“You must never be fearful about what you are doing when it is right.”
- Rosa Parks -
On the evening of September 3, 1944, in Abbeville, Alabama, a 24-year-old woman named Recy Taylor, accompanied by her friend Fannie Daniels and Fannie’s son West, was walking home from a church service when she noticed a green Chevrolet following them. The vehicle eventually stopped next to them, and the door opened to reveal seven armed young white men inside. The men ordered the group to stop in their tracks but were ignored. Eventually, one of the men walked up to Recy Taylor and pointed a shotgun directly at her. (a)
The men kidnapped Recy Taylor, brought her to the woods, and sexually assaulted her. They then left her on the side of a highway alone to fend for herself. The men made a point to tell Taylor not to say a word about anything because if she did, they would kill her. Bravely, Taylor did the exact opposite and told a couple of police officers, gathered by Daniels, what had just happened to her.
Shortly after, the sheriff drove Taylor to a nearby store where they quickly identified two of the seven men. “He [the sheriff] asked the boys, ‘Was y’all with this lady tonight?’” Taylor recounted in 2011, “And the white boys said, ‘Yeah.’ Mr. Louis [the sheriff] told them to get in the car, and he left. We didn’t have no conversation about the boys. He just left.” (b)
In the following days, Taylor was contacted by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), which took an interest in her case and sent a private investigator to speak with her. When the investigator made it to Taylor’s home, she found the town’s sheriff waiting for her outside. The sheriff made his presence known by driving up and down the road outside Taylor’s house and eventually interrupting Taylor and the investigator.
The sheriff even sent the investigator away as he had assured his constituents that there would be no “troublemakers” in town. After the interrupted meeting, the investigator created the Committee for Equal Justice for the Rights of Mrs. Recy Taylor, a committee that would soon become headline news. However, even with all the work that went towards bringing Taylor’s abusers to justice, no justice would be served until the Alabama House of Representatives offered her a resolution… some seventy years later. (b)
Long after Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863 that set slaves free Black people in America were still not treated equally. Many opportunities for success were not given to them and were instead reserved for white people, and many public spaces were separated by the words “for colored” and “for white.” So, due to the era and environment Taylor, the investigator, and many other Black people lived through, the unsatisfactory ending to the case was not surprising, and the injustice undoubtedly caused the fire for racial justice inside the investigator’s heart to intensify.
The investigator lived the rest of her life fighting for racial justice. Years later, after her straightforward response to a bus driver’s question and the actions that followed, the investigator would eventually become known as the “Mother of the Civil Rights Movement''. Before that, of course, she was known by a much simpler name…
Rosa Parks was born on February 4, 1913, to parents James and Leona McCauley. Parks’s parents split when she was very young, leading the girl and her mother to move in with Parks’s grandparents Rose and Sylvester Edwards, two former slaves. From her earliest days, Parks learned both about racial inequality and the need for activism to achieve racial equality. After being taught to read by her mother, she attended a small schoolhouse that taught grades 1-6 in Pine Level, Alabama. Her school lacked adequate supplies, and the classes were made up of all Black children. On the other hand, the nearby school for white children had brand new materials and even a bus to take them to and from school. Still, Parks completed her education there and moved on to secondary school.
Parks dropped out during the eleventh grade to care for her sick mother and grandmother. To make ends meet, she got a job working in a shirt factory. In 1932, she married Raymond Parks who encouraged her to go back to school and get her diploma. (c) After earning her diploma, Parks became involved in the civil rights movement and began working as a sexual assault investigator, a decision fueled by her own experience with sexual assault in 1931 during which she was able to fight back and escape. “I was ready to die, but give my consent? Never. Never, never,” she recalled later on when asked about the incident. (b)
This position led her to work with Recy Taylor in 1944, which then led her to embrace other positions within the NAACP, including secretary to civil rights leader E.D. Nixon, the president of the NAACP. While Parks spent her time fighting for civil rights, one could imagine that she had little to no idea about just how much her life would change nine years later. (c)
In 1954, the historical case Brown v. the Board of Education saw the U.S. Supreme Court ruling against segregated schools as they were deemed unconstitutional. While this had the promise of racial equality, many things in the country were still unequal. In March of 1955, 15-year-old Claudette Colvin boarded a bus in Montgomery, Alabama. It was a typical ride for Colgin at first, but the normalcy soon dwindled when she refused to give up her seat to a white passenger per the driver’s request. Colvin was arrested for this action. (d) Many heard about her arrest, but it wasn’t until December 1, 1955, that wheels would start to turn.
On that day, Rosa Parks had just gotten off work in a department store where she was a seamstress. Back then, buses in Montgomery, Alabama, were split into two different sections--people of color were forced to sit in the back while white people were allowed to sit in the front. When Black passengers boarded buses, they would walk inside the front of the bus to pay, get out of the bus, and then get on from the back. According to Montgomery law, bus drivers held “powers of a police officer of the city while in actual charge of any bus for the purpose of carrying out the provisions”. (c) This essentially meant that whatever they said went… a dictate Rosa Parks showed no real interest in.
“Why don’t you stand up?” the bus driver asked Parks as he attempted to make her give up her seat to a white passenger.
“I don’t think I should have to stand up,” Rosa Parks replied. (e)
She was arrested shortly after.
Meanwhile, Dr. Martin Luther King was making his strides in the fight for racial justice. He is often credited for the events that occurred soon after Parks’s arrest, but many forget that everything organized had a long line of strong Black women leading the way. For example, Jo-Ann Robinson became president of the Women’s Political Council (WPC) in Montgomery, Alabama. The WPC was an organization designed to keep Black women involved in anti-segregation politics and movements. Robinson had been trying to bring to light the segregated busing issue for a while but had failed.
However, the actions and arrests of Colvin and especially Parks catapulted the movement into a success best known as the Montgomery Bus Boycott. The WPC began publicizing the boycott by handing out flyers to encourage participation, planning protests, and even setting up carpools. (f) On the first day of the Montgomery Bus Boycott, Dr. Martin Luther King took center stage at a gathering outside of a church where he proclaimed: “The great glory of American democracy is the right to protest for right.” (g)
The Black community was urged to stay out of the Montgomery public transit system on December 5, 1955, when Parks was set to arrive at a courthouse with her attorney, Fred Gray. She was greeted with many cheers and well-wishes outside the courthouse, and her trial began. She was found guilty of breaking the law and was charged $10 with an extra $4 in court fees. (h)
Soon after, a multitude of people began boycotting the Montgomery bus system. Many people used the carpool system, rode only in Black-operated cabs, and simply walked to work. This, of course, upset many people, particularly those who lost money due to the boycotting. Dr. King and E.D. Nixon had their houses destroyed by bombs, and many Black churches were burnt to the ground. In addition, many participating in the boycott were arrested due to an ancient law prohibiting this very practice.
After nearly a year of the boycott, the Supreme Court of Alabama ruled that segregation laws were unconstitutional. At that moment, the buses in Montgomery were so broke that they had no choice but to abide by the ruling, leading the bus system to end its racist practices. As a result, the Montgomery Bus Boycott is hailed as one of the most successful movements in American history. (i)
While that is true, Parks’s life wasn’t easy after the boycott. “She got a lot of attention for that arrest,” Parks’s niece, Susan McCauley, later said, “She was disheartened that her Black co-workers did not speak to her. If you were doing anything for a change, you were an outcast. Jim Crow conditioned Black folk to think this was the best life they were going to get. People just stopped speaking to her until she was let go.” Parks was eventually forced to quit her job as many fights took place between her and her co-workers.
Her husband was also banned from speaking of her and the boycott at work. Parks was now both broke and broken in a place she wanted to see succeed, in a place that she wanted to help. “People didn’t understand what she went through. It was never about her. It was about changing the law.” her niece says. After a while, Parks found herself and her husband in Hampton, Virginia, where they continually searched for work to no avail. (j)
Ten years passed until Parks found some good work as she was hired by John Conyers, a newly-elected Michigan representative. Now living in Detroit, Parks used her time working for Conyers to engage with the community. She also held a position on the Board of Advocates for Planned Parenthood of America.
In 1987, Parks and her friend Elaine Steele founded the Rosa and Raymond Parks Institute, a place designed to teach people of all ages the importance of civil rights in America by taking guests on bus tours to critical civil rights and Underground Railroad locations. An icon in her later days, Parks would receive the Medal of Freedom from Bill Clinton, the Congressional Gold Medal, and the Martin Luther King Jr. Award, just to name a few notable accolades.
Rosa Parks’s legacy lives on in those she inspired and continues to inspire. In 2002, Parks was diagnosed with progressive dementia and died in her Detroit apartment in 2005, but she will forever be an American hero and a beacon of hope to those who fight for racial justice and refuse to bend to tradition. (c)
“You treated her with indifference because she was so quiet, so serene - just a very special person. There was only one Rosa Parks.”
- John Conyers
Reflection
At the time I’m writing this, it is January 22, 2021. A little over 48 hours ago, I watched the inauguration of Joseph R. Biden. But before Joe Biden took the oath of office, I watched Kamala Harris take her vice-presidential oath of office. Regardless of your political affiliations, and let’s be honest here, whether or not you are completely tone-deaf to the world today, I think we can all agree that Kamala Harris taking her oath of office as not only the first woman but the first Black, Asian-American woman to do so is both a historic and phenomenal moment. Little girls and women of all ages all over the world, especially Black girls and women, can look to her for inspiration when trying to break that glass ceiling.
When I think of Madam Vice President Kamala Harris’s historic feat, I am reminded of other historic feats accomplished by Black American men and women throughout history; Rosa Parks, of course being the topic of this essay, is remembered for her many achievements in a tumultuous era. I also think about people like Martin Luther King Jr. and Frederick Douglass who are civil rights icons of yesterday but are still honored today. But when I think of yesterday, today inevitably comes to mind with less than happy thoughts.
If someone had said fifteen years ago that America would have a Black man named Barack Obama as president, most Americans probably would have said that they were crazy. If that same person had said that this man had the middle name Hussein, was part Kenyan and would take residence in the White House for eight years, Americans probably would have sent them to a mental ward.
The impact of America’s first Black president also makes me think about more current pieces of media and culture. Six years ago, Hamilton: An American Musical became both an iconic piece of Broadway history and an instant classic that stretched far beyond the Richard Rogers Theater in New York City like few Broadway shows do. This outreach no doubt was accomplished with the overall uniqueness of the show itself. Hamilton featured a predominantly Black cast that not only played Founding Fathers like George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Aaron Burr but told their stories through important pieces of Black culture--the musical genres of rap and hip-hop.
I also cannot forget to mention movies like Black Panther as it featured Chadwick Boseman as Marvel Studios’ first Black main superhero, and African culture and history set the stage for the entire film. This movie, of course, inspired nearly everyone who saw it to break the barriers put in front of them as well as put a new superhero in the hearts of so many Black children, teens, and adults who had never seen a major superhero who looked like them.
What I’ve described here are groundbreaking people and media, and I think it is pretty obvious why. But when I think of such groundbreaking political figures and materials, I am also reminded of the systemic racism and racial inequality still felt so heavily today.
158 years ago slaves were set free.
92 years later, Rosa Parks was arrested for sitting on a bus seat.
63 years later, it is still groundbreaking to see a Black superhero.
Nevertheless, seeing Kamala Harris become the first Black woman vice president really shouldn’t be as impactful as it was on January 22. It is 2021, and America has still allowed systemic racism to exist and thrive in our neighborhoods, schools, workplaces…everywhere. I’d love to end this essay on a positive note, but while I have pushed the need for education to help solve these issues, education is not always happy.
Decades after Rosa Parks’ determination to not give up her seat led to the desegregation of the Montgomery bus system, these people, events, and pieces of art and media shouldn’t be surprising--they should be just as normal as all the rest.
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