[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 194 (Thursday, December 7, 1995)]
[Senate]
[Page S18247]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         TRIBUTE TO ROSA PARKS

 Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, 40 years ago this month--December 
1955--in Montgomery, AL, the modern civil rights movement began when 
Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat and move to the back of the bus. 
The strength and spirit of this courageous woman captured the 
consciousness of not only the American people but the entire world.
  Rosa Parks' arrest for violating the city's segregation laws was the 
catalyst for the Montgomery bus boycott. Her stand on that December day 
in 1955 was not an isolated incident but part of a lifetime of struggle 
for equality and justice. Twelve years earlier, in 1943, Rosa Parks had 
been arrested for violating another one of the city's bus-related 
segregation laws requiring blacks to pay their fares at the front of 
the bus then get off of the bus and reboard from the rear of the bus. 
The driver of that bus was the same driver with whom she would have her 
confrontation years later.
  The rest is history, the boycott which Rosa Parks began was the 
beginning of an American revolution that elevated that status of 
African-Americans nationwide and introduced to the world a young leader 
who would one day have a national holiday declared in his honor, the 
Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr.
  Mr. President, on the occasion of this important 40th anniversary, I 
want to pay tribute to Rosa Parks, the gentle warrior who decided that 
she would no longer tolerate the humiliation and demoralization of 
racial segregation on a bus.
  We have come a long way toward achieving Dr. King's dream of justice 
and equality for all. But we still have work to be done. Let us 
rededicate ourselves to continuing the struggle.

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