The Montgomery Bus Boycott: Rosa Parks And The Civil Rights Movement

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The Montgomery bus boycott was a thirteen-month-long protest against racial segregation on public transportation in Montgomery, Alabama in the 1950s. It began with the arrest of Rosa Parks on December 1, 1955. She was arrested because she would not give up her seat to a white passenger. Many different events contributed to the end of racial segregation on the buses. Many people do not know that the Women's Political Council (WPC) and other groups were talking about planning the boycott. So Rosa Parks' arrest helped to push the WPC to act, thus bringing about the Montgomery bus boycott. On December 5, ninety percent of regular black bus riders did not ride the bus. After this, leaders met to discuss extending the boycott. During this meeting, the Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA) was formed with Martin Luther King Jr. as president. They then proceeded to meet at Holt…show more content…
The demands were: kind and fair treatment by bus operators; first-come, first-served seating for everyone, with black people seated from the back, white people seated from the front; and black bus drivers on mainly black routes. However, the demands were not met and the black residents of Montgomery continued to boycott the buses through 1956 no matter how hard officials tried to stop it. The city began to penalize black taxi drivers for helping boycotters, so the MIA started a carpool following the advice of T.J. Jemison who had started a carpool during a 1953 bus boycott in Baton Rouge. The carpool, once organized, included about 300 cars. Meetings were scheduled with the Alabama council; however, no agreement could be made. Martin Luther King Jr. and E. D. Nixon’s homes were bombed in early 1956. Nobody was harmed in the bombing. When many people arrived at King’s home, King said to all of those gathered, “Be calm as me and my family are. We are not hurt and remember that if anything happens happens to me there will be others to take my
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