Background

=Montgomery Bus Boycott Background=

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//The Civil Rights movement// took place during the 1940s and 1950s. //The Civil Rights Movement// is "an umbrella term that refers to the various efforts of African American activists to gain full citizenship rights and to end racial discrimination in American society" (Wendt). //The Civil Rights Movement// was a major turning point in American History and allowed African Americans to gain their full citizen rights. After the //Civil War//, slavery was abolished and blacks gained full citizenship during //Reconstruction// from 1865-1877. However, blacks soon lost these rights when, in the 1880s, the South "enacted legislation that mandated racial segregation in=====

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public life and disfranchised black men" (Wendt). With these new ways of life came the //Jim Crow laws//. The main purpose of these laws were to segregate whites from blacks and decline blacks from their full citizenship rights. In Montgomery, Alabama, //the Jim Crow laws// were enforced in the //bus system regulations//. Under=====

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these regulations (1955), "blacks sitting behind the white reserve section were only required to give up their seats to whites if there was another seat available to them" (Hare). African Americans were forced to pay for their ride at the front of the bus, and walk around to the back entrance for seating. Many white drivers would pull away from the bus stop before they could reboard. On the bus, there was a barrier dividing the races, "as the bus filled, the barrier was pushed back to make room for white passengers. No black person could sit in the same row as a white, and whites had priority in this middle 'no-man's land'" (Ziegenbien). The bus system was the main source of transportation for blacks and, usually, blacks followed the regulations.=====

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 * JO ANN ROBINSON** was the leader of the Womens' Political Council (WPC), a foundation of "mostly middle-class black women who were committed to increasing African American participation in civic affairs" (Robinson). A few years before, the WPC had already been protesting against the //Jim Crow laws// on the Montgomery city buses; **CLAUDETTE COLVIN** was arrested on March 2, 1955 for declining the request made by the bus driver to move from her seat. Months later, **MARY LOUISE SMITH** was arrested for refusing to give up her seat on the bus as well. These events set up the need to boycott against the bus system. Blacks saw it as unfair for them to move from their bus seats just because of their skin color. Also, at this time, more //Jim Crow laws// were enacted in more public locations. For example, there were different restrooms for blacks and whites with signs marking the doors, black children and white children attended different schools, and blacks were constantly being lynched and tormented because of their race. The WPC tried to stop these events from occurring. Their main goal was to obtain full citizenship rights to blacks and have racial equality throughout America.=====

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Parks was arrested and taken to jail where she was fingerprinted and allowed one phone call. This phone call was to **E.D NIXON,** the president of the NAACP, who knew Parks well, and was able to pay her bail. The bus rules had reached a breaking point and Rosa expressed this when she said "... The only tired I was, was tired of giving in" (Parks).
 * ROSA PARKS**, a legendary African American woman, is known for her refusal to give up her bus seat to a white man on December 1, 1955. Parks was the secretary for the //National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP)// which was founded in 1909 and sought to "...ensure the political, educational, social and economic equality of minority group citizens of United States and eliminate race prejudice..." (NAACP.org). Parks' refusal to give up her bus seat to a white man sparked an important chapter during the Civil Rights movement. Parks claimed, "I didn't get on the bus with the intention of being arrested...I got on the bus with the intention of going home." (Hare).=====

= The Decision =