Committee Honors Rosa Parks

On July 27, the House Judiciary Committee approved, by voice vote, a resolution (H. Con. Res. 208) recognizing the 50th anniversary of Rosa Louise Parks’ refusal to give up her seat on the bus, which led to the subsequent desegregation of American society.

Sponsored by Rep. John Conyers (D-MI), the resolution contains a number of findings, including:

• On December 1, 1955, Rosa Louise Parks was arrested for refusing to give up her seat in the “colored” section of the bus to a white man on the orders of the bus driver because the “white section” was full;
• Her arrest led African Americans and others to boycott the Montgomery, Alabama city bus line until the buses were desegregated;
• This fearless act of civil disobedience resulted in a legal action challenging Montgomery’s segregated public transportation system, which subsequently led to the November 13, 1965, United States Supreme Court decision stating that the segregation codes deny and deprive African Americans equal protection under the law; and
• Rosa Louise Parks has been commended for her work in the realm of civil rights with such recognitions as the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People’s Springarn Medal in 1979, the Martin Luther King, Jr., Nonviolent Peace Prize in 1980, the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1996, and the Congressional Gold Medal in 1999.