During the period of 1955 to 1965, four of the most significant chapters in civil rights history were connected to the cities of Montgomery and Birmingham: The Montgomery Bus Boycott of 1955, the Freedom Rides of 1961, the Birmingham Mass Protests in the summer of 1963, and the Selma to Montgomery Voting Rights March in 1965.The Montgomery Bus Boycott was the event that catapulted Martin Luther King to the front of the civil rights movement and gave black citizens the opportunity to realize that they could change the laws and practices of society through nonviolent mass protest.
It could be said that the civil rights movement as a movement of mass protest of ordinary citizens in America had a distinct beginning point, on December 5, 1955, and the place was the Holt Street Baptist Church in Montgomery Alabama.* It is well known that Rosa Parks was arrested for refusing to yield her seat on the bus to a white passenger. Many also know that fifteen year old Claudette Colvin had been arrested earlier that year for the same reason. Rosa Parks’ stand was heroic, and the legal strategy that was developed to challenge segregation on public transportation was brilliant. A third woman, Jo Ann Robinson, was a significant leader in pushing for the action and she is responsible for writing the now famous flyer that was distributed throughout the black community to publicize the boycott (35,000 copies produced on mimeograph machines!). Equally or more significant was the willingness of thousands of ordinary citizens to join and remain committed to this movement for the thirteen months that it took to obtain a Supreme Court ruling that broke through this racist system.
It could be said that the civil rights movement as a movement of mass protest of ordinary citizens in America had a distinct beginning point, on December 5, 1955, and the place was the Holt Street Baptist Church in Montgomery Alabama.* It is well known that Rosa Parks was arrested for refusing to yield her seat on the bus to a white passenger. Many also know that fifteen year old Claudette Colvin had been arrested earlier that year for the same reason. Rosa Parks’ stand was heroic, and the legal strategy that was developed to challenge segregation on public transportation was brilliant. A third woman, Jo Ann Robinson, was a significant leader in pushing for the action and she is responsible for writing the now famous flyer that was distributed throughout the black community to publicize the boycott (35,000 copies produced on mimeograph machines!). Equally or more significant was the willingness of thousands of ordinary citizens to join and remain committed to this movement for the thirteen months that it took to obtain a Supreme Court ruling that broke through this racist system.
Holt Street Baptist Church, photograph taken on December 5, 2005, the 50th Anniversary of the Montgomery Bus Boycott.
On the night of December 5, 1955, a crowd estimated at 5,000 people gathered in and around the Holt Street Baptist Church to hear the first public civil rights speech of a 26 year old preacher by the name of Martin Luther King, Jr. King exhorted the crowd not only in the importance of the struggle they were about to undertake, but in the specific strategies by which they would begin to change history. Having faced decades of intimidation, humiliation, and oppression, King and the leaders of the emerging movement motivated and trained participants in the principles of nonviolent resistance – the willingness to be insulted, arrested and jailed while refusing to engage in violent retaliation – and the commitment to stick together and see the cause through to its end.
King’s oratorical gifts stirred the people. “And we are not wrong; we are not wrong in what we are doing. If we are wrong, the Supreme Court of this nation is wrong. If we are wrong, the Constitution of the United States is wrong. If we are wrong, God Almighty is wrong. If we are wrong, Jesus of Nazareth was merely a utopian dreamer that never came down to Earth. If we are wrong, justice is a lie, love has no meaning. And we are determined here in Montgomery to work and fight until justice runs down like water, and righteousness like a mighty stream.”
The participants walked, carpooled, set up taxi services, and stayed off of the buses for over a year. Eventually the dedication, unity, teamwork, and persistence of the movement paid off as the effort went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, which ruled against the segregation of public buses. The ruling arrived in Montgomery on December 20, 1956. The integration of the buses was not easy even after this ruling, but the movement inspired black citizens across the country that they could successfully stand up to segregation.
*For the sake of historical accuracy, two boycotts, lasting one day and one week respectively, had been held in Baton Rouge in 1953 to protest for improved arrangements for black bus riders. Some concessions were gained, although the rules preserved segregated seating.
Eyes on the Prize, Chapter 3 “We’re Not Moving to the Back, Mr. Blake,” 1987, Juan Williams.
http://mlk-kpp01.stanford.edu/index.php/encyclopedia/documentsentry/ the_addres_to_the_first_montgomery_improvement_association_mia_mass_meeting/
Text of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s speech at Holt Street Baptist Church, December 5, 1955.
"My friends, we are certainly very happy to see each of you out this evening. We are here this evening for serious business. We are here in a general sense because first and foremost we are American citizens, and we are determined to apply our citizenship to the fullness of its meaning. We are here also because of our love for democracy, because of our deep-seated belief that democracy transformed from thin paper to thick action is the greatest form of government on earth.
But we are here in a specific sense because of the bus situation in Montgomery. We are here because we are determined to get the situation corrected. This situation is not at all new. The problem has existed over endless years. For many years now, Negroes in Montgomery and so many other areas have been inflicted with the paralysis of crippling fear on buses in our community. On so many occasions, Negroes have been intimidated and humiliated and oppressed because of the sheer fact that they were Negroes. I don't have time this evening to go into the history of these numerous cases. Many of them now are lost in the thick fog of oblivion, but at least one stands before us now with glaring dimensions.
Just the other day, just last Thursday to be exact, one of the finest citizens in Montgomery-- not one of the finest Negro citizens, but one of the finest citizens in Montgomery--was taken from a bus and carried to jail and arrested because she refused to get up to give her seat to a white person. Now the press would have us believe that she refused to leave a reserved section for Negroes, but I want you to know this evening that there is no reserved section. The law has never been clarified at that point. Now I think I speak with legal authority--not that I have any legal authority, but I think I speak with legal authority behind me- that the law, the ordinance, the city ordinance has never been totally clarified.
Mrs. Rosa Parks is a fine person. And, since it had to happen, I'm happy that it happened to a person like Mrs. Parks, for nobody can doubt the boundless outreach of her integrity. Nobody can doubt the height of her character, nobody can doubt the depth of her Christian commitment and devotion to the teachings of Jesus. And I'm happy, since it had to happen, it happened to a person that nobody can call a disturbing factor in the community. Mrs. Parks is a fine Christian person, unassuming, and yet there is integrity and character there. And just because she refused to get up, she was arrested.
And you know, my friends, there comes a time when people get tired of being trampled over by the iron feet of oppression. There comes a time, my friends, when people get tired of being plunged across the abyss of humiliation, where they experience the bleakness of nagging despair. There comes a time when people get tired of being pushed out of the glittering sunlight of life's July and left standing amid the piercing chill of an alpine November. There comes a time.
We are here, we are here this evening because we are tired now. And I want to say that we are not here advocating violence. We have never done that. I want it to be known throughout Montgomery and throughout this nation that we are Christian people. We believe in the Christian religion. We believe in the teachings of Jesus. The only weapon that we have in our hands this evening is the weapon of protest. That's all.
And certainly, certainly, this is the glory of America, with all of its faults. This is the glory of our democracy. If we were incarcerated behind the iron curtains of a Communistic nation, we couldn't do this. If we were dropped in the dungeon of a totalitarian regime, we couldn't do this. But the great glory of American democracy is the right to protest for right. My friends, don't let anybody make us feel that we are to be compared in our actions with the Ku Klux Klan or with the White Citizens Council. There will be no crosses burned at any bus stops in Montgomery. There will be no white persons pulled out of their homes and taken out on some distant road and lynched for not cooperating. There will be nobody among us who will stand up and defy the Constitution of this nation. We only assemble here because of our desire to see right exist. My friends, I want it to be known that we're going to work with grim and bold determination to gain justice on the buses in this city.
And we are not wrong; we are not wrong in what we are doing. If we are wrong, the Supreme Court of this nation is wrong. If we are wrong, the Constitution of the United States is wrong. If we are wrong, God Almighty is wrong. If we are wrong, Jesus of Nazareth was merely a utopian dreamer that never came down to Earth. If we are wrong, justice is a lie, love has no meaning. And we are determined here in Montgomery to work and fight until justice runs down like water, and righteousness like a mighty stream.
I want to say that in all of our actions, we must stick together. Unity is the great need of the hour, and if we are united we can get many of the things that we not only desire but which we justly deserve. And don't let anybody frighten you. We are not afraid of what we are doing, because we are doing it within the law. There is never a time in our American democracy that we must ever think we are wrong when we protest. We reserve that right. When labor all over this nation came to see that it would be trampled over by capitalistic power, it was nothing wrong with labor getting together and organizing and protesting for its rights. We, the disinherited of this land, we who have been oppressed so long, are tired of going through the long night of captivity. And now we are reaching out for the daybreak of freedom and justice and equality.
May I say to you, my friends, as I come to a close, and just giving some idea of why we are assembled here, that we must keep--and I want to stress this, in all of our doings, in all of our deliberations here this evening and all of the week and while, --whatever we do--, we must keep God in the forefront. Let us be Christian in all of our actions. But I want to tell you this evening that it is not enough for us to talk about love, love is one of the pivotal points of the Christian faith. There is another side called justice. And justice is really love in calculation. Justice is love correcting that which revolts against love.
The Almighty God himself is not only, not the God just standing out saying through Hosea, "I love you, Israel." He's also the God that stands up before the nations and said: "Be still and know that I'm God, that if you don't obey me I will break the backbone of your power and slap you out of the orbits of your international and national relationships." Standing beside love is always justice, and we are only using the tools of justice. Not only are we using the tools of persuasion, but we've come to see that we've got to use the tools of coercion. Not only is this thing a process of education, but it is also a process of legislation.
And as we stand and sit here this evening and as we prepare ourselves for what lies ahead, let us go out with the grim and bold determination that we are going to stick together. We are going to work together. Right here in Montgomery, when the history books are written in the future, somebody will have to say, "There lived a race of people, a black people, 'fleecy locks and black complexion', a people who had the moral courage to stand up for their rights. And thereby they injected a new meaning into the veins of history and of civilization." And we're going to do that. God grant that we will do it before it is too late. As we proceed with our program, let us think of these things."
On the night of December 5, 1955, a crowd estimated at 5,000 people gathered in and around the Holt Street Baptist Church to hear the first public civil rights speech of a 26 year old preacher by the name of Martin Luther King, Jr. King exhorted the crowd not only in the importance of the struggle they were about to undertake, but in the specific strategies by which they would begin to change history. Having faced decades of intimidation, humiliation, and oppression, King and the leaders of the emerging movement motivated and trained participants in the principles of nonviolent resistance – the willingness to be insulted, arrested and jailed while refusing to engage in violent retaliation – and the commitment to stick together and see the cause through to its end.
King’s oratorical gifts stirred the people. “And we are not wrong; we are not wrong in what we are doing. If we are wrong, the Supreme Court of this nation is wrong. If we are wrong, the Constitution of the United States is wrong. If we are wrong, God Almighty is wrong. If we are wrong, Jesus of Nazareth was merely a utopian dreamer that never came down to Earth. If we are wrong, justice is a lie, love has no meaning. And we are determined here in Montgomery to work and fight until justice runs down like water, and righteousness like a mighty stream.”
The participants walked, carpooled, set up taxi services, and stayed off of the buses for over a year. Eventually the dedication, unity, teamwork, and persistence of the movement paid off as the effort went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, which ruled against the segregation of public buses. The ruling arrived in Montgomery on December 20, 1956. The integration of the buses was not easy even after this ruling, but the movement inspired black citizens across the country that they could successfully stand up to segregation.
*For the sake of historical accuracy, two boycotts, lasting one day and one week respectively, had been held in Baton Rouge in 1953 to protest for improved arrangements for black bus riders. Some concessions were gained, although the rules preserved segregated seating.
Eyes on the Prize, Chapter 3 “We’re Not Moving to the Back, Mr. Blake,” 1987, Juan Williams.
http://mlk-kpp01.stanford.edu/index.php/encyclopedia/documentsentry/ the_addres_to_the_first_montgomery_improvement_association_mia_mass_meeting/
Text of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s speech at Holt Street Baptist Church, December 5, 1955.
"My friends, we are certainly very happy to see each of you out this evening. We are here this evening for serious business. We are here in a general sense because first and foremost we are American citizens, and we are determined to apply our citizenship to the fullness of its meaning. We are here also because of our love for democracy, because of our deep-seated belief that democracy transformed from thin paper to thick action is the greatest form of government on earth.
But we are here in a specific sense because of the bus situation in Montgomery. We are here because we are determined to get the situation corrected. This situation is not at all new. The problem has existed over endless years. For many years now, Negroes in Montgomery and so many other areas have been inflicted with the paralysis of crippling fear on buses in our community. On so many occasions, Negroes have been intimidated and humiliated and oppressed because of the sheer fact that they were Negroes. I don't have time this evening to go into the history of these numerous cases. Many of them now are lost in the thick fog of oblivion, but at least one stands before us now with glaring dimensions.
Just the other day, just last Thursday to be exact, one of the finest citizens in Montgomery-- not one of the finest Negro citizens, but one of the finest citizens in Montgomery--was taken from a bus and carried to jail and arrested because she refused to get up to give her seat to a white person. Now the press would have us believe that she refused to leave a reserved section for Negroes, but I want you to know this evening that there is no reserved section. The law has never been clarified at that point. Now I think I speak with legal authority--not that I have any legal authority, but I think I speak with legal authority behind me- that the law, the ordinance, the city ordinance has never been totally clarified.
Mrs. Rosa Parks is a fine person. And, since it had to happen, I'm happy that it happened to a person like Mrs. Parks, for nobody can doubt the boundless outreach of her integrity. Nobody can doubt the height of her character, nobody can doubt the depth of her Christian commitment and devotion to the teachings of Jesus. And I'm happy, since it had to happen, it happened to a person that nobody can call a disturbing factor in the community. Mrs. Parks is a fine Christian person, unassuming, and yet there is integrity and character there. And just because she refused to get up, she was arrested.
And you know, my friends, there comes a time when people get tired of being trampled over by the iron feet of oppression. There comes a time, my friends, when people get tired of being plunged across the abyss of humiliation, where they experience the bleakness of nagging despair. There comes a time when people get tired of being pushed out of the glittering sunlight of life's July and left standing amid the piercing chill of an alpine November. There comes a time.
We are here, we are here this evening because we are tired now. And I want to say that we are not here advocating violence. We have never done that. I want it to be known throughout Montgomery and throughout this nation that we are Christian people. We believe in the Christian religion. We believe in the teachings of Jesus. The only weapon that we have in our hands this evening is the weapon of protest. That's all.
And certainly, certainly, this is the glory of America, with all of its faults. This is the glory of our democracy. If we were incarcerated behind the iron curtains of a Communistic nation, we couldn't do this. If we were dropped in the dungeon of a totalitarian regime, we couldn't do this. But the great glory of American democracy is the right to protest for right. My friends, don't let anybody make us feel that we are to be compared in our actions with the Ku Klux Klan or with the White Citizens Council. There will be no crosses burned at any bus stops in Montgomery. There will be no white persons pulled out of their homes and taken out on some distant road and lynched for not cooperating. There will be nobody among us who will stand up and defy the Constitution of this nation. We only assemble here because of our desire to see right exist. My friends, I want it to be known that we're going to work with grim and bold determination to gain justice on the buses in this city.
And we are not wrong; we are not wrong in what we are doing. If we are wrong, the Supreme Court of this nation is wrong. If we are wrong, the Constitution of the United States is wrong. If we are wrong, God Almighty is wrong. If we are wrong, Jesus of Nazareth was merely a utopian dreamer that never came down to Earth. If we are wrong, justice is a lie, love has no meaning. And we are determined here in Montgomery to work and fight until justice runs down like water, and righteousness like a mighty stream.
I want to say that in all of our actions, we must stick together. Unity is the great need of the hour, and if we are united we can get many of the things that we not only desire but which we justly deserve. And don't let anybody frighten you. We are not afraid of what we are doing, because we are doing it within the law. There is never a time in our American democracy that we must ever think we are wrong when we protest. We reserve that right. When labor all over this nation came to see that it would be trampled over by capitalistic power, it was nothing wrong with labor getting together and organizing and protesting for its rights. We, the disinherited of this land, we who have been oppressed so long, are tired of going through the long night of captivity. And now we are reaching out for the daybreak of freedom and justice and equality.
May I say to you, my friends, as I come to a close, and just giving some idea of why we are assembled here, that we must keep--and I want to stress this, in all of our doings, in all of our deliberations here this evening and all of the week and while, --whatever we do--, we must keep God in the forefront. Let us be Christian in all of our actions. But I want to tell you this evening that it is not enough for us to talk about love, love is one of the pivotal points of the Christian faith. There is another side called justice. And justice is really love in calculation. Justice is love correcting that which revolts against love.
The Almighty God himself is not only, not the God just standing out saying through Hosea, "I love you, Israel." He's also the God that stands up before the nations and said: "Be still and know that I'm God, that if you don't obey me I will break the backbone of your power and slap you out of the orbits of your international and national relationships." Standing beside love is always justice, and we are only using the tools of justice. Not only are we using the tools of persuasion, but we've come to see that we've got to use the tools of coercion. Not only is this thing a process of education, but it is also a process of legislation.
And as we stand and sit here this evening and as we prepare ourselves for what lies ahead, let us go out with the grim and bold determination that we are going to stick together. We are going to work together. Right here in Montgomery, when the history books are written in the future, somebody will have to say, "There lived a race of people, a black people, 'fleecy locks and black complexion', a people who had the moral courage to stand up for their rights. And thereby they injected a new meaning into the veins of history and of civilization." And we're going to do that. God grant that we will do it before it is too late. As we proceed with our program, let us think of these things."