Claudette Colvin in the early 1950s
Shutterstock.com (frame, background); IanDagnall Computing/Alamy Stock Photo (Claudette Colvin)
A Brave Stand
It was March 2, 1955. Claudette Colvin, 15, was sitting on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama. She was on her way home.
At the time, laws in many places kept Black people segregated (or separated) from White people. Black people had to sit in the back of buses. And they had to give up their seat if a White person wanted it.
But on that day, Colvin was fed up with those unfair laws. The driver told her to give up her seat. Colvin refused. The police arrived and took her to jail.
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Rosa Parks on a Montgomery, Alabama, bus in 1956
Colvin was the first person arrested for challenging Montgomery’s bus rules. Rosa Parks and several others were arrested later. Parks’s arrest in December 1955 led to a bus boycott in Montgomery.
Meanwhile, Colvin sued city officials over the bus rules. The case reached the U.S. Supreme Court. That’s the nation’s highest court. In 1956, the Court ruled that segregation on public buses was illegal.
Colvin later moved to New York. She spent about 30 years as a nurse’s aide. She died in January at age 86. Today her role in history isn’t as widely known as Parks’s.
Gloria Laster is Colvin’s younger sister. She hopes Colvin’s story inspires kids to stand up for their rights.
“Even the youngest person has a voice,” Laster says.
1. What did the unfair bus laws in Montgomery, Alabama, say?
2. What is a boycott, according to the article? What do you think happens during a bus boycott?
3. Why does the article mention the U.S. Supreme Court?
