Internal Assessment
A Plan of the investigation
What role did personal convictions vs. social ideology play in Rosa Park’s
act of civil disobedience?
On December 1, 1955, an African American woman by the name of Rosa Parks
refused to give up her bus seat to a white man. When she refused to move, she
was arrested. The aim of this investigation will be to discover what played
a role in her decision not to give up her seat. First in section B I will present
the firm beliefs Rosa Parks lived by and discuss why she did not give up her
bus seat and the laws that forced her and every other African American, male
or female to sit in the back of the bus. Then in part C I will I evaluate and
state the importance of two sources used during the research process. In part
D I will analysis all the evidence and dig deeper into the facts stated in part
B. I will also present the impact Rosa Parks had on American History and the
lives of all people and all races. In part E I will state the conclusion to
my thesis question.
B Summary of Evidence
Rosa Parks was an educated woman who was very involved in the fight for human
rights along with her husband, Raymond Parks. She served as secretary of the
National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). And later
as youth leader of the local Montgomery branch.[1] Jim Lawson founded the NAACP
and the organization still exists today. They promote solving problems in a
positive way without the use of violence. Jim Lawson’s mother inspired
him, she believed there had to be a better way than responding to hatred with
hatred.[2] Rosa Park believed that too.
In those days African Americans were not allowed to sit in the front of the
bus. The front seats were reserved for the “whites”. Whenever the
front seats got filled up, “colored” people would have to give up
their seats and move further into the back of the bus. An African American had
to go to the front door of a bus to pay for
the ride and then walk outside to the end of the bus to get on and find a seat.
If you were “colored” you could not sit in the same row or across
the aisle from a “white” man. On that unforgettable day Rosa Parks
did not sit in the front of the bus. She sat in the front row of the “colored”
section. When the bus got crowded she refused to give up her seat in the “colored”
section.[3] Rosa Parks. Not an activist or a radical. Just a quiet, conservative,
churchgoing woman with a nice family and a decent job as a seamstress…she
did not get on that bus looking for trouble or trying to make a statement. Going
home was all she had in mind, like everybody else.[4] She may have been tired
after a day of work, but really she was tired of all the racism. She no longer
wanted to be pushed around and she was tired of seeing the bad treatment and
disrespect of children, women and men just because of the color of their skin.[5]
There were three other blacks sitting in the same row as her, but all three
of them got up and went further to the back of the bus. But she stayed in her
seat and slid closer to the bus.[6]
She was a strong fearless woman who put her trust in God. She learned that when
one’s mind is made up, this diminishes fear. She had made up her mind
along time ago that she would someday be a free person. “When I sat down
on the bus the day I was arrested, I was thinking of going home. I had made
up my mind quickly about what it was that I had to do, what I felt was right
to do. I did not think about being physically tired or fearful … I felt
the Lord would give me the strength to endure what ever I had to face. God did
away with all my fear. It was time for someone to stand up or in my case, sit
down. I refused to move.”[7]
The African Americans of Montgomery called a mass meeting after they heard what
Rosa Parks did. They all voted to boycott the buses, and they did for exactly
381 days. The city retaliated by sending many of the boycott leaders to jail
and white segregationists turned to violence. Homes and churches were being
shot at and exploded, but they still pressed on. In November of 1956
the Supreme Court outlawed segregation on local bus line. Montgomery was the
beginning. It set the style and
mood of the vast protest movement that would sweep the South in the next 10
years.[8]
C Evaluation of Sources
Two of the sources used in the investigation were:
Parks, Rosa with Reed, J Gregory. 1994. Quiet Strength. Gran Rapids. Zondervan
Publishing House.
This book was a great source to use. It is filled with all of Rosa Parks’s
thoughts: thoughts on injustice, faith, values and much more. She discusses
principles and convictions that led to her quiet defiance. This book gives great
insight to understand why she did not give up her seat. She states that she
was not physically tired, but tired of injustice. There are still limitations
in this source, even though it is a first hand account. The information may
be sugar coated and twisted. This book was recently written in the 1990’s;
over time stories have a way of snowballing, (that is, becoming greater and
bigger than what really had happened.)
Birnbaum, Jonathan and Taylor Clarence. 2000. Civil Rights Since 1787. New York
and London. New York University Press.
This book deals with the civil rights movement starting in 1787 until the present
time, but there are sections devoted to Rosa Parks. It gives great insight in
understanding what laws were applied to only African Americans on public transportation.
It gives you a whole new perspective on how she really was not a radical. “This
book is an excellent reader on the struggle for racial equality,” according
to a well-known revisionist writer by the name Howard Zinn. The fact that this
book is written by revisionists is a limitation. Again the further back in time
a historian is writing about, the lesser amount of hard solid facts you get.
Revisionists often also take God out of the picture of any time in history,
and Rosa Parks’s life centered around her faith in God.
D Analysis
Many people have come to believe that the reason Rosa Parks did not give up
her seat was because her feet were tired, but there was a lot more to it than
that. She was tired of the unfair treatment forced upon her and all people of
all races. She was an educated woman, happily married, and very much involved
in the NAACP. But still, so many times she has been perceived as an old, tired,
poor black woman. She may not have planned on protesting that day, but she knew
what she was doing, she knew that there was going to be a consequence, nobody
was going to let her get away with this.
She must have felt it in her heart that this was the right thing to do, otherwise
she would have left like the other people who sat in her row did. Through organizations
like the NAACP she spoke to people all the time about taking a positive role
in the community and fighting for injustice in peaceful terms. She could not
preach something she did not do herself, she set an example for people of all
races that day. To be fearless no matter whom you are, what you are, or where
you are. And to stand up for what you believe in.
It is important to realize that Rosa Parks was not a radical. She was an ordinary
woman with strong personal convictions on her way home from work. She did not
plan on getting arrested she didn’t even plan on being asked to give up
her seat that day. It is interesting to know now that she actually sat in the
front of the section for blacks, not in the very front of the bus. If she were
to have sat in the very front of the bus I would have to say she was a radical.
She was not trying to start a movement, but that is exactly what her courageous
act did.
E Conclusion
Rosa Parks was not a radical, but rather a fearless middle aged woman who could
no longer passively sit by and accept the injustice of any race. Her choice
was based on her personal convictions not on social ideology. Her personal convictions
were: that everyone deserved equal
human rights, regardless of race. She could no longer take the injustice. She
knew that very moment what she had to do, she had to take the first step. But
she was not fearful, for she believed that God was with her and that he could
get her through the next step. She was a great woman, someone to be looked up
to for her strength, and courage. For it was this woman who started a movement
that would change the lives of every American citizen. She proved that you did
not have to be violent and radical to get your point across, but that problems
could be solved in non-violent terms.
F List of Sources
Zinn, Howard. 1995. A People’s History of the United States 1942-Present.
New York. HarperCollins Publishers.
Parks, Rosa with Reed, J Gregory. 1994. Quiet Strength. Gran Rapids. Zondervan
Publishing House.
Halberstam, David. 1998. The Children. New York. Random House.
Fulghum, Robert. 1988. It Was On Fire When I Lay Down On It. Ivy Books.
Birnbaum, Jonathan and Taylor Clarence. 2000. Civil Rights Since 1787. New York
and London. New York University Press.
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[1] Rosa Parks, pg.12
[2] David Halberstam, pg.32
[3] Jonathan Birnbaum and Clarence Taylor, pg.451
[4] Robert Fulghum, pg.109-110
[5] Rosa Parks, pg.17
[6] Rosa Parks, pg. 22
[7] Rosa Parks, pg.17-18
[8] Howard Zinn, pg.442
