Claudette Colvin
Encyclopedia
Claudette Colvin is a pioneer of the African-American civil rights movement. She was the first person to resist bus segregation
in Montgomery, Alabama
, preceding the better known Rosa Parks
incident by nine months. The court case stemming from her refusal to give up her seat on the bus, decided by the U.S. District Court, ended bus segregation in Alabama
.
Montgomery's black leaders did not publicize Colvin's pioneering effort for long because she was a teenager and became pregnant while unmarried. The NAACP leaders worried about using her to represent their movement, given the social norms of the time.
, Alabama
. In 1955, at the age of 15, she refused to give up her seat on a Montgomery
bus
to a white person, in violation of local law. Her arrest preceded that of Rosa Parks
by nine months.
She sat in the section where, if a white person was standing, the blacks would have to get up and move to the back. When a white woman got on the bus and was standing, the bus driver, Robert W. Cleere, ordered Colvin and two other black passengers to get up and change seats. When Colvin refused, she was removed from the bus and arrested by two police officers.
When she refused to get up, she was still thinking about a school paper that she had written that day. It was about the prohibition against blacks' trying on clothing in department stores. They were prohibited from using the dressing rooms.
"The bus was getting crowded and I remember the bus driver looking through the rear view mirror asking her to get up out of her seat, which she didn't," said a classmate at the time, Annie Larkins Price. "She had been yelling it's my constitutional right
. She decided on that day that she wasn't going to move." Colvin was handcuffed, arrested and forcibly removed from the bus. She shouted that her constitutional rights were being violated. "Price testified on Colvin's behalf in the juvenile court case, where Colvin was convicted of violating the segregation law and assault." "There was no assault," Price said.
hearing
about her actions on the bus in a case called Browder v. Gayle
. During the trial, Claudette Colvin described her arrest
. "I kept saying, 'He has no civil right... this is my constitutional right
... you have no right to do this.' And I just kept blabbing things out, and I never stopped. That was worse than stealing, you know, talking back to a white person." "The case was fought all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court (which declared bus segregation unconstitutional in December 1956). Attorneys decided not to use Colvin in the lawsuit because they wanted to build a case that clearly challenged the legality of bus segregation. Colvin had been charged with disorderly conduct
."
in 1958 because she had difficulty finding and keeping work after her arrest, just as Parks had left for Detroit in 1957." She "retired in 2004 after 35 years as a nurse’s aide at a Manhattan nursing home." Colvin never married. "The son she had in Montgomery died at age 37; a second son is an accountant in Atlanta." In New York Claudette moved in with her sister Velma Colvin.
Colvin told the Montgomery Advertiser that she would not have changed her decision to remain seated. "I feel very, very proud of what I did, [she said]. I do feel like what I did was a spark and it caught on." "I'm not disappointed," Colvin said. "Let the people know Rosa Parks was the right person for the boycott. But also let them know that the attorneys took four other women to the Supreme Court to challenge the law that led to the end of segregation."
Racial segregation in the United States
Racial segregation in the United States, as a general term, included the racial segregation or hypersegregation of facilities, services, and opportunities such as housing, medical care, education, employment, and transportation along racial lines...
in Montgomery, Alabama
Montgomery, Alabama
Montgomery is the capital of the U.S. state of Alabama, and is the county seat of Montgomery County. It is located on the Alabama River southeast of the center of the state, in the Gulf Coastal Plain. As of the 2010 census, Montgomery had a population of 205,764 making it the second-largest city...
, preceding the better known Rosa Parks
Rosa Parks
Rosa Louise McCauley Parks was an African-American civil rights activist, whom the U.S. Congress called "the first lady of civil rights", and "the mother of the freedom movement"....
incident by nine months. The court case stemming from her refusal to give up her seat on the bus, decided by the U.S. District Court, ended bus segregation in Alabama
Alabama
Alabama is a state located in the southeastern region of the United States. It is bordered by Tennessee to the north, Georgia to the east, Florida and the Gulf of Mexico to the south, and Mississippi to the west. Alabama ranks 30th in total land area and ranks second in the size of its inland...
.
Montgomery's black leaders did not publicize Colvin's pioneering effort for long because she was a teenager and became pregnant while unmarried. The NAACP leaders worried about using her to represent their movement, given the social norms of the time.
Biography
Colvin lived in MontgomeryMontgomery, Alabama
Montgomery is the capital of the U.S. state of Alabama, and is the county seat of Montgomery County. It is located on the Alabama River southeast of the center of the state, in the Gulf Coastal Plain. As of the 2010 census, Montgomery had a population of 205,764 making it the second-largest city...
, Alabama
Alabama
Alabama is a state located in the southeastern region of the United States. It is bordered by Tennessee to the north, Georgia to the east, Florida and the Gulf of Mexico to the south, and Mississippi to the west. Alabama ranks 30th in total land area and ranks second in the size of its inland...
. In 1955, at the age of 15, she refused to give up her seat on a Montgomery
Montgomery, Alabama
Montgomery is the capital of the U.S. state of Alabama, and is the county seat of Montgomery County. It is located on the Alabama River southeast of the center of the state, in the Gulf Coastal Plain. As of the 2010 census, Montgomery had a population of 205,764 making it the second-largest city...
bus
Bus
A bus is a road vehicle designed to carry passengers. Buses can have a capacity as high as 300 passengers. The most common type of bus is the single-decker bus, with larger loads carried by double-decker buses and articulated buses, and smaller loads carried by midibuses and minibuses; coaches are...
to a white person, in violation of local law. Her arrest preceded that of Rosa Parks
Rosa Parks
Rosa Louise McCauley Parks was an African-American civil rights activist, whom the U.S. Congress called "the first lady of civil rights", and "the mother of the freedom movement"....
by nine months.
Bus incident
In 1955 Colvin was a student at Booker T. Washington High School in Montgomery. She was returning from school on March 2, 1955 when she got on a Capital Heights bus downtown (at the same place Parks boarded another bus nine months later). Colvin's family owned a car, but she relied on the city's buses to get to school.She sat in the section where, if a white person was standing, the blacks would have to get up and move to the back. When a white woman got on the bus and was standing, the bus driver, Robert W. Cleere, ordered Colvin and two other black passengers to get up and change seats. When Colvin refused, she was removed from the bus and arrested by two police officers.
When she refused to get up, she was still thinking about a school paper that she had written that day. It was about the prohibition against blacks' trying on clothing in department stores. They were prohibited from using the dressing rooms.
"The bus was getting crowded and I remember the bus driver looking through the rear view mirror asking her to get up out of her seat, which she didn't," said a classmate at the time, Annie Larkins Price. "She had been yelling it's my constitutional right
Constitutional right
An inalienable right is a freedom granted by a Nature or the Creator's endowment by birth , and may not be legally denied by that government.-United States:...
. She decided on that day that she wasn't going to move." Colvin was handcuffed, arrested and forcibly removed from the bus. She shouted that her constitutional rights were being violated. "Price testified on Colvin's behalf in the juvenile court case, where Colvin was convicted of violating the segregation law and assault." "There was no assault," Price said.
Court trial
On May 11, 1956, Colvin, along with three other women, testified in a Montgomery federal courtUnited States federal courts
The United States federal courts make up the judiciary branch of federal government of the United States organized under the United States Constitution and laws of the federal government.-Categories:...
hearing
Hearing (law)
In law, a hearing is a proceeding before a court or other decision-making body or officer, such as a government agency.A hearing is generally distinguished from a trial in that it is usually shorter and often less formal...
about her actions on the bus in a case called Browder v. Gayle
Browder v. Gayle
Browder v. Gayle, 142 F. Supp. 707 , was a case heard before the United States District Court for the Middle District of Alabama on Montgomery bus segregation laws...
. During the trial, Claudette Colvin described her arrest
Arrest
An arrest is the act of depriving a person of his or her liberty usually in relation to the purported investigation and prevention of crime and presenting into the criminal justice system or harm to oneself or others...
. "I kept saying, 'He has no civil right... this is my constitutional right
Constitutional right
An inalienable right is a freedom granted by a Nature or the Creator's endowment by birth , and may not be legally denied by that government.-United States:...
... you have no right to do this.' And I just kept blabbing things out, and I never stopped. That was worse than stealing, you know, talking back to a white person." "The case was fought all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court (which declared bus segregation unconstitutional in December 1956). Attorneys decided not to use Colvin in the lawsuit because they wanted to build a case that clearly challenged the legality of bus segregation. Colvin had been charged with disorderly conduct
Disorderly conduct
Disorderly conduct is a criminal charge in most jurisdictions in the United States. Typically, disorderly conduct makes it a crime to be drunk in public, to "disturb the peace", or to loiter in certain areas. Many types of unruly conduct may fit the definition of disorderly conduct, as such...
."
Personal life
In 1956, Colvin gave birth to a son, Raymond, who was so light-skinned (like his father) that people frequently accused her of having had a white baby. Colvin "left Montgomery for New YorkNew York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
in 1958 because she had difficulty finding and keeping work after her arrest, just as Parks had left for Detroit in 1957." She "retired in 2004 after 35 years as a nurse’s aide at a Manhattan nursing home." Colvin never married. "The son she had in Montgomery died at age 37; a second son is an accountant in Atlanta." In New York Claudette moved in with her sister Velma Colvin.
Colvin told the Montgomery Advertiser that she would not have changed her decision to remain seated. "I feel very, very proud of what I did, [she said]. I do feel like what I did was a spark and it caught on." "I'm not disappointed," Colvin said. "Let the people know Rosa Parks was the right person for the boycott. But also let them know that the attorneys took four other women to the Supreme Court to challenge the law that led to the end of segregation."
In popular culture
- The former U.S. poet laureatePoet LaureateA poet laureate is a poet officially appointed by a government and is often expected to compose poems for state occasions and other government events...
Rita DoveRita DoveRita Frances Dove is an American poet and author. From 1993-1995 she served as Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress, a position now popularly known as "U.S. Poet Laureate"...
published a poem, "Claudette Colvin Goes to Work", in her 1999 poetry collection On the Bus with Rosa Parks (W.W. Norton). Rita Dove also referred to Claudette Colvin in her magazine article "The Torchbearer Rosa Parks" - The folk singer John McCutcheonJohn McCutcheonJohn McCutcheon is an American folk music singer and multi-instrumentalist who has produced 34 albums since the 1970s. He is regarded as a master of the hammered dulcimer, and is also proficient on many other instruments including guitar, banjo, autoharp, mountain dulcimer, fiddle, and...
set it to music, sang and recorded it, with Rita DoveRita DoveRita Frances Dove is an American poet and author. From 1993-1995 she served as Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress, a position now popularly known as "U.S. Poet Laureate"...
speaking one line, on his CD Mightier than the Sword (2006). - The storyteller-actress Awele Makeba wrote, directed and starred in a one-woman drama, Rage Is Not A 1-Day Thing!, in which Makeba relates the story of the 1955-56 Montgomery bus boycottMontgomery Bus BoycottThe Montgomery Bus Boycott was a political and social protest campaign that started in 1955 in Montgomery, Alabama, USA, intended to oppose the city's policy of racial segregation on its public transit system. Many important figures in the civil rights movement were involved in the boycott,...
through the eyes of Colvin following her arrest. - Phillip HoosePhillip HoosePhillip Hoose is an award-winning author of books, essays, stories, songs, and articles. Although he first wrote for adults, he turned his attention to children and young adults in part to keep up with his own daughters...
won the 2009 National Book AwardNational Book AwardThe National Book Awards are a set of American literary awards. Started in 1950, the Awards are presented annually to American authors for literature published in the current year. In 1989 the National Book Foundation, a nonprofit organization which now oversees and manages the National Book...
for Young People’s Literature for his biography, Claudette Colvin: Twice Toward Justice.
See also
- Montgomery Bus BoycottMontgomery Bus BoycottThe Montgomery Bus Boycott was a political and social protest campaign that started in 1955 in Montgomery, Alabama, USA, intended to oppose the city's policy of racial segregation on its public transit system. Many important figures in the civil rights movement were involved in the boycott,...
- Mary Louise SmithMary Louise SmithMary Louise Smith is a civil rights protester. She is famous as one of the pre-Rosa Parks women who refused to give up their seat in the "whites only" section of Montgomery, Alabama city buses. She was 18 years old when she was arrested.Born in Montgomery, Alabama, Smith has lived there since...
- Irene MorganIrene MorganIrene Morgan , later known as Irene Morgan Kirkaldy, was an important predecessor to Rosa Parks in the successful fight to overturn segregation laws in the United States...
- Rosa ParksRosa ParksRosa Louise McCauley Parks was an African-American civil rights activist, whom the U.S. Congress called "the first lady of civil rights", and "the mother of the freedom movement"....
- Martin Luther King Jr.
Further reading
- Phillip Hoose. Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR), Claudette Colvin, Twice Toward Justice. (2009). ISBN 0374313229.
- Taylor Branch. New York, Simon & Schuster Paperbacks, Parting The Waters - American in the King Years 1954-63. (1988). ISBN 0671687425.
External links
- She Had A Dream
- Daybreak of Freedom: The Montgomery Bus Boycott (Preface)
- Daybreak of Freedom: The Montgomery Bus Boycott (Excerpt)
- BROWDER v. GAYLE: The Women Before Rosa Parks. Tolerance.org
- "In The Shadow of Rosa Parks: 'Unsung Hero' Of Civil Rights Movement Speaks Out" by Vanessa de la Torre, The Cardinal Inquirer, January 20, 2005
- She Would Not Be Moved (Article) Guardian.
- An asterisk, not a star, of black history. Pulsejournal.com