The Life and Civil Rights Activism of Rosa Parks

This essay is about Rosa Parks, a civil rights activist fighting for the equal and fair treatment of African Americans. She had such a huge impact she was later called the first lady of civil rights by the United Congress and she is also called the mother of the freedom movement. She was bold and a brave person but this was very helpful to her to fight for these rights. 

Rosa Parks was born in 1913 in the state called “Alabama.” Growing up, Rosa Parks lived on a farm in a little town, her family worked as sharecroppers meaning they didn’t own the land but they worked the land in the hopes of earning same money as others. At that time life was incredibly difficult. After growing up Rosa Parks turned 11 years old and she moved to the community of Pine level where it was just a capital of Alabama but it was an urban environment. After this moved in that place there were bad laws in which things were segregated. The word segregated means separated by race, this was not fair and it was so horrible to treat people different because of the color of their skin and this was true not only the little town that she grew up when she was really young but also just outside of Montgomery and in Montgomery this was true in rural life suburban life and urban life, Africans Americans were mistreated just because of the color of their skin, it was awful they had to use different schools, restaurants sometimes, theaters, even hospitals, retrooms, lunch counters, libraries. There was even segregation in the buses African-Americans were forced to sit in the back of the bus, sometimes they were even forced to stand up during the ride, this was horrible it was not fair, they were being mistreated.

Rosa Parks suffered a lot at that time because she was African-American, she was treated differently she was bullied she was not treated with the respect that each human being deserved. In 1943 Rosa Parks joined the NAACP which was an organization that fights for the rights of African-Americans and it still around today, Rosa Parks was ready to join the civil rights movement and was ready to make a big impact to make things more equal for everybody. Rosa Parks worked hard for 12 years but did not become famous in the civil rights movement until December 1st 1955 that was the day that would change not only her life but the entire civil rights movement, on that day they tried to force her to stand up during a bus ride to give up her seat stand up and give it to someone else but she knew that was not fair and she was not going to back down, she did not allowed them to bully anymore and forced her to do something that was not right, she was there first and she deserved to stay right where she was, they threatened her and were mean and said that they are going to call the police, but she refused and said NO I’m going to sit there you go ahead and get those police officers because I’m going to do what’s right and is supposed to be. After this she got arrested for just sitting in the seat that she deserved to sit in. 

Later on they announced a bus boycott in Montgomery the leaders of civil rights movement said you know what we have got to do something about this, we are going to make sure this stops now. What is a boycott? It's when you stop using a good or a service in order to make a statement, in this way they plan not to ride more buses because they knew that the buses needed them to continue to use their service. They boycott lasted just over one year so lasted a pretty long time, they boycott ended when the supreme court ruled that segregation on public transportation is illegal, it was a shame they didn’t declare all segregation did not become illegal until the Civil Rights Act of 1964 but this was a big victory and ended the boycott because it made segregation on public transportation like buses illegal. 

Now after the Montgomery bus boycott Rosa Parks moved to Detroit to continue to dedicate her life to the Civil Rights Movement, she wrote books, made speeches and continued the flight for African American Rights. Then in 1996 president Clinton presented Rosa Parks with the presidential Medal of Freedom a huge honor for an incredible woman after leaving a full life. 

Rosa Parks passed away nine years later at the age of 92. Her entire life was dedicated to Civil Rights and that legacy and that impact is still felt by millions today.