISTORY MATTERS
See Part 2
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