|
|
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
|
Presidential Medal of Freedom Recipient Rosa Parks
|
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
| |
| |
Presidential Medal of Freedom Recipient Rosa Parks
born Rosa Louise McCauley
b. Tuskegee, Macon, Alabama, 4 February 1913
Civil rights heroine Rosa Parks smiles after President Clinton introduces her to the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation on Sept. 14, 1996. Parks is wearing the Presidential Medal of Freedom she received for her many civic contributions.
Rosa Parks : "Why do you push us around?"
Officer: "I don't know but the law is the law and you're under arrest."
From
Rosa Parks with Gregory J. Reed, Quiet Strength
(Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Pub. House, 1994), page 23.
Here is Rosa Parks in 1964, eight years after she was catapulted into national attention by her refusal to give up her seat on a Montgomery bus to a white person. "It just happened that the driver made a demand," she recalled, "and I just didn't feel like obeying his demand."
R osa Parks was born on February 4, 1913, in Tuskegee, Alabama, the first child of James and Leona (Edwards) McCauley; Rosa Parks is honored as the "first lady of civil rights" and the "mother of the freedom movement", and her quiet dignity ignited the most significant social movement in the history of the United States; she was arrested on December 1, 1955, in Montgomery, Alabama, for refusing to give up her seat on a bus to a white man, and her stand for equal rights became legendary; news of Rosa Parks’ arrest resulted in 42,000 African Americans boycotting Montgomery buses for 381 days, beginning on December 5, 1955, until the bus segregation laws were changed on December 21, 1956; the United States Supreme Court ruled on November 13, 1956, that the Montgomery segregation law was unconstitutional, and on December 20, 1956, Montgomery officials were ordered to desegregate buses; the civil rights movement led to the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which broke down the barriers of legal discrimination against African Americans and made equality before the law a reality for all Americans; Rosa Parks is the recipient of many awards and accolades for her efforts on behalf of racial harmony, including the Springarn Award, the NAACP’s highest honor for civil rights contributions, the Congressional Gold Medal the Nation’s highest civilian honor, and the first International Freedom Conductor Award from the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center; she has dedicated her life to the cause of universal human rights and truly embodies the love of humanity and freedom; Rosa Parks was the first woman to join the Montgomery chapter of the NAACP, was an active volunteer for the Montgomery Voters League, and in 1987, co-founded the Rosa and Raymond Parks Institute for Self-Development; Rosa Parks, by her quiet courage, symbolizes all that is vital about nonviolent protest, as she endured threats of death and persisted as an advocate for the simple, basic lessons she taught the Nation and from which the Nation has benefited immeasurably; and Rosa Parks, who has resided in the State of Michigan since 1957, has become a living icon for freedom in America.
5,000 at Meeting Outline Boycott; Bullet Clips Bus,
December 6, 1955,
African American Odyssey.
Copyprint from microfilm. Serial and Government Publications Division.
Courtesy of the Montgomery Advertiser. On the evening of December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks, an African American, was arrested for disobeying an Alabama law requiring black passengers to relinquish seats to white passengers when the bus was full. Blacks were also required to sit at the back of the bus. Her arrest sparked a 381-day boycott of the Montgomery bus system and led to a 1956 Supreme Court decision banning segregation on public transportation.
Rosa McCauley was born in 1913. At age twenty, she married Raymond Parks and with his encouragement earned a high school diploma. The couple was active in the Montgomery Chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. While working as a seamstress, Mrs. Parks served as chapter secretary and, for a time, as advisor to the NAACP Youth Council. Denied the right to vote on at least two occasions because of her race, Rosa Parks also worked with the Voters League preparing blacks to register.
Following the Brown v. Board of Education decision, the NAACP choose Rosa Parks to attend a desegregation workshop at the Highlander Folk School in Monteagle, Tennessee. Reflecting on that experience, Parks recalled, "At Highlander I found out for the first time in my adult life that this could be a unified society . . . I gained there the strength to persevere in my work for freedom not just for blacks, but for all oppressed people."
Although her arrest was not "planned," Park's action was consistent with the NAACP's desire to challenge segregated public transport in the courts. A one-day bus boycott coinciding with Parks's December 5 court date resulted in an overwhelming African American boycott of the bus system. Since black people constituted seventy percent of the transit system's riders, most busses carried few passengers that day.
Success demanded sustained action. Religious and political leaders met at the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church and formed the Montgomery Improvement Association (later the Southern Christian Leadership Conference) and Dexter's new pastor, Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., was appointed the group's leader. For the next year, the Montgomery Improvement Association coordinated the bus boycott and the eloquent young preacher inspired those who refused to ride:
If we are wrong--the Supreme Court of this nation is wrong. If we are wrong--God almighty is wrong! If we are wrong--Jesus of Nazareth was merely a utopian dreamer and never came down to earth. If we are wrong--justice is a lie. And we are determined here in Montgomery to work and fight until justice runs down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream."
Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr., Montgomery, Alabama, 1955. During the boycott, King insisted protestors retain the moral high ground, hinting at his later strategy of nonviolent resistance.
This is not a war between the white and the Negro but a conflict between justice and injustice. If we are arrested every day, if we are exploited every day, if we are trampled over every day, don't ever let anyone pull you so low as to hate them. We must use the weapon of love. Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr., Montgomery, Alabama, 1955. In December 1956 the Supreme Court banned segregation on public transportation and the boycott ended over a year after it had begun. Rosa and Raymond Parks moved to Detroit where, for over twenty years, the "Mother of the Civil Rights Movement" worked for Congressman John Conyers. In addition to the Rosa Parks Peace Prize (Stockholm, 1994) and the U.S. Medal of Freedom (1996), Rosa Parks has been awarded two dozen honorary doctorates from universities around the world.
The Library of Congress
Martin Luther King, Peter Seeger, Charis Horton, Rosa Parks, & Ralph Abernathy at Highlander's 25th Reunion, 1957
Presidential Medal of Freedom Citation:
President William Jefferson Clinton has announced that he will award the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian honor, to eleven distinguished Americans. All have made important contributions to their communities and the nation. The President will bestow the medals at a White House ceremony on September 9, 1996. Among the honorees is:
ROSA PARKS
September 6, 1996
by
President Bill Clinton
On December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on a city bus in Montgomery, Alabama and helped launch the modern civil rights movement. Since that historic act of civil disobedience, Parks has remained devoted to human rights issues. In 1987, she founded the Rosa and Raymond Parks Institute for Self Development in Detroit, which offers career training for teenagers. She makes frequent personal appearances and was a vocal opponent of apartheid in South Africa.
Rosa Parks is fingerprinted by D. H. Lackey of the Montgomery Police Department.
|
|
|
|
|
|
Medal History
