50th Anniversary of Montgomery Bus Boycott

Today marks the 50th anniversary of the start of the Montgomery Bus Boycott. Civil rights pioneer Rosa Parks was arrested December 1st 1955 for violating segregation laws when she refused to give up her seat on a city bus to a white man.

Civil rights leaders called for a one-day boycott of the city's segregated buses days later. On December 5th, ninety percent of Montgomery's black citizens stayed off the buses. The Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. led the boycott that stretched on for over a year. 50,000 boycotters carpooled, used church vehicles and walked to work for 381 days.

The bus boycott ended soon after the US Supreme Court ruled the bus segregation unconstitutional in June 1956.

Rosa Parks became known as the "mother of the civil rights movement." She died last month at the age of 92 and was the first woman to lie in honor at the U.S. Capitol.

Amy Goodman went to the Rosa Parks memorial service along with Democracy Now! producers Yoruba Richen and Elizabeth Press last month in Washington D.C. and interviewed some of those outside.

LISTEN ONLINE (or read transcript):
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05/12/01/1526215