Rosa Parks: A Legacy of Courage

The legend of Rosa Parks paints her as a tired seamstress simply trying to get home on an ordinary day – with no thought of sparking a year-long boycott that galvanized the Civil Rights Movement.The only part of that legend that is true is the boycott was never meant to last a year.

In reality, Rosa Parks had been a civil rights activist for more than a dozen years before that day, 60 years ago this week, when she was arrested for refusing to give up her seat on the bus. She was, at the time, secretary of the NAACP’s state and Montgomery chapters and head of the NAACP’s youth leadership organization.

A few months before Parks’ arrest, Montgomery NAACP President  E.D. Nixon, had planned to use the similar arrest of a 15-year-old-girl, Claudette Colvin, as the test case to challenge Montgomery’s bus segregation laws. That plan fell through when Nixon learned Colvin was pregnant; Nixon feared her condition would not inspire sympathy among conservatives.

Parks’ arrest presented a new opportunity. Alabama State College Professor Jo Ann Robinson,  president of the Women’s Political Council, circulated fliers alerting the community of Parks’ arrest announcing a one-day boycott.

That one-day boycott, intended only to demonstrate the impact a long-term boycott might have, was so successful, it grew into a larger movement, led by the then-unknown new pastor at the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church, Martin Luther King, Jr.

Rosa Parks’ legacy lives on today through movements like #BlackLivesMatter and student activists demanding racial justice on campuses, as well as the Urban League Movement every day .  We honor her memory, 60 years after her courageous stance, by continuing the fight for equality and dignity for all.