[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 151 (2005), Part 18]
[Senate]
[Page 24596]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                         TRIBUTE TO ROSA PARKS

  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I rise today to pay tribute to one of 
the truly legendary and enduring figure of the 20th century, Rosa 
Parks, who dedicated herself to fighting for equality and justice.
  Rosa Parks, the matriarch of our Nation's civil rights movement, died 
last Monday at the age of 92. An American icon who changed the course 
of the 20th Century, Rosa Parks believed that men and women, regardless 
of color, should not be treated as second class citizens. Sixty years 
after the name Rosa Parks first made headlines, her courageous acts 
continue to symbolize the cause of freedom in America.
  As we mourn the passing of Rosa Parks, we are reminded of the power 
and integrity of her spirit. Her quiet dignity and fearless strength 
shaped and inspired the civil rights movement in the United States over 
the last half-century.
  Most historians date the beginning of the modern civil rights 
movement in the United States to December 1, 1955. Tired and weary not 
only from a long day of work, but from years of discrimination and 
racial inequality, an unknown seamstress in Montgomery, AL, refused to 
give up her bus seat to a white passenger. On that momentous day in 
history, Rosa Parks was arrested for violating a city ordinance, but 
her lonely act of defiance sparked a movement that ended legal 
segregation in America.
  The subsequent bus boycott by African Americans created a national 
sensation. Led by Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr., the Montgomery bus 
boycott lasted nearly 13 months and inspired the Nation's civil rights 
movement.
  The boycott led to the Supreme Court questioning the legality of the 
Jim Crow law that mandated the discrimination of African-Americans on 
the public bus system. And on November 13, 1956, in the landmark case 
Browder v. Gayle, the Supreme Court banned segregation on buses. A 
tremendous victory for the cause of freedom and equality.
  Throughout her long life, Rosa Parks possessed an innate ability to 
lead. Her quiet acts of courage illuminated for Americans the disgrace 
and moral injustice of segregation. She continued to inspire non-
violent protests in the name of civil rights throughout the 20th 
century and changed the face of America forever.
  Rosa Parks was born in Tuskegee, AL, in 1913, a time when black and 
white America seemed destined to remain perpetually divided. In 1932, 
she married civil rights activist Raymond Parks. Together, they worked 
for the Montgomery chapter of the NAACP, where she worked as a 
secretary for the Montgomery branch and as its youth leader.
  In the summer of 1955, while working for the NAACP, Rosa Parks 
attended an interracial leadership conference. She later said that it 
was at this conference where she ``gained strength to persevere in my 
work for freedom, not just for blacks but for all oppressed people.''
  Rosa Parks had a distinguished career of public and community 
service. In 1965, Rosa Parks began to work as a receptionist and office 
assistant for Congressman John Conyers in his Detroit office, where she 
continued to work until 1988. Later, she established the Rosa and 
Raymond Parks Institute for Self-Development. Its ongoing mission is to 
motivate and direct youth to achieve their highest potential.
  Rosa Parks once remarked that she wanted to be remembered ``as a 
person who wanted to be free and wanted others to be free.'' She lived 
each day by this mantra and inspired countless individuals in America 
and throughout the world to take up the mantle of freedom.
  But although our country has come a long way since the days of the 
Jim Crow laws, it doesn't mean that we still don't have even more to 
accomplish. We must protect the advances made by America's minorities, 
and also further those advances in the years ahead.
  Today, we honor the life and legacy of Rosa Parks, a great champion 
of freedom, equality and justice, and prosperity for all people. I 
believe that it was especially fitting that she was given the distinct 
tribute of lying in honor in our Nation's Capitol. An icon who changed 
America, there is no doubt that Rosa Parks will remain etched forever 
in our memories.

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