[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 34 (Thursday, March 4, 1999)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2278-S2280]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

      By Mr. ABRAHAM (for himself, Mr. Sessions, Mr. Levin, Mr. 
        Kennedy, and Mr. Harkin):
  S. 531. A bill to authorize the President to award a gold medal on 
behalf of the Congress to Rosa Parks in recognition of her 
contributions to the Nation; to the Committee on Banking, Housing, and 
Urban Affairs.


legislation to authorize the president to award a gold medal on behalf 
                     of the congress to rosa parks.

  Mr. ABRAHAM. Mr. President, I rise today along with Senators 
Sessions, Levin, Kennedy and Harkin to introduce an important piece of 
legislation that will honor one of the most important figures in the 
American civil rights movement, Rosa Parks.
  Given her immense contributions to our Nation, we believe it is only 
fitting that she be honored with a Congressional Gold Medal.
  For decades, Mr. President, African-Americans in this country, this 
birth place of freedom, were treated as second class citizens, or less.
  Even after the moral enormity of slavery had finally been ended, 
African-Americans were subjected to discrimination, segregation and, if 
they resisted, prosecution and even lynching.
  Rosa Parks set in motion the events that brought to an end the 
shameful history of Jim Crow.
  Rosa Parks refused to obey the segregation laws in her home city of 
Montgomery, AL, and go to the back of the bus.
  When confronted, she refused give up her seat on that bus to a white 
man, even when threatened with jail.
  She was arrested, and the reaction would change the face of this 
Nation.
  Over 40,000 people boycotted Montgomery buses for 381 days.
  Faced with official condemnation and violence, these brave men and 
women maintained their unity until the bus segregation laws were 
finally changed.
  Their actions brought about the 1956 Supreme Court decision declaring 
the Montgomery segregation law unconstitutional and spurred the civil 
rights movement to further action; action which produced the Civil 
Rights Act of 1964, breaking down the barriers of legal discrimination 
against African-Americans and establishing equality before the law as a 
reality for all Americans.
  Rosa Parks set these historic events in motion.
  She was the first woman to join the Montgomery chapter of the NAACP 
and served as an active volunteer for the Montgomery Voters League.
  Because of her strength, perseverance and quiet dignity, all 
Americans have been freed from the moral stain of segregation.
  And this mother of the civil rights movement continues to be active 
in the struggle for equality and the empowerment of the 
disenfranchised.
  Ms. Parks has received many awards in recognition of her efforts for 
racial harmony, including the NAACP's highest honor for civil rights 
contributions, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the Nation's highest 
civilian honor, and the first International Freedom Conductor Award 
from the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center.
  Throughout her life, Rosa Parks has been an example of the power of 
conviction and quiet dignity in pursuit of justice and empowerment. Mr. 
President, I urge my colleagues to join us in supporting legislation to 
bestow upon her the Congressional Gold Medal she so well deserves.
  Mr. President, I remember as a young student in grade school being 
told the story of the woman who said she would not move to the back of 
the bus. I did not know who that was by name. I just remember being so 
struck and touched by that story. I did not realize someday I would 
have the opportunity to meet that lady. She lives in my State of 
Michigan today. I have had a chance to get to know her a bit, but, more 
importantly, to work with her organizations there which do fine work 
for our communities and for our country.
  So Mr. President, I am very proud to be here today to offer this 
Congressional Gold Medal proposal. I want to thank our cosponsors. We 
are very hopeful that others will join us so we can pass this proposal 
as soon as possible.
  At this time, Mr. President, I yield the floor to the Senator from 
Alabama.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Alabama.
  Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I want to say how much I appreciate the 
courtesies of Senator Abraham and Senator Levin as we work through this 
effort to achieve this Gold Medal for Ms. Rosa Parks. I think it is a 
very fitting and appropriate thing that we do so.
  So I rise today to recognize Ms. Parks, a native Alabamian, who 
through her life and example has touched both the heart and the 
conscience of an entire Nation. She is a native of Tuskegee, and a 
former resident of Montgomery, AL. Her dignity in the face of 
discrimination helped spark a movement to ensure that all citizens were 
treated equally under the law.
  Equal treatment under the law is a fundamental pillar upon which our 
Republic rests. In fact, over the first 2 months of this year this 
Senate has discussed that very issue in some detail. As legislators, we 
should work to strengthen the appreciation for this fundamental 
governing principle and recognize those who have made extraordinary 
contributions toward ensuring that all American citizens have the same 
opportunities, regardless of their race, sex, creed, or national 
origin, to enjoy the freedoms this country has to offer.
  Through her efforts, Ms. Parks has become a living embodiment of this 
principle. And it is entirely appropriate that this Congress takes the 
opportunity to acknowledge her contribution by authorizing the award of 
a Congressional Gold Medal to her. Her courage, what we in Alabama 
might call ``gumption'', at a critical juncture resulted in historic 
change.
  Certainly, there is much still to be done. True equality, the total 
elimination of discrimination, and a real sense of ease and acceptance 
among the races has not been fully reached. But it is fair to say that 
in the history of this effort, the most dramatic and productive chapter 
was ignited by the lady we honor today.
  Ms. Parks' story is well known, but it bears repeating. She was born 
on February 4, 1913, in the small town of Tuskegee AL to Mr. James and 
Leona McCauley. As a young child, she moved to Montgomery with her 
mother, who was a local schoolteacher. Like many Southern cities, the 
Montgomery of Ms. Parks' youth was a segregated city with numerous laws 
mandating the unequal treatment of people based on the

[[Page S2279]]

color of their skin. These laws were discriminatory in their intent, 
and divisive, unfair, and humiliating in their application, but for 
years Ms. Parks had suffered with them until the fateful day of 
December 1, 1955, when her pride and her dignity would allow her to 
obey them no more. On this day Ms. Parks, a 42-year-old seamstress, 
boarded a city bus after a long, hard day at work. Like other public 
accommodations, this bus contained separate sections for white and 
black passengers, with white passengers allocated the front rows, and 
black passengers given the back. This bus was particularly crowded that 
evening. At one of the stops, a white passenger boarded, and the bus 
driver, seeing Ms. Parks, requested that she give up her seat and move 
to the back of the bus, even though this meant that she would be forced 
to stand. Ms. Parks refused to give up her seat and was arrested for 
disobeying that order.
  For this act of civic defiance, Ms. Parks set off a chain of events 
that have led some to refer to her as the ``Mother of the Civil Rights 
Movement.'' Her arrest led to the Montgomery bus boycott, and organized 
movement led by a young minister, then unknown, named Martin Luther 
King, Jr., who had been preaching at the historic Baptist church 
located on Montgomery's Dexter Avenue. The bus boycott lasted 382 days, 
and its impact directly led to the integration of the bus lines while 
the attention generated helped lift Dr. King to national prominence. 
Ultimately, the U.S. Supreme Court was asked to rule on the 
constitutionality of the Montgomery law which Ms. Parks had defied and 
the court struck it down.
  This powerful image, that of a hard working American ordered to the 
back of the bus, simply because of her race, was a catalytic event. It 
was the spark that caused a nation to stop accepting things as they had 
been and focused everyone on the fundamental issue--whether we could 
continue as a segregated society. As a result of the movement Ms. Parks 
helped start, today's Montgomery is very different from the Montgomery 
of Ms. Parks' youth. Today, the citizens of Montgomery look with a 
great deal of historical pride upon the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church. 
Today's Montgomery is home to the Southern Poverty Law Center, an 
organization devoted to the cause of civil rights and also the Civil 
Rights Memorial, a striking monument of black granite and cascading 
water which memorializes the individuals who gave their lives in the 
pursuit of equal justice. Today's Montgomery is a city in which its 
history as the ``Capital of the Confederacy'' and its history as the 
``Birthplace of the Civil Rights Movement'' are both recognized, 
understood and reconciled. But Montgomery is not alone in this 
development. Many American cities owe the same debt of gratitude to Ms. 
Parks that Montgomery does. In fact, Ms. Parks' contributions may 
extend beyond even the borders of our nation. In the book ``Bus Ride to 
Justice,'' Mr. Fred Gray, who gained fame while in his 20's as Ms. 
Parks' attorney in the bus desegregation case and as the lead attorney 
in many of Alabama's and the Nation's most important civil rights 
cases, wrote these words, and I don't think they are an exaggeration:

       Little did we know that we had set in motion a force that 
     would ripple throughout Alabama, the South, the nation, and 
     even the world. But from the vantage point of almost 40 years 
     later, there is a direct correlation between what we started 
     in Montgomery and what has subsequently happened in China, 
     eastern Europe, South Africa, and even more recently, in 
     Russia. While it is inaccurate to say that we all sat down 
     and deliberately planned a movement that would echo and 
     reverberate around the world, we did work around the clock, 
     planning strategy and creating an atmosphere that gave 
     strength, courage, faith and hope to people of all races, 
     creeds, colors and religions around the world. And it all 
     started on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama, with Rosa Parks on 
     December 1, 1955.

  For her courage and her conviction, and for her role in changing 
Alabama, the South, the nation and the world for the better, our Nation 
owes thanks to Ms. Parks. I hope that this body will extend its thanks 
and recognition to her by awarding her the Congressional Gold Medal.
  Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, Rosa Parks is truly one of this Nation's 
greatest heroes. Her personal bravery and self-sacrifice have shaped 
our Nation's history and are remembered with respect and with reverence 
by us all.
  Forty three years ago--December 1995--in Montgomery, Alabama the 
modern civil rights movement began. 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.
  My home state of Michigan proudly claims Rosa Parks as one of our 
own. Rosa Parks and her husband made the journey to Michigan in 1957. 
Unceasing threats on their lives and persistent harassment by phone 
prompted the move to Detroit where Rosa Park's brother resided.
  Rosa Park's 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. For instance, twelve years earlier, in 1943, 
Rosa Parks had been arrested for violating another one of the city's 
bus related segregation laws, which required African Americans to pay 
their fares at the front of the bus then get off of the bus and re-
board from the bus at the rear. The driver of that bus was the same 
driver with whom Rosa Parks would have her confrontation 12 years 
later.
  The rest is history--the boycott which Rosa Parks began was the 
beginning of an American revolution that elevated the 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.
  The Congressional Gold Medal is a fitting 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 towards achieving Dr. King's dream of justice 
and equality for all. But we still have much work to do. Let us 
rededicate ourselves to continuing the struggle on Civil Rights, and to 
human rights in Rosa Parks name.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that a brief biography of the 
life and times and movement which was sparked by Rosa Parks, the mother 
of the civil rights movement, and excerpted from USL Biographies, be 
printed in the Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                  Rosa Parks--American Social Activist

       ``I felt just resigned to give what I could to protect 
     against the way I was being treated.''


                              introduction

       On December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat 
     on a bus to a white man who wanted it. By this simple act, 
     which today would seem unremarkable, she set in motion the 
     civil rights movement, which led to the Civil Rights Act of 
     1964 and ultimately ensured that today all black Americans 
     must be given equal treatment with whites under the law.
       Parks did not know that she was making history nor did she 
     intend to do so. She simply knew that she was tired after a 
     long day's work and did not want to move. Because of her 
     fatigue and because she was so determined, America was 
     changed forever. Segregation was on its way out.


                   growing up in a segregated society

       In the first half of this century, Montgomery, Alabama, was 
     totally segregated, like so many other cities in the South. 
     In this atmosphere Parks and her brother grew up. They had 
     been brought to Montgomery by their mother, Leona (Edwards) 
     McCauley, when she and their father separated in 1915. Their 
     father, James McCauley, went away north and they seldom saw 
     him, but they were made welcome by their mother's family and 
     passed their childhood among cousins, uncles, aunts, 
     grandparents, and great-grandparents.
       Parks's mother was a schoolteacher, and Parks was taught by 
     her until the age of eleven, when she went to Montgomery 
     Industrial School for Girls. It was, of course, an all-black 
     school, as was Booker T. Washington High School, which she 
     attended briefly. Virtually everything in Montgomery was for 
     ``blacks only'' or ``whites only,'' and Parks became used to 
     obeying the segregation laws, though she found them 
     humiliating.
       When Parks was twenty, she married Raymond Parks, a barber, 
     and moved out of her mother's home. Parks took in sewing and 
     worked at various jobs over the years. She also became an 
     active member of the National Association for the Advancement 
     of Colored People (NAACP), working as secretary of the 
     Montgomery chapter.

[[Page S2280]]

                            silent protests

       In 1955 Parks was forty-two years old, and she had taken to 
     protesting segregation in her own quiet way--for instance, by 
     walking up the stairs of a building rather than riding in an 
     elevator marked ``blacks only.'' She was well respected in 
     the black community for her work with the Montgomery Voters 
     League as well as the NAACP. The Voters League was a group 
     that helped black citizens pass the various tests that had 
     been set up to make it difficult for them to register as 
     voters.
       As well as avoiding black-only elevators, Parks often 
     avoided traveling by bus, preferring to walk home from work 
     when she was not too tired to do so. The buses were a 
     constant irritation to all black passengers. The front four 
     rows were reserved for whites (and remained empty even when 
     there were not enough white passengers to fill them). The 
     back section, which was always very crowded, was for black 
     passengers. In between were some rows that were really part 
     of the black section, but served as an overflow area for 
     white passengers. If the white section was full, black 
     passengers in the middle section had to vacate their 
     seats--a whole row had to be vacated, even if only one 
     white passenger required a seat.


                        the arrest of rosa parks

       This is what happened on the evening of December 1, 1955: 
     Parks took the bus because she was feeling particularly tired 
     after a long day in the department store where she worked as 
     a seamstress. She was sitting in the middle section, glad to 
     be off her feet at last, when a white man boarded the bus and 
     demanded that her row be cleared because the white section 
     was full. The others in the row obediently moved to the back 
     of the bus, but Parks just didn't feel like standing for the 
     rest of the journey, and she quietly refused to move.
       At this, the white bus driver threatened to call the police 
     unless Parks gave up her seat, but she calmly replied ``Go 
     ahead and call them.'' By the time the police arrived, the 
     driver was very angry, and when asked whether he wanted Parks 
     to be arrested or let off with a warning, he insisted on 
     arrest. So this respectable middle-aged woman was taken to 
     the police station, where she was fingerprinted and jailed. 
     She was allowed to make one phone call. She called an NAACP 
     lawyer, who arranged for her to be released on bail.


                            the bus boycott

       Word of Parks' arrest spread quickly, and the Women's 
     Political Council decided to protest her treatment by 
     organizing a boycott of the buses. The boycott was set for 
     December 5, the day of Parks' trial, but Martin Luther King, 
     Jr., and other prominent members of Montgomery's black 
     community realized that here was a chance to take a firm 
     stand on segregation. As a result, the Montgomery Improvement 
     Association was formed to organize an boycott that would 
     continue until the bus segregation laws were changed. 
     Leaflets were distributed telling people not to ride the 
     buses, and other forms of transport were relied on.
       The boycott lasted 382 days, causing the bus company to 
     lose a vast amount of money. Meanwhile, Parks was fined for 
     failing to obey a city ordinance, but on the advice of her 
     lawyers she refused to pay the fine so that they could 
     challenge the segregation law in court. The following year, 
     the U.S. Supreme Court ruled the Montgomery segregation law 
     illegal, and the boycott was at last called off. Yet Parks 
     had started far more than a bus boycott. Other cities 
     followed Montgomery's example and were protesting their 
     segregation laws. The civil rights movement was underway.


                  mother of the civil rights movement

       Parks has been hailed as ``the mother of the civil rights 
     movement,'' but this was not an easy role for her. Threats 
     and constant phone calls she received during the boycott 
     caused her husband to have a nervous breakdown, and in 1957 
     they moved to Detroit, where Parks' brother, Sylvester, 
     lived. There Parks continued her work as a seamstress, but 
     she had become a public figure and was often sought out to 
     give talks about civil rights.
       Over the years, Parks has received several honorary 
     degrees, and in 1965 Congressman John Conyers of Detroit 
     appointed her to his staff. Parks' husband died in 1977 and 
     she retired in 1988, but she has continued to work for the 
     betterment of the black community. She is particularly eager 
     to help the young, and in 1987 she established the Rosa and 
     Raymond Parks Institute for Self-Development, a training 
     school for Detroit teenagers.
       Each year sees more honors showered upon her. In 1990, some 
     three thousand people attended the Kennedy Center in 
     Washington, D.C., to celebrate the seventy-seventh birthday 
     of the indomitable campaigner and former seamstress, Rosa 
     Parks.

  Mr. LEVIN. I thank the Chair and I thank our colleagues from Michigan 
and Alabama.
                                 ______