Montgomery Bus Boycott

The Montgomery Bus Boycott was one of the most powerful acts of peaceful protest in American history. It began on December 5, 1955, just four days after Rosa Parks was arrested for refusing to give up her seat on a Montgomery, Alabama, city bus. Parks was sitting in the colored section of the bus, which was where Black passengers were required to sit. But when the white section filled up, the bus driver demanded that she and three other Black passengers move so a white man could sit down. Parks refused, and she was arrested. Black community leaders acted quickly. Jo Ann Robinson, a professor at Alabama State College, stayed up all night printing 52,500 flyers calling for a one-day bus boycott. That one day turned into 381 days. More than 40,000 Black residents stopped riding the buses. They walked miles to work, organized carpools, and shared taxis. A 26-year-old pastor named Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was chosen to lead the newly formed Montgomery Improvement Association, which organized the boycott. The boycott hit the bus company hard — it lost about 65 percent of its revenue because Black riders had made up the majority of passengers. While the boycott continued, lawyers challenged bus segregation in court. In June 1956, a federal court ruled in Browder v. Gayle that Montgomery's bus segregation laws were unconstitutional. The Supreme Court upheld that decision on November 13, 1956. On December 20, 1956, the order reached Montgomery, and the boycott officially ended. Black and white passengers could sit wherever they chose. The boycott proved that when a community stands together, even unjust laws can be changed.