Transcripts For CSPAN3 Lectures In History Rosa Parks The Montgomery Bus Boycott 20240712

Going to go back for discussion of origin points, our favorites light which you are going to be so sick of representing the narrative arc of the popular story of the Civil Rights Movement and we are going back to our topic of origin points again with the objective of troubling it, putting those events in context but also troubling the idea of them as origin points. Last week we discussed brown versus board of education, we discussed the decision, response, the impact but also the legacy. I want to talk more about the legacy as we go forward. But we are not going to do that today. And then on tuesday, we spent time talking about the emmett till case, the lynching of emmett till in august of 1955. We used a mix of secondary and primary sources to consider how ideologies of race, gender and justice impacted that case and impacted the live experience of the people in that case. I want to take a moment to pull out and say that this week, what happened this week that is of significance in relationship to the emmett till case. Anybody paying attention . Yeah . Go ahead. Passing legislation. Yes. They passed the emmett till antilynching act, that doesnt days lynching as a hate crime under federal law. This legislation is coming 65 years after tells lynching and 120 years after Congress First considered anti lynching legislation. So that is 125 years of Congress Failing to, choosing not to, pass such legislation. In 2005, Congress First did see fit to apologize to the descendants of lynching victims but it took another 15 years for both the senate and the house to pass this legislation. And then it will go to the white house for signing by president trump, so you can imagine that there are a lot of responses going on to this. The prominent one is why now . People are asking is this commemorative . Is this a cause for celebration or is this a cause for concern . Is this preemptive . What is the context now that is making this bill feasible within congress when it has been 120 years that it hasnt been the case . I just want to take a moment to point out ida b. Wells. Because a lot of people are point talking about this antilynching legislation are asking what about wells . Ida b. Wells was an activist any journalist in the late 19 century who publicly and doggedly and consistently was condemning and publicizing lynching. Most notably through her publication a red record, she did this at great personal cost. Her printing outfit was burnt down and she was run out of town. You can understand why some people might say certainly not that till should be but where is the recognition of ida b. Wells . We will come back to wells actually when talking about montgomery. So going back to the origin points, i just wanted to point that out. Today we will focus on the montgomery bus boycott and i want to put that in the timeline i that we were talking about or that i showed you this time. So we have the brown versus board of education decision in may of 1954. Immediately after the anne brown versus board of education the following year may 1955. And the emmett till lynching in august of 1955, i dont think a lot of people understand how close to the till lynching the montgomery bus boycott was, you have rosa parks being arrested on december 1st of 1955, that was a thursday. And then the following monday on december 5th, montgomery bus boycotts begins. So thats just a little bit of context for you. To put it in a visual form. And so we are going to use the readings today to consider to consider the bus boycott, and these readings gave you a lot of information about events and circumstances leading up to but not so much information is fairly about the boycott. So we will also talk about that and we can continue the conversation in our next lecture as well, and certainly people have questions so i want to focus on montgomery, because more than any of the other origin events that we have talked about, montgomery is most often cited as the beginning of the Civil Rights Movement within the popular narrative. And that i find the popular narrative of the boycott itself within this larger narrative, to be somewhat pop problematic. And i want to dig into that mid, where that story of the montgomery bus boycott. In doing that, i think it effective way of doing that is looking to a central figure in that mid, rosa parks. I want to look at what i call the mythic rosa parks. And i want to make a real distinction between rosa parks as a person, as a woman, and then rosa parks as an icon. We are going to be talking about both. But those are two separate things and so i want to ask you if you can give me, some of you may have a lot more information about rosa parks. We have a lot more Information Available to us now. But if you just give me a sense of the popular narrative, the enduring narrative or idea of rosa parks, whose you likely learned when you were in Elementary School, or typically celebrated through black history month. The anybody want to go up there . I think what line what i learned about her in Elementary School was definitely, she refused to give a perceived. And she was just an ordinary woman coming from work and it was just a manifestation of the common attitudes of the time. And the common, shes just an ordinary woman and a martyr come honestly. That is how it was portrayed. She definitely became a martyr in that sense, anyone else . I guess the way i learned about it was that she was the catalyst for this movement, as if she was the only woman or person that had been arrested for not giving up their seat. As if it was a single incident that happened, and it was. Her yet. As much as the montgomery bus boycott to see is the beginning of the Civil Rights Movement, she is seen as the beginning of the bus boycott. Thats where that title mother of the Civil Rights Movement comes from. On our best day, how many of us could hope for such a title. But going off of both those points, she was typically described as an elderly woman. She was 40. Two i need that not to be elderly. All right . She was not elderly. She was described as an elderly seamstress, many of those accounts didnt even give her name. An elderly seamstress with tired feet who spontaneously took a stand by sitting down and then singlehandedly sparked the modern black freedom movement. I dont want to deny her any of her importance. This is actually the rosa parks that, with the best of intentions, my mother introduced me to when i was very young. And i held on to that picture all the way through college, all the way through my history classes in college, well into graduate studies, and it was only when i started doing my own research as a masters student that that image started to crumble. Not just crumble but become really frustrating to me. Because i think that this idea of parks really frustrates or negates her actual history, particularly her activist. History. In recent years weve had historians who are really working or who have really worked the breakdown of the idea to give us a more complicated picture. I want to point to these two books in particular. Anybody read any of them . At the darkened of the street, by Daniel Maguire and the rebellious life of mrs. Rosa parks. The rebellious life of mrs. Rosa parks already tells you that it it is going to be a corrective narrative. If you have a desire to know more about was a parks as a woman and as an activist, these are great sources. And i actually drying on them some to do that with you today. So i want to use these books or use the information i have from books and i own research to kind of deconstruct that. Myth and i am going to ask you if you know more about rosa parks, or if what you are holding on to, you can just raise your hand, you dont have to answer if if what you are holding on to, for how many people you are holding on to this kind of typical, iconic idea. They get celebrated in black history month. For how many of you is that the image you are most familiar with . Says while. Okay. All right so that is really not surprising because i think that image circulates in newspapers and museums and definitely an Elementary Schools Childrens Books and all of those, so its not surprising to me but it is troubling to me. It is very troubling. What i wanted to point out is how simple and inaccurate that representation is. So i would just start at the beginning. Beginning in the 1930s, rosa parks was campaigning on behalf of the scott schoolboys with her husband. Right, melanie brought up the scouts for a boys in our last class in terms of these nine African American men who were accused of raping two white women on a train. And then it was a long drawn up case in which many of them spent years and years and years in prison prison. So rosa parks was actively campaigning on their behalf. And which is notable, because also as melanie brought up these were African Americans who were defended by the communist party. So that right there, that is some subversive activity. Dont worry about running this down, i will send it to you immediately after. Listen to the story. Right, just listen to the story. Particularly if its the first time youve actually had any encounter with this woman, all right . I promise you. So she sat as the look out on the steps to her own home while they were meetings in aid to naacp meetings held in her house, where she discusses she had never seen so many guns on her kitchen table. She had never seen so many guns until those meetings were held in her house. She joined the naacp in 1943, either the second or third woman in montgomery to do that. So i should say the montgomery chapter, the naacp. She became the secretary almost immediately because nobody else wanted to do it. That in and of itself as a woman was unusual in montgomery at the time. Less and less unusual one of the other women of the tour three was her mother. So you can see that there are some modeling going on there. This is key. In her role as the secretary of the naacp in the 19 forties and in mongolia marie alabama or in alabama, she traveled around the state by herself together evidence or proof or testimony from black suede goodness or experienced white on black violence. Think about that. How many of you have seen a picture of rosa parks . She is not a formidable woman. Shes a black woman traveling by herself through the jim crow south to get material that many whites or Authority Figures would have been upset about. This is a dangerous thing that she is doing. But in contrast to the image we have of her. She beginning in the 1940s she organized on the behalf of sexually abused black women, sexually assaulted abused black women, very openly. Very openly. That is what the ohara says book is about. Actually both of them touch on the, but the oharas really traces that history of parks really advocating on behalf of sexually abused black women abused largely by white man. And largely in the offices of white supremacy. She made repeated attempts to register to vote in the 1940s. Repeated attempts. As we will talk about and as im sure you know to some extent, this could too could be a dangerous act at this point in time. Cf i had never heard her, but here she is speaking before a convention crowd in 1948. Very public. Very public. She trained at the Highlander Folk School in tennessee. This is before her arrest she did a twoweek training in desegregation at the highlander folk, school which was pegged as communist, but it was not a communist school, it was a leadership training institution. It and it was precisely because of brown versus board of education that workshops were being held. It was to help learn how to facilitate that process. Hopefully peacefully. She never fully embraced non violence, and she is on the record about the. She is on the record about not knowing if threatening with violence or messed with in a particular way, that she could turn the other cheek. She certainly supported some of the nonviolent activities of the Civil Rights Movement as we think about it but she never fully supported or embraced or non violence. So how many of you raise of hands is that surprising . Right . That is, again, troubling to me. But not at all surprising. So my question then and i am going to allow for a couple of questions were couple of answers why do you think, there is no right answer because you are the ones who know, why do you think there is such an investment or that that mythic parks is like as im calling her, has taken, has survived so long well after her death . She died in 2005. Why do you think that has such currency, that idea . One i think, when i learned about this i think i was in Elementary School, so eight, nine, ten years old. And i think its a lot easier for her to be a one dimensional character in the story we we tell children when we are first learning about this history, then it is for her to be a complex human being that has more to offer, the story than just sitting on a bus. Much to me its also thinking about how a lot of us learned about this in Elementary School, very strategic on like public education, to tell says children and push this narrative that black people get what they want if they are nonviolent and pacified. There are so many Historic Events we learn about that are achieved through violent means in European Countries and buy white people generally, revolutionary wise. The and obviously this is a catalyst for a Larger Movement and we are told this person was nonviolent, peaceful, old, tired woman, when thats not the case. I think thats very strategic. At least politically significant if not intended. Others, anyone else want to speak to . That. I also think that this narrative presents her as a political agent, which something that even broader for women of all races that is something that is not mentioned, that she is someone who is very strategic in what she did. Even in terms of what organizations she associated with. It shows her agency in a way that we are reluctant to talk about regarding women. Yeah. I remember i told you to draw bradford forward and thinking about parks in the actions as she would take in the moment. That is just months beforehand, is just mark months beforehand. We also have to think about how parks might have been presenting herself, women talk more about that in a different time. But i agree with all of you, to an extent, the montgomery bus boycott i think is one of our greatest national fairytales. Its just a really nice story of and its popular form, of good versus evil, david and goliath, and that good americans bear out. Those aberrant racist southerners, but good americans bear out. In that sense and i think when you have a fairytale you have very simple good forces bad, and rosa parks is the hero along with Martin Luther king. They are the hero of this fairytale. Its always interesting to me though how many of you learned about rosa parks for the first time in Elementary School . Okay. How many of you learned anything else about her after . Okay. Its always interesting to me because i think that you are right maybe in the sense that people think that children need simple characters. To me, the sad thing is that is when i think minds, altitudes are very flexible i can take in complex information. Often used the example of when i was in graduate school this Childrens Book came out about melissa king and my professor brought it in and he read it to us. And its it and on april 4th 1968, Martin Luther king died. Says which is not inaccurate. Right . But he was assassinated. And that showed a hesitancy to deal in that material. Then a point grimace fairytales jar horrifying and scary. But there is this idea that we need the sanitized stories for children and i think that would be fine but that would be okay if there was at any other point where you are learning building on that story. In my experience is, and im sure this is different to different regions and different schools, but my experience is that most people dont then have more education on the Civil Rights Movement and rosa parks. Yes. So i learned about was a parks when i was young, preschool probably, and also get an Elementary School, and then later i think in middle school or high school i learned about how she was not the first person to give up her seat. And so i think that something thats really interesting. In one of the articles about the origins of the montgomery bus boycott, they said that rosa parks had the caliber of character we needed to get the city to rally around behind us. I thought that was kind of the moment i was always curious about rosa parks, this happened before was a parks, which the article laid out. I thought it was interesting that we focus will specifically on her and we dont talk about the back story when were learning about her. Let me speak to that, lets go through the because one of the reasons i focus on this symbolic mystical rosa parks, or start their is because i think she is propping up this bigger mid of the montgomery mid, and then i would argue that is also obscuring information about the Montgomery Movement and the montgomery bus boycott that would be really helpful to us now. Information about organizing, information about how they fund things, information about what formed their theories or strategies. I want to speak to that because that is a huge question, why . Why do we not have that information . So, the montgomery myth, here are some aspects of it, dont go writing this down. I will send it to. That rosa parks is this accident, shes had enough, shes tired, she is going home, shes not taking it anymore. That she was the first one who took that stand that the boycott was unprecedented and that the boycott is spontaneous. That is part of what allows for us to have the container idea of the Civil Rights Movement. Like suddenly there was organizing on this issue of civil rights. Martin luther king junior should say organize the boycott, the masses followed king, the messes walked, the boycott ended segregated buses and the boycott was short. And i just want to kind of take through those. And just speak to those. The first one being this idea that parks was the first. That she was the first woman, black woman to resist segregated public transportation. Thats not even true, there are examples from the previous century one of them being ida b. Wells, who protested on railroad, she sued and won. Sojourn truth protested on d. C. Street cars, and then home or plus a, a black man but that is where plessy versus ferguson equal comes in 96. So we have examples of African Americans boycotting surrogates transportation before and in another location birmingham alabama we have two examples i only wrote one down here but colleen carr, she was a teenager and a bus driver treated her poorly, she spent on him she cursed him, and then she spent 30 days in jail. As a teenager. And then theres an instance of another woman whos nameless in the record, who got into a shoving match with a white man on the bus. He she cursed him while she was right in the bus, and then when she got off the bus, she was arrested and sentenced to, spent time in jail. But in montgomery, the point several of you have made their several documented incidences of women doing exactly what parks did. And some of them did it more than once the first one here being pepsi worthy, who in 1943 she argued with the driver she got off the bus the driver followed her split on her beat her and according to eyewitness testimony she gave as much as she got, i dont know what happened to her. But im thinking she probably spent some time in jail henrietta brinson sat in front of a white couple on a bus and it was targeted by the bus driver but you avoided jail in that sense because the white couple agreed to move. What you need to understand about segregated buses generally speaking, there are ten seats in the front and ten in the back. 16 and 16, im sorry, whites and blacks and then this no mans land. But the pending on who was on the bus, the seats went to the white patrons. And African Americans had to remove when they were instructed to. And what is important here is understanding that bus drivers have police powers. They had police powers. That makes resisting doubly risky. They could do what a Police Officers could do in those circumstances. Including violence. Two other examples, rosa parks as i said, she resisted, a decade before. And then one of the worst cases is viola white who in 1943, refused to give up her seat, the driver tried to remove, her she resisted, she was beaten, she was arrested, she was jailed. She was found guilty, she appealed the case and as reprisal white Police Officer was kidnapped her 16yearold daughter and raped her in a cemetery. That was for her resisting. And so it tells you the significance of crossing that line. We also have as the article pointed, out in the same year, in 1960 in 1955, you have clogged it coleman who is a 15yearold teenager who refuses to give up her seat on the bus and the naacp everyone rallies around her in march of 1955 until she wants a pregnant, and then the back off. In april of that year, a month later ariella browder has an incident on a bus where she is arrested for resisting giving up her seat. In october, mary louise smith, an 18yearold africanamerican girl who refuses to give up her seat, also before rosa parks. We dont know about her because her father came down and paid her fine and she was out before the naacp knew about it. But both claudette and Mary Louise Coleman has said something to the effect of we were not in the inner circle. We were too dark and too poor, the smith family were catholics, which also put them outside the bounds of the circle in that sense. So we have at least three women who have done the same thing in the same year as rosa parks. We need to think about, we need to scratch off that rosa parks was the first. Just take that off. Yes . When you say that they are too dark, too poor are you saying they could not be the figure behind the boycott . Right. Thats what colin and louise smith believed and there is evidence that supported them in that. Because you had parks you had parks and edie nixon both saying we cant use her, the media will when tear us up, particular with coleman. I see it as not really seeing rosa parks as a threat, i think if she was wearing a black panther unit uniform it would be a different story. And of course her skin complexion i think has something to do with it. She doesnt look like possibly the traditional. But i dont think she was much of a threat, just super innocent in that case. There is definitely evidence again park says this yourself when she was arrested edie nixon is like hallelujah. She is the one. They all gather at her house to convinced her but who is against . It her husband. Because hes not an idiot and he knows how dangerous it is. Do you think that nixon kind of forced that narrative went to make her kind of a figure of the Civil Rights Movement and thats what propagated since then. Thats a great thing i dont think robinson, then i think parks did, and i think nixon did. Robinson was angry really angry when they backed off of covid and coleman was a student who was a young girl that parks had worked with because parks was in charge of the double acp youth so they had a relationship in that sense so when they backed off of colvin she was really upset because as the gear article tells you they are waiting robinson has been fighting this fight for a decade and when the decision the brown decision comes out and she writes what four days later she raced to the mayor just reminding you African Americans make up 75 of the riders and if we were to actually boycott that would be really bad for the bus company. That is a threat, right . The degree to which she could do it. I dont think that we can peg that on robinson so much but i think we can pick it on gender politics of the time and certainly also the politics of color. It is not incidental that she is a light skinned woman. Shes chosen all of these things to allow for the idea of middle class respectability. They all allow for the idea of middle class respectability, despite the fact that was a parks absolutely of the working class in arguably of the working poor. She doesnt have that veneer. She doesnt, she does not have a demeanor that is radical. She has a radical activist past but she doesnt have her demeanor that is radical. There is definitely image politics going on here, and we can decide whether or not we fault them for that, or if we are looking at the reality of the situation. We have talked in here about the trap of getting into an image politics game. And so one of the things we could consider, what are the effects of rosa parks having been the symbol . I think about goes back to Morgans Point of who is worthy of justice . We talked about that with mamie till bradley as well. Another thing that i want you to just keep in mind is that the question often comes up, why was it primarily women, and it was primarily women who were doing this, and all you need to know is that emmett till. There is a bigger history to that, to do the same types of resistance, you are seeing these women get beaten, to do the same type of assistance as an African American man would have been even riskier. Also, African American men were not riding the buses as much. It was if there was a car in the family, the man would be taking into his job. It was women who were on the bus primarily. Also because they were domestics, they were on the bus in a greater capacity, and often with white people. Those lines were blurred because might they might go to the Grocery Shopping of the children of their white employer. And in that capacity they set up front because the white baby was not going in the back. There is a little more blurring of the line there. There are stories of African American man often if a scuffle started with an African American woman they would just go out the back door. They suffered psychically for that and were criticized for it, they just get up and got the backdoor because they understood how loaded that situation lies. I also want to go to the next idea of this movement being unprecedented and spontaneous. I want to try and trouble. That or just refute it. There are examples within alabama that refute that idea. There is a boycott in 1900 of the trolleys that lasts about two years. Its not as total as the montgomery bus boycott is. The montgomery bus wicket is 95 successful among African Americans. In robinson is right, if 75 of your clientele is African American and 95 of them stay off the buses, this crippled the bust company they had to keep raising fares they were very much on the brink of financial ruin, and yet time after time after time again, they refused to segregate the buses. That is important. To think about, to understand. So, montgomery blacks boycotted the buses in 1941 around the Easter Holiday event that happened and they said that they were often bust out but then dropped far away and had to walk in the rain and everything so they had to pick up the buses that was a very short event. In baton rouge in 1953 there was a bus boycott that people in montgomery very much took information from. Thats when i say, if you have a bus boycott narrative as simple as the one we have, you cant do what people in montgomery did in terms of the baton rouge boycott, where they took information and they learned from that to organize their own boycott. And then the idea of it being spontaneous. I think garrow successfully deconstructs that idea. If you look at when the g. A. R. Carol article was written, in 1985 when i ask you how many of you have more complex idea of rosa parks or the montgomery bus boycott and you are telling me in 2020 that its still coming down this way that is troubling because we have had this information now for a long time, people educators we have had this information for a long time and the womens political counsel just blows that out of the water, that idea that it was spontaneous, that they decided at the last moment. We know from garrow that there was a plan in place, at least a loose plan in that robinson was just waiting. And that there had been many many meetings between the wpec and city authorities to address this segregated seating, with all these half measures. Like let us come in the front door. At least. Have more black but more black bus drivers, it doesnt even necessarily have to be that its an integrated bust at this point. But its no, no, no to all of those things. So a question that i have that is why dont we know anything about the womens political counsel until 1985 and then why dont you know anything about her . Why do you think we dont know anything about her . Or anything about the political counsel . This for you . 35 years later. What do you think accounts for the . I think part of it is the image of Martin Luther king jr. As the leader and the figurehead in all of. This is in a sense, the montgomery bus boycott is the origin point for him. And so then if the story is not that he was the one leading this, pushing this forward then that kind of makes things difficult for his narrative. Very much. And that is in keeping with what was said before about rosa parks and that simple idea. The absolutely. And the other thing that we have to understand is that African Americans on the ground or forging some of these ideas because it is politically expedient and safer to do so. And that is important to consider when you are thinking about your marginalized group or one oppressed group trying to advance their politics. Within any particular historical moment. The African American women that we are talking about particularly women like join robinson, shes an activist but she is still a middle class black women in the south. Im not saying that because she was limited, she also had some gender ideologies about how she should behave as a middle class woman in the south. Those are things that we also have to understand. But a lot of African American women were putting the black man in front. But there are some other practical reasons for why they could do that, because one, they think that is the image that should be out there, it makes African American men look stronger. It doesnt emasculate them in a way. And robinson has a job at a university. I love this. I remember learning about robinson and her distributing this leaflet in the middle of the night, getting her students to go to her university and middle graphing this leaflet once rosa parks was arrested saying this happened to another person we cant let this happen to any more, what got the buses on monday. And she blankets the black sections of town with this to the point that black ministers and church on sunday are saying what is happening . Were just coming from . And the news reports on it on sunday the Montgomery Advertiser reports on it and that sunday afternoon like where it is coming from . Because she does it all in the middle of the night. And she gets in trouble for because she has used University Property to do it. But the the do it yourself kind of nature of this, she says that she already had it written to a large degree and it was just waiting to be mimeographed but theres a reason she did it behind the scenes and when they asked was responsible for this the underbelly cpp was able to say hey its. Us when in fact that friday, thursday night distributing these leaflets, that friday all the African American ministers get together and black leaders get together to talk about what to do, and that becomes more the site of the organizing or the thrust behind. That so then there is this idea which is connected of Martin Luther king organizing the boycott, and that everybody was following his order. And that is partially because he was among that group of blackmail leaders, its also because he was elected as the president , on a monday afternoon the day that the boycott starts. He is elected as the president of the Montgomery Improvement Association, which is the organization that was the official representative of the boycott. Why do you think he was elected . Does anybody know anything about king at this point in time . He is 26 years old he has just moved to montgomery. As a minister, he kind of provides a level of respectability to the movement. Definitely. Everybody agrees, he has a ph. D. At 26, in theology, he is articulate, which that is a coated word. He is articulate, he presents, well definitely. But he is also new. He kind of gets pushed out front because he doesnt have any of the relationships, patronage relationships some of the other black males do. He is not loyal to anyone yet, and if he messes up, they dont lose something. Im not saying he was not willing to do this or volunteered, but i think about it, this is the origin point for martin with a king. 26 years old. No way did he know what this would mean for him, how he would be launched on to the national stage. Partly because nobody thought this boycott was going to last more than one day. The reason that it was that monday was because that was one rosa parks was going to war trial. Nobody thought the boycott would last more than one day, the other reason that this people think that king was a leader is because at the mass meetings the one that was described in the reading as the newspaper that we had, he is out front, and his audience is the masses, so its very easy for outside media, which did come and film, this and film it report on it, to see him as the leader, and infected this first mass meeting theres this picture of rosa parks, they presenter and Martin Luther king says, this person we are so lucky she is the face of our movement, this person who is not a disturbing factor in community, she is totally a disturbing factor in the community. She is standing there and she says, shes going to say something, the ministers say you have done enough. I always find that interesting. I always find that moment interesting, because she does, she sits down. I just wonder what the dynamics were there. If she sits down because she takes their gift of you dont have to do anymore, youve done enough, let us just recognize you, or if it was like, weve got this. But she sits down. It is very easy, you see the mantle shift from parks to king that night. It is also the official debut of the parks we know. Thats not disturbing, middle class, respectable woman. From that point forward, the Media Campaign begins. And i told you that the till trial was one of the first media dramas of the Civil Rights Movement as we think about. It the montgomery bus boycott was sustained media event, in many ways, a sustained staged drama. Part of the reason people see him as a leader is because he is standing out front all of the time. But through the boycott, he and the women who have been arrested before, and he are saying its not me. I am not the leader. I am a spokesperson, but the masses are leading this movement. Claudette colvin says the leaders are we ourselves when asked about king. She is still a teenager at this point. King is not refuting that. He considers himself lucky to be representing them, but because of the gender politics and because of the media image and how it is being positioned, there is this idea that he is the leader. Its interesting to know that on monday, that monday, december 5th, everybody gathers at this mass meeting to assess how it has gone. The montgomery improvements to see a shun was formed that afternoon. Then the idea is that it is a boycott, very successful, they show their strength, and all of the people in the audience are, like we are not going back on those buses. Especially the mates and the cooks. We are not going back on those buses we are not suffering that humiliation anymore. This is no longer like, this is a show of force in a sense. The masses decide that night, we are going to continue this, we are going to continue. This and then it becomes a matter of how you are going to continue a bus boycott. How you have to run the, because, it says here, messes walked and i put that as an aspect of the montgomery myth, absolutely African Americans have their own walking during the bus boycott, during all sorts of weather for miles and miles this testimony of people talking about how they walk miles and miles indoor and its 95 effective you see pictures of buses with like one bright, lady the iconic photograph one lightly this otherwise the buses are completely empty theres also reports of African Americans threatening other African Americans if they get on the bus so they are absolutely walking, but its not reasonable to think that if they had to walk everywhere to their jobs and anywhere else that they want to go that this would have been as successful as it would have been. That would have just been a burden that wouldve been really difficult. Looking to the baton rouge example, they form a carpool. A very intricate carpool that is organized and run by the Montgomery Improvement Association. And many of the drivers are middle class black women who are either housewives of at least black men or teachers at the university. They are driving people around. They also have all of the black taxis start to do free rides or reduced fear rights until the city makes that illegal. There is this really organized carpool that is happening and at the center of it they need funding, they need to put gas in these cars. Recently actually, this woman named Georgia Gilmore has been recognized. She was a cook, an activist in montgomery, and she formed the nowhere club, the name was a joke so that when people would say wear, because she sold all the sandwiches, to pay for the fuel. Where did you get the sandwiches . No. Where she is getting credit for that. But they had all of this infrastructure behind the boycott, most of which is manned by women, including rosa parks, who was fired immediately after she takes her stunned the bus, she was fired so she and her husband her husband is fired. So she becomes one of the people who are organizing the boycott throughout the spring of 1956. But is primarily women who are running these activities. None of this is visible if you just have the saintly rosa parks and then suddenly the powers that be realized this is really wrong, and they disaggregate the buses. Theres a lot of work that went into it. There is a book called daybreak of freedom by stewart burns, and there is no narrative, he just compiles all of these documents about what was going on during the boycott, and you see the memos the inter office memos about events being planned, things that they need, how they are going to fund king going different places to talk and things. There is a big machine behind the boycott. This is a huge one, the idea that the boycott, the montgomery boycott desegregated the buses. How many of you think that this is true or have thought thats true . Youre like, this is a trick question. I wont say that it is not true. This is a debatable question. But it did not officially end segregation on public transportation. Any guesses as to what would . Or did . Waffler melody . Since it lasted for like 382 days, so i think if you look at it as a monetary perspective, how much money they were losing, and if they can sustain that i think it was, more monetary decision. I rule that is a very logical and reasonable, yes. Its wrong. Because it should be, of course they are crippling the bust company and they are making a very difficult for they have to keep reducing bus routes and everything, and the fact that that is not the answer, again tells you how entrenched the city officials were. Was it like the Civil Rights Act of 1960 . For now. Yes, but it was legislation. Browder versus gaill. You court case. Are this is another instance where, this is a huge injustice. You have five plaintiffs, eventually recent drops out because she is harassed to know and. You have five plaintiffs who bring this court case against mayor gayle and the city of montgomery, and the bust company. Looking at that list of plaintiffs, notice any absences . Who is not there . Rosa parks is not anywhere. She cant be, she could no longer be a test case because during her trial on the fifth, they changed what she had been charged, which she was charged for violating the City Ordinance in not giving up for seats. The City Ordinance says that if there were Seats Available African Americans could sit on them. The state ordinance said African Americans had to obey whatever the bus said. So it was amended in the middle of the trial and her lawyer went to appeal it. Because it was under appeal she could not be the test case. She is not involved in this case. Any other absences . There are no men. And there is an appeal for men. And eating nixon says that in Montgomery Improvement Association meeting says, seriously, guys you have been riding the apron strings. Of these cooks inmates, forever. None of you king, no one, . Youre not gonna put your name to . This which is interesting because the blackmail ministers leadership, were less vulnerable because their patronage were black people. They did not have a business, they were not working at a university funded by white people. It is all women, all women who have experienced arrest or harassment on the buses, including coleman, smith, these people considered not eligible, not the right fit for being the face of the movement. And they werent, because none of you knew about them. You dont even know about this case. They were not the face of it. This goes forward, and starts february 1, 1956. It goes forward. This is where you get all of the testimony about women, these Court Documents are so useful because you have testimony for all these women about what happened to them. And that brings in all of these other records about their arrests. And you have them saying in a public court against the mayor and the city of montgomery, this happened to me, that is why i am here and they keep asking where Claudette Colvin says we the leaders are just we ourselves. They keep trying to find out about king. They are ponds for kane, the leaders are just we ourselves. So, starts in february, in june, 1956, you have a ruling, the lower Court Rules Two to one in favor of the plaintiffs on the ground of that 14th amendment. City officials appeal, they are not giving up, the city officials of peel. November 13, the Supreme Court upholds a lower court ruling, city officials appeal. This is part of what accounts for the fact that its 381 days. African americans are like, we are not going back on those segregated buses. December 20th, the Supreme Court, they did not hear the case again they said we wont consider the appeal, we have decided this. That effectively ends the city s quest or attempt to stave off this desegregation of city buses. The decree of that ruling reaches montgomery on december 20th, 1956 African Americans meet in the final mass meeting of the boycott, and agree okay, we got what we wanted. We are going on the buses tomorrow. December 21st, 1956. And in the morning, cameras come from all over the countries and they go to Martin Luther kings house and watch him and him, and Ralph Abernathy and other prominent ministers walk to the bus station at 5 00 in the morning, get on the bus, and they take these iconic photographs. At some point in the morning, someone says what about that parks woman . Maybe we should get a photograph of her. And so they do go and find her, but shes an afterthought. So even as she has become the face of the movement, because youre not the leader of the movement she was the one that was relatively taken care of and again, this is because during the entire year, every time she appears in the public setting in relationship to the boycott, shes with men. Very much the scene bradley, was e. D. Nixon is done next to, her lawyer sending extra, her she is surrounded by men. Insouciant ice. She does speak after certain events which is right next to these authoritative looking African American man throughout the entire thing. So they do become seemingly the strength of that movement so i think that its really an injustice that no one knows about these women are real abroad or was she had six children, she was a seamstress she was wife and mother midwife, she had went back to get her batches agreed her 30, she got her masters degree, she was an activist, they did not pick her the first time because they did not think she could withstand across examination. I dont know why. But thats why they did not use her as a test case. Then she becomes the league of this case and nobody knows about. It so and then to that end, what melody brought up, this idea that the boycott was short. Just out of curiosity, because you all of made it, most of you have admitted, i had a skewed idea of this, how long do you think most people if not yourself, thought the boycott was . Or how long do you think most people think the boycott . Was just yell out a number. A few weeks. Thats definitely what i grew up thinking. Yeah. I think what allows for that is kind of the fairytale idea. Again, some things are so wrong, would not take that long. Where with browder versus gail, my question to you is, did the boycott desegregate the buses . You dont have enough information to make a this is where im planting my flag. But without the boycott, what do you think . Browder versus gail put the nail in the coffin of plessy versus ferguson, that was when separate but equal went by the wayside. This was a huge ruling. Arguably more important or as important as brown, as brown v. Board of education. A huge ruling. Do you think the boycott was necessary to that ruling . I think it was, because i think the boycott wheel it was not a no legal action or may have not produced like mine out of taken down certain peoples perceptions i think it definitely changed peoples perceptions of what was happening with separate versus equal. Immediate campaign, it reverberated throughout the country. I think you change peoples hearts, you change peoples minds. Maybe that is playing into the mid, but you definitely have allyship grow especially in the north, which is probably what people down boycotting needed. To that extent, you talked about how there were previous cases that had been lost and then courts about buses, so desegregating, them so i think the boycott was necessary to finalize like you said the media, push necessary to finalize like you, said the nail in the coffin. Because theres been a couple failures. Okay. Anyone else . Yeah. I think thats a very strong argument, because the Supreme Court or Court Officials arent operating in a vacuum, and so to understand that Public Opinion may be moving in Different Directions and theres also maybe legal grounds, but to understand Public Opinion may be moving in another direction, which is demonstrated by a northern response. Thats too simple, but in northern response. Because this is when the Movement Goes, national . Right this is when the Movement Goes. National people are sending in money from all over the world. The Movement Goes international actually. Theres political cartoons that you can find fresh newspapers talking about the boycott. The Movement Goes national and international. So if we think again about putting that in a cold war context, thats part of the reason people are are interested outside the United States anyway. And it inspires a similar boycott in south africa. So people are paying attention to this, in a way that movements hadnt, they hadnt coalesced, they hadnt gotten that attention before. Why do you think this one got so much attention . Its not that African Americans in a city hadnt organized around some action, its not even that that hadnt happened in montgomery before. Why did this become a National Media event . The answer is implied in the question. laughs because they had media billable . Right, to some degree. You cant take out the fact that we had this idea of a movement coming in a post war moment, without considering what those circumstances were. It wasnt just the cold war thing, that is something to consider, we had new technologies, and this is the first example of a movement that is considered nonviolent direct action. Its not the first time the strategy was used but this is when that becomes publicized. The leaders, martin of the king, recognized as a spokesperson, are talking about nonviolent direct action. We are going to talk about to non violence more in terms of a strategy, in relationship to other strategies that come later. But i need to be careful when i say, this because i do not want to dismiss the idea that these people participating in the boycott were dedicated to a doctrine of non violence for moral, civil, principled reasons. But its also pageantry, right . Its also pageantry. And when you have media cameras, you have people coming down and you see these crowds, row after row of well dressed and African American stoically peacefully, walking through the city, walking up to the court building, that is an image of black nunes that hasnt been mean stream before that point in time. And activist subsequent activists, take note we are going to talk about that, when we talk about little rock and birmingham. We take note. So this nonviolent direct action, certainly this is a strategy had that have been used in other moments, other movements, becomes something people understand as defining the movement. That comes out of montgomery in that sense. So it has this National Presence that also, to your earlier point, is scary to the virulent, segregationists. It is scary. But its not scary because theres no angry black people, theres no weapons right . Nobody is demanding. They are totally demanding. Nobody is demanding. Theyre just peacefully refusing, they are peacefully refusing. And they are litigated against many times during that year for doing that, the boycott is considered illegal, they take king, they put him, they charge him on conspiracy grounds, they bring all these other people who are considered to be including robinson and parks, how many of you have seen the picture of parks, the mugshot of rosa parks . That is not from when she was arrested. Thats from when she had to participate in this conspiracy trial. And everyone in the trial saying, king is not leading this boycott. This is just we ourselves. You have all these African American people in montgomery show up at the courthouse. They find out the king has been arrested and they say where is my warrant . This is never happened before it where African American people arent afraid to go to the jail. They get in their best close, they drive to the jail, all sorts of working class people lined the courthouse steps, to make sure they go in and out. They turn themselves in. That is a shift in the relationship of African Americans toward law enforcement. You dont take yourself to jail and African American jim crow south. But they show up, and it takes away the leverage the city authorities have in that sense. So throughout the boycott, someone bombs kings house, they put an injunction against the free taxis, and theyre doing all these things trying to cut the legs out from underneath the boycotters, but unsuccessfully. I think all that pageantry is what allows for the idea that we have the montgomery bus boycott, as being short, speaking of action of martyrs and saints. With Martin Luther king, marching the message to freedom of the wall comes tumbling down in that, right . You can see how it starts this freedom movement, you can see why i kind of find that problematic because this is not a useful history, at least in my mind. It is not a useful history, it is inspiring and many people find a compelling and inspiring and that is important. You dont want to rip down an origin story, a myth, without putting Something Else there. And i think if you have an idea about who is organizing, how the organizing, how they were successful, they were successful. This was one of the more successful social movements in history, right . At least in u. S. History, in the 20th century. They were successful. But if you dont know anything about, it and if king and parks appear to be these figures, again, who on your best day can be saintly, or as courageous as king and parks, as these things make them appear . And they certainly were courageous. But there were people, with complex things and tasks in that sense, and put in these situations for a myriad of reasons. And then you start to, think oh, that is possible lets look at what they did. Of course you can take the strategies and map them into a 24 century. But we can take their strategies and adjust for our historical circumstance. Thats a useful history, this is not a useful history, as far as im concerned. And so if we put these here, if i give you these facts, this timeline, i just want you to have a sense of the bus boycott timeline, again i will send this to you, dont worry about it right now. Me going backwards. I also want to point out parks israel. Person highlander before she ever got in a, bus before she ever made her stand, and this is important because people always say she was either a plant, or she didnt mean to, she was inspired by her tired feet. She doesnt have to be an naacp plant, she was entirely inclined to do which he did on the bus that day. It didnt have to be preplant. She was entirely inclined to do that, because of her activist self. And then you have the Supreme Court ruling that ends the bus boycott. And i want to point out all these other women, just make sure, and here. The symbolic mythic rosa parks, propping up this montgomery mid, and the other thing that we are going to continue for the rest next time and several other classes, i would argue that that is at the center of this more problematic popular narrative of the Civil Rights Movement, lauren. I think going back to the original question of why is it taught in schools and what weve overlooked is not talking about the organization not talking about the court case, is just showing women saying isnt inspirational, its like when you are talking to these young black kids that are going to be in schools, i think the whole point of the Education School is to push of specific agenda and so we dont bring about the specifics, but young black people in the class, and missing the point of oh, if we organize, if we are finding solidarity within each other, or amongst each other, we are able to kind of progress properly but it said the rhetoric in the agenda is being pushed and if its peaceful and are kind of quiet about it. Thatll happen throughout history we have seen that is not the way that happens. The reason it is not ever spoken about, its because if you speak about it in its truest form it might ignite a new feeling in these children to make some kind of difference and aligned with each other. Im sure thats the case in many cases. Ive not had time to tell you anything about the brown case. We talked about the decision. You dont know anything about the nine children who were involved in the brown case. You dont know anything about them. That is not sexy. The decision was sexy, the boycott with sexy, the details, its part of the reason you should question whether there is a movement now. We are not seeing sexy or pageantry stuff, that does not mean theres no organizing going on. The pain article, part of the reason i gave it to you is men let but women organized. Then you may have to organ, consider what your ideas of leadership and organizing our. The troubles his thesis there at least for me. Only if you allow yourself to consider what do they mean by organizing . For today mean by leadership . I was reading emmett till these past two classes and i drew a lot of comparison to mothers of movement and how they are a huge part of black lives matter. I do not think they get enough credit as leaders in the movement as they should. They definitely relate to bradley and this situation where the women were those who built the infrastructure that allow them to boycott. Trying comparisons to today i guess. I was thinking about those mothers. We will talk about this more. The need for people on the ground to keep their activities secret and the consequences of that. I told you earlier about this book, all black lives matter by barbara rains be. That gets into all of the details. It really tells you what is going on right now or what has been going on over the past few years. It is the first time reading something i had some optimism. I am not seeing it right . I am not seeing it because people have adopted different ideas on how to approach this. I am not seeing it in the media or in the public to such a degree. It does not mean it is not happening or resulting in some victories right . Okay, i need to let you go. I will see you guys next time. On lectures and history, George Mason University professor sam lebovic teaches a class about u. S. Politics and economics of the early cold war period of the early forties and fifties. He argues with extreme ideologies such as fascism and communism completely discredited or out of favor, a consensus formed in the u. S. Around centrist political views. To the point where the Political Parties were barely distinguishable. On the economic front, a belief and a mixed economy ruled meaning a broad acceptance of some government involvement in the market. All right. Last couple of classes we have been talking about the red scare and the impact of the red scare in policing the edges of american politics. Today we will be looking a kind of the rest of the political landsce