A United States Supreme Court case in 1896, Plessy v. Ferguson is considered a landmark decision that confirmed the legitimacy of racial segregation laws in public facilities in the United States, underscoring support for a constitutional right doctrine known as “separate but equal.” This decision not only supported the idea of ​​separation but equality, but also condoned many states in the American South to pass laws that reestablished racial segregation, these laws became what were known as Jim Crow laws. There were many varieties of activism that sought to secure social, political, and economic rights for African Americans. Activism involved many approaches, from lawsuits in court, to lobbying the federal government, to direct mass action. The Montgomery Bus Boycott of 1955-56 was a form of activism that successfully desegregated the public transportation system of Montgomery, Alabama, and is considered one of the key events in the emergence of the modern civil rights movement. Its occurrence was due to African Americans' search for equality and social justice, and many factors came into play for its success: organization, community solidarity, and nonviolence, to name a few. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay There were many contributions that led to the bus boycott other than the fact that African Americans were tired of being oppressed and treated unequally by a white man, what broke the camel's back for many was murder of fourteen-year-old Emmett Till. In 1955, two white men from Money, Mississippi brutally beat and killed an African-American Chicago teenager for allegedly flirting with the wife of one of the killers. Emmett Till's mother went on to hold an open casket funeral as a way to show the world what violent racists did to her child because of this 100,000 mourners turned out, the largest turnout of any protest for the civil rights at that time. . Demands for justice across the country led to the trial of Roy Bryant and J.W. Milam a month later, the case was the first major event covered by the media attracting journalists, politicians and news networks from across the United States as the courts were heavily segregated at the time neither African Americans nor women could serve on a jury, meaning the defendants were prosecuted before an all-white male jury. The defendants were later found not guilty of the murder of 14-year-old Emmett Till, leaving many enraged and disappointed by the decision, as in the case of African-American politician Charles Diggs who stated: “I'm disappointed. I went to Sumner with the hope that the Till trial would end in a conviction. This process has also posed the question to many: “How long must we wait for the federal government to act? Whenever there is a crisis affecting our lives or our rights, we look hopefully to Washington for help. It rarely comes." (Eyes on the Prize, 39) The call for action after the federal government's call for intervention into ongoing racial tensions in the South did not come immediately. Till's murder and the derisive trial that took place they showed the world the gruesome ferocity of racism in the United States, but they had a dramatic impact on an entire generation of civil rights activists Rosa Parks, a forty-two-year-old, married, regular churchgoer, seamstress at a downtown department store of Montgomery, Alabama, and rights activistcivilians under the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People) for more than a decade was arrested in December 1955 for failing to obey a bus driver who ordered her to give up her seat, so that could be made available for a white passenger and as she herself recalled the situation, "When the driver saw that I was still sitting there, he asked me if I wanted to get up. I told him, no, I wasn't... A few minutes later , two policemen got on the bus, approached me and asked me if the driver had asked me to get up, and I said yes, and they wanted to know why I hadn't. I told them that I didn't think I should get up…I was taken to jail and arrested as a suspect…” She would later recall that Emmett Till was on her mind as she was arrested. This unjust series of events sparked what became known as the Bus Boycott of Montgomery, a form of nonviolent protest in which black citizens, women, children, and men of Montgomery refused to ride city buses in response to the bus system's racial policies. segregation. This would become the first form of mass direct action in the civil rights era. Boycott leaders brought the bus system's policies regarding racial segregation to the attention of the Supreme Court and called for an end to segregation on the trains. public transportation in Montgomery. The case took some time to reach the Supreme Court, but in November 1956 the court ruled that segregated public buses were unconstitutional based on the 14th Amendment's guarantee of equal protection under the law. The boycott was a success. There were many factors that contributed to the success of the boycott: organization, community solidarity, and nonviolence, to name a few. The Montgomery Improvement Association is considered an important organization that helped bring down the city's entire public transportation system in such a short amount of time with such determination and organization. The MIA established an effective and elaborate carpool system for African Americans. Over two hundred people volunteered their cars for carpooling and around a hundred collection stations operated within the city. To help fund the car pool, the MIA held mass rallies at various African American churches where donations were collected and people could learn about their continued success with the boycott. Most civil rights battles took place through civil rights organizations, directly or indirectly. King, who was then a new face to everyone, also proposed his civil rights agendas that would help him begin his rise to national prominence in the civil rights movement through his series of articulate and powerful speeches that helped him convey a message of non-violent protest against racial injustice. Martin Luther King would go on to say, “We must love our white brothers, I said, no matter what they do to us… In mass meeting after mass meeting we have emphasized nonviolence.” His emphasis on nonviolent civil disobedience through the teachings of Henry David Thoreau and Mahatma Gandhi is essentially what convinced his fellow black citizens to boycott the city's bus system. The Montgomery Bus Boycott demonstrated to all African Americans living in the United States what could be achieved through direct action. protest action. This would prove to be the first victory of many, although small it would still be enough to inspire, 2016.