Freedom ride
Encyclopedia
Freedom Riders were civil rights activists who rode interstate buses into the segregated
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...

 southern United States
Southern United States
The Southern United States—commonly referred to as the American South, Dixie, or simply the South—constitutes a large distinctive area in the southeastern and south-central United States...

 to test the United States Supreme Court
Supreme Court of the United States
The Supreme Court of the United States is the highest court in the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all state and federal courts, and original jurisdiction over a small range of cases...

 decisions Boynton v. Virginia
Boynton v. Virginia
Boynton v. Virginia, 364 U.S. 454 was a decision by the Supreme Court of the United States. The case overturned a judgment convicting an African American law student for trespassing by being in a restaurant in a bus terminal which was "whites only." It held that racial segregation in public...

(1960) and Morgan v. Virginia. The first Freedom Ride left Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....

, on May 4, 1961, and was scheduled to arrive in New Orleans on May 17.

Boynton outlawed racial segregation
Racial segregation
Racial segregation is the separation of humans into racial groups in daily life. It may apply to activities such as eating in a restaurant, drinking from a water fountain, using a public toilet, attending school, going to the movies, or in the rental or purchase of a home...

 in the restaurants and waiting rooms in terminals serving buses that crossed state lines. Five years prior to the Boynton ruling, the Interstate Commerce Commission
Interstate Commerce Commission
The Interstate Commerce Commission was a regulatory body in the United States created by the Interstate Commerce Act of 1887. The agency's original purpose was to regulate railroads to ensure fair rates, to eliminate rate discrimination, and to regulate other aspects of common carriers, including...

 had issued a ruling in Sarah Keys v. Carolina Coach Company
Sarah Keys v. Carolina Coach Company
Sarah Keys v. Carolina Coach Company, 64 MCC 769 is a landmark civil rights case in the United States in which the Interstate Commerce Commission, in response to a bus segregation complaint filed in 1953 by a Women's Army Corps private named Sarah Louise Keys, broke with its historic adherence to...

that had explicitly denounced the Plessy v. Ferguson
Plessy v. Ferguson
Plessy v. Ferguson, 163 U.S. 537 , is a landmark United States Supreme Court decision in the jurisprudence of the United States, upholding the constitutionality of state laws requiring racial segregation in private businesses , under the doctrine of "separate but equal".The decision was handed...

doctrine of separate but equal
Separate but equal
Separate but equal was a legal doctrine in United States constitutional law that justified systems of segregation. Under this doctrine, services, facilities and public accommodations were allowed to be separated by race, on the condition that the quality of each group's public facilities was to...

 in interstate bus travel, but the ICC failed to enforce its own ruling, and thus Jim Crow
Jim Crow laws
The Jim Crow laws were state and local laws in the United States enacted between 1876 and 1965. They mandated de jure racial segregation in all public facilities, with a supposedly "separate but equal" status for black Americans...

 travel laws remained in force throughout the South.

The Freedom Riders set out to challenge this status quo by riding various forms of public transportation in the South to challenge local laws or customs that enforced segregation. The Freedom Rides, and the violent reactions they provoked, bolstered the credibility of the American Civil Rights Movement and called national attention to the violent disregard for the law that was used to enforce segregation in the southern United States. Riders were arrested for trespassing, unlawful assembly
Unlawful assembly
Unlawful assembly is a legal term to describe a group of people with the mutual intent of deliberate disturbance of the peace. If the group are about to start the act of disturbance, it is termed a rout; if the disturbance is commenced, it is then termed a riot.- Section 144 :Section 144 is a...

, and violating state and local Jim Crow laws, along with other alleged offenses.

Most of the subsequent rides were sponsored by the Congress of Racial Equality
Congress of Racial Equality
The Congress of Racial Equality or CORE was a U.S. civil rights organization that originally played a pivotal role for African-Americans in the Civil Rights Movement...

 (CORE), while others belonged to the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee
Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee
The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee ' was one of the principal organizations of the American Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s. It emerged from a series of student meetings led by Ella Baker held at Shaw University in Raleigh, North Carolina in April 1960...

 (SNCC). The Freedom Rides followed on the heels of dramatic sit-in
Sit-in
A sit-in or sit-down is a form of protest that involves occupying seats or sitting down on the floor of an establishment.-Process:In a sit-in, protesters remain until they are evicted, usually by force, or arrested, or until their requests have been met...

s against segregated lunch counters conducted by students and youth throughout the South and boycotts beginning in 1960.

The Supreme Court's decision in Boynton granted interstate travelers the legal right to disregard local segregation ordinances
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...

 regarding interstate transportation facilities. Freedom Riders' rights were not enforced and their actions considered criminal throughout most of the South. For example, upon the Riders' arrival in Mississippi
Mississippi
Mississippi is a U.S. state located in the Southern United States. Jackson is the state capital and largest city. The name of the state derives from the Mississippi River, which flows along its western boundary, whose name comes from the Ojibwe word misi-ziibi...

, their journey ended with imprisonment. Similar arrests took place in other Southern cities.

Starting point

The Freedom Riders were inspired by the 1947 Journey of Reconciliation
Journey of Reconciliation
The Journey of Reconciliation was a form of non-violent direct action to challenge segregation laws on interstate buses in the Southern United States....

, led by civil rights activists Bayard Rustin
Bayard Rustin
Bayard Rustin was an American leader in social movements for civil rights, socialism, pacifism and non-violence, and gay rights.In the pacifist Fellowship of Reconciliation , Rustin practiced nonviolence...

 and George Houser
George Houser
George M. Houser is a Methodist minister, civil rights activist, and activist for the independence of African nations. He served on the staff of the Fellowship of Reconciliation . With James Farmer, and Bernice Fisher, he co-founded the Congress of Racial Equality in 1942 in Chicago...

. Like the Freedom Rides of 1961, the Journey of Reconciliation was intended to test an earlier Supreme Court ruling that banned racial discrimination in interstate travel. Rustin and a few of the other riders, chiefly members of Congress of Racial Equality
Congress of Racial Equality
The Congress of Racial Equality or CORE was a U.S. civil rights organization that originally played a pivotal role for African-Americans in the Civil Rights Movement...

 (CORE), were arrested and sentenced to serve on a chain gang
Chain gang
A chain gang is a group of prisoners chained together to perform menial or physically challenging work, such as mining or timber collecting, as a form of punishment. Such punishment might include building roads, digging ditches or chipping stone...

 in North Carolina
North Carolina
North Carolina is a state located in the southeastern United States. The state borders South Carolina and Georgia to the south, Tennessee to the west and Virginia to the north. North Carolina contains 100 counties. Its capital is Raleigh, and its largest city is Charlotte...

 for violating local Jim Crow laws
Jim Crow laws
The Jim Crow laws were state and local laws in the United States enacted between 1876 and 1965. They mandated de jure racial segregation in all public facilities, with a supposedly "separate but equal" status for black Americans...

 regarding segregated seating on public transportation.

The first Freedom Ride began on May 4, 1961. Led by CORE Director James Farmer
James L. Farmer, Jr.
James Leonard Farmer, Jr. was a civil rights activist and leader in the American Civil Rights Movement. He was the initiator and organizer of the 1961 Freedom Ride, which eventually led to the desegregation of inter-state transportation in the United States.In 1942, Farmer co-founded the Committee...

, 13 riders (seven black, six white, including Genevieve Hughes
Genevieve Hughes
Genevieve Hughes Houghton is known for as one of two women participants in the original 13-person Congress of Racial Equality Freedom Rider and a staff member of CORE. She grew up in the upper middle class suburb community of Chevy Chase in Washington. Hughes studied at Cornell and upon her...

, William E. Harbour
William E. Harbour
William E. Harbour was a freedom rider who participated in the civil rights movements. He was considered to be one of the eight children along with: John Lewis, William Barbee, Paul Brooks, Charles Butler, Allen Cason, Catherine Burks and Lucretia Collins...

, Ed Blankenheim
Ed Blankenheim
Edward Norval "Ed" Blankenheim was one of the original thirteen freedom riders who rode Greyhound buses in 1961 as part of the US civil rights movement, in an effort to desegregate transit systems.-Biography:...

) left Washington, D.C., on Greyhound
Greyhound Lines
Greyhound Lines, Inc., based in Dallas, Texas, is an intercity common carrier of passengers by bus serving over 3,700 destinations in the United States, Canada and Mexico, operating under the well-known logo of a leaping greyhound. It was founded in Hibbing, Minnesota, USA, in 1914 and...

 and Trailways
Trailways Transportation System
The Trailways Transportation System is an American group of 80 independent bus companies that have entered into a franchising agreement. The company is headquartered in Fairfax, Virginia.- History :...

 buses. Their plan was to ride through Virginia
Virginia
The Commonwealth of Virginia , is a U.S. state on the Atlantic Coast of the Southern United States. Virginia is nicknamed the "Old Dominion" and sometimes the "Mother of Presidents" after the eight U.S. presidents born there...

, the Carolinas, Georgia
Georgia (U.S. state)
Georgia is a state located in the southeastern United States. It was established in 1732, the last of the original Thirteen Colonies. The state is named after King George II of Great Britain. Georgia was the fourth state to ratify the United States Constitution, on January 2, 1788...

, 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...

, and Mississippi
Mississippi
Mississippi is a U.S. state located in the Southern United States. Jackson is the state capital and largest city. The name of the state derives from the Mississippi River, which flows along its western boundary, whose name comes from the Ojibwe word misi-ziibi...

, ending with a rally in New Orleans, Louisiana. Most of the Riders were from CORE, and two were from SNCC
Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee
The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee ' was one of the principal organizations of the American Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s. It emerged from a series of student meetings led by Ella Baker held at Shaw University in Raleigh, North Carolina in April 1960...

. Many were in their 40s and 50s.

The Freedom Riders' tactics for their journey were to have at least one interracial pair sitting in adjoining seats and at least one black Rider sitting up front (seats usually reserved for white customers only), while the rest would sit scattered throughout the rest of the bus. One rider would abide by the South's segregation ideals in order to avoid arrest and to contact CORE and arrange bail for those who were arrested.

Only minor trouble was encountered in Virginia and North Carolina, but John Lewis was attacked in Rock Hill, South Carolina
Rock Hill, South Carolina
Rock Hill is the largest city in York County, South Carolina and the fourth-largest city in the state. It is also the third-largest city of the Charlotte metropolitan area, behind Charlotte and Concord, North Carolina. The population was 71,459 as of . Rock Hill has undergone rapid growth between...

, and some of the Riders were arrested in Charlotte, North Carolina
Charlotte, North Carolina
Charlotte is the largest city in the U.S. state of North Carolina and the seat of Mecklenburg County. In 2010, Charlotte's population according to the US Census Bureau was 731,424, making it the 17th largest city in the United States based on population. The Charlotte metropolitan area had a 2009...

, Winnsboro, South Carolina
Winnsboro, South Carolina
Winnsboro is a town in Fairfield County, South Carolina, United States. The population was 3,599 at the 2000 census. It is the county seat of Fairfield County. Winnsboro is part of the Columbia, South Carolina Metropolitan Statistical Area....

, and Jackson, Mississippi
Jackson, Mississippi
Jackson is the capital and the most populous city of the US state of Mississippi. It is one of two county seats of Hinds County ,. The population of the city declined from 184,256 at the 2000 census to 173,514 at the 2010 census...

.

Mob violence in Anniston and Birmingham

Violence in Alabama was organized by Birmingham
Birmingham, Alabama
Birmingham is the largest city in Alabama. The city is the county seat of Jefferson County. According to the 2010 United States Census, Birmingham had a population of 212,237. The Birmingham-Hoover Metropolitan Area, in estimate by the U.S...

 Police Sergeant Tom Cook (an avid Ku Klux Klan
Ku Klux Klan
Ku Klux Klan, often abbreviated KKK and informally known as the Klan, is the name of three distinct past and present far-right organizations in the United States, which have advocated extremist reactionary currents such as white supremacy, white nationalism, and anti-immigration, historically...

 supporter) and police commissioner Bull Connor
Bull Connor
Theophilus Eugene "Bull" Connor was the Commissioner of Public Safety for the city of Birmingham, Alabama, during the American Civil Rights Movement...

. The pair made plans to bring the Ride to an end in Alabama. They assured Gary Thomas Rowe, an FBI informer and member of Eastview Klavern #13 (the most violent Klan group in Alabama), that the mob would have fifteen minutes to attack the Freedom Riders without any arrests being made. The final plan laid out an initial assault in Anniston with a final assault taking place in Birmingham.

On May 14, Mother's Day, in Anniston, Alabama
Anniston, Alabama
Anniston is a city in Calhoun County in the state of Alabama, United States.As of the 2000 census, the population of the city is 24,276. According to the 2005 U.S. Census estimates, the city had a population of 23,741...

, a mob of Ku Klux Klansmen, some still in church attire, attacked the first of the two buses (the Greyhound). They tried to leave, but a person in a car kept blocking the bus as it tried to leave. The KKK members then slashed its tires. They forced the crippled bus to stop several miles outside of town, and it was firebombed shortly afterwards by the mob chasing it in cars. As the bus burned, the mob held the doors shut, intent on burning the riders to death. Sources disagree, but either an exploding fuel tank
Fuel tank
A fuel tank is safe container for flammable fluids. Though any storage tank for fuel may be so called, the term is typically applied to part of an engine system in which the fuel is stored and propelled or released into an engine...

 or an undercover state investigator brandishing a revolver caused the mob to retreat, allowing the riders to escape the bus. The riders were viciously beaten as they fled the burning bus, and only warning shots fired into the air by highway patrolmen prevented the riders from being lynched
Lynching
Lynching is an extrajudicial execution carried out by a mob, often by hanging, but also by burning at the stake or shooting, in order to punish an alleged transgressor, or to intimidate, control, or otherwise manipulate a population of people. It is related to other means of social control that...

.

That night, the hospitalized Freedom Riders, most of whom had been refused care, were removed from the hospital at 2 AM, because the staff feared the mob outside the hospital. Local civil rights leader Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth
Fred Shuttlesworth
Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth, born Freddie Lee Robinson, was a U.S. civil rights activist who led the fight against segregation and other forms of racism as a minister in Birmingham, Alabama...

 organized several cars of blacks who defied the mob to rescue the injured Freedom Riders.

When the Trailways bus reached Anniston and pulled in at the terminal an hour after the Greyhound bus was burned, it was boarded by eight Klansmen, who proceeded to beat the Freedom Riders and afterwards left them semi-conscious in the back of the bus. When the bus arrived in Birmingham
Birmingham, Alabama
Birmingham is the largest city in Alabama. The city is the county seat of Jefferson County. According to the 2010 United States Census, Birmingham had a population of 212,237. The Birmingham-Hoover Metropolitan Area, in estimate by the U.S...

, it too was attacked by a mob of Ku Klux Klan members, aided and abetted by the police under the orders of Commissioner Bull Connor. As the riders exited the bus, they were mercilessly beaten by the mob with baseball bats, iron pipe
Pipe (material)
A pipe is a tubular section or hollow cylinder, usually but not necessarily of circular cross-section, used mainly to convey substances which can flow — liquids and gases , slurries, powders, masses of small solids...

s and bicycle
Bicycle
A bicycle, also known as a bike, pushbike or cycle, is a human-powered, pedal-driven, single-track vehicle, having two wheels attached to a frame, one behind the other. A person who rides a bicycle is called a cyclist, or bicyclist....

 chains. Among the Klansmen attacking the riders was FBI informant Gary Thomas Rowe. White Freedom Riders were particularly singled out for frenzied beatings; James Peck
James Peck (pacifist)
James Peck was an American activist who practiced nonviolent resistance during World War II and in the Civil Rights movement...

 required more than 50 stitches to the wounds in his head. Peck was taken to Carraway Methodist Medical Center
Carraway Methodist Medical Center
Carraway Methodist Medical Center was a medical facility in Birmingham, Alabama founded as Carraway Infirmary in 1908 by Dr. Charles N. Carraway. It was moved in 1917 to Birmingham's Norwood neighborhood. Its facilities were segregated according to skin color for much of its history and, in one...

, which refused to treat him; he was later treated at Jefferson Hillman Hospital
UAB Hospital
The University of Alabama Hospital , is a Level I trauma center hospital located in Birmingham, Alabama....

.

When reports of the bus burning and beatings reached US Attorney General Robert Kennedy, he urged restraint on the part of Freedom Riders and sent an assistant, John Seigenthaler
John Seigenthaler
John Lawrence Seigenthaler is an American journalist, writer, and political figure. He is known as a prominent defender of First Amendment rights....

, to Alabama to try to calm the situation.

Despite the violence they suffered already and the threat of more to come, the Freedom Riders desired to continue their journey. Kennedy had arranged an escort for the Riders in order to get them to Montgomery safely. However, radio reports told of the mob awaiting the riders at the bus terminal, as well as on the route to Montgomery. The Greyhound clerks also informed them that their drivers were refusing to drive any Freedom Riders anywhere. The Riders agreed that their efforts had already called great attention to the civil rights cause and that if they encountered any more delays, then they would miss the rally in New Orleans. Taking all this into consideration, the Riders decided that their best option was to abandon the rest of the Ride and fly directly to New Orleans from Birmingham. However, when they got on the plane the first time, they had to leave because of a bomb threat.

Nashville
Nashville, Tennessee
Nashville is the capital of the U.S. state of Tennessee and the county seat of Davidson County. It is located on the Cumberland River in Davidson County, in the north-central part of the state. The city is a center for the health care, publishing, banking and transportation industries, and is home...

 student and SNCC
Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee
The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee ' was one of the principal organizations of the American Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s. It emerged from a series of student meetings led by Ella Baker held at Shaw University in Raleigh, North Carolina in April 1960...

 leader Diane Nash
Diane Nash
Diane Judith Nash was a leader and strategist of the student wing of the 1960s Civil Rights Movement. A historian described her as: "…bright, focused, utterly fearless, with an unerring instinct for the correct tactical move at each increment of the crisis; as a leader, her instincts had been...

 felt that if violence were allowed to halt the Freedom Rides, the movement would be set back years. She pushed to find replacements to resume the ride, and, on May 17, a new set of riders, 10 students from Nashville, took a bus to Birmingham, where they were arrested by Bull Connor
Bull Connor
Theophilus Eugene "Bull" Connor was the Commissioner of Public Safety for the city of Birmingham, Alabama, during the American Civil Rights Movement...

 and jailed. These students kept their spirits up in jail by singing freedom songs
Civil Rights anthem
Civil Rights anthems is a relational concept to protest song, but one that is specifically linked to the African-American Civil Rights Movement. The songs were often sung during protests or marches related to the movement...

. Out of frustration, Connor drove them back up to the Tennessee
Tennessee
Tennessee is a U.S. state located in the Southeastern United States. It has a population of 6,346,105, making it the nation's 17th-largest state by population, and covers , making it the 36th-largest by total land area...

 line and dropped them off, stating, "I just couldn't stand their singing." They immediately returned to Birmingham.

Mob violence in Montgomery

The Freedom Riders who had answered SNCC's call from across the Eastern US joined John Lewis and Hank Thomas, the two young SNCC members of the original Ride who had remained in Birmingham. On May 19, they attempted to resume the ride, but, terrified by the howling mob surrounding the bus depot, the drivers refused. Harassed and besieged by the KKK mob, the riders waited all night for a bus.

Under intense public pressure from the Kennedy administration, Greyhound was forced to provide a driver, and Alabama Governor John Patterson
John Malcolm Patterson
John Malcolm Patterson is an American politician who was the 44th Governor of Alabama, from 1959 to 1963. Previously he served as State Attorney General ....

 reluctantly promised to protect the bus from KKK mobs and snipers on the road between Birmingham and 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...

 after direct intervention from Attorney General's office employee Byron White
Byron White
Byron Raymond "Whizzer" White won fame both as a football halfback and as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. Appointed to the court by President John F. Kennedy in 1962, he served until his retirement in 1993...

. On the morning of May 20, the Freedom Ride resumed, with the bus carrying the riders traveling toward Montgomery at 90 miles an hour protected by a contingent of the Alabama State Highway Patrol
Alabama Highway Patrol
The Alabama Highway Patrol is a division of the Alabama Department of Public Safety and is the highway patrol agency for Alabama, which has jurisdiction anywhere in the state. It was created to protect the lives, property and constitutional rights of people in Alabama.In 1971, the Alabama Highway...

.

However, when they reached the Montgomery city limits, the Highway Patrol abandoned them. At the bus station
Greyhound Bus Station (Montgomery, Alabama)
The Greyhound Bus Station at 210 South Court Street in Montgomery, Alabama, was the site of a violent attack on participants in the 1961 Freedom Ride during the Civil Rights Movement...

 on South Court Street, a white mob awaited and beat the Freedom Riders with baseball bats and iron pipes. The local police allowed the beatings to go on uninterrupted.

Again, white Freedom Riders were singled out for particularly brutal beatings. Reporters and news photographers were attacked first and their cameras destroyed, but there is a famous picture taken later of Jim Zwerg
James Zwerg
James Zwerg is an American former minister who became famous for his involvement with the freedom riders in the early 1960s.-Early life:...

 in the hospital, beaten and bruised. Justice Department official Seigenthaler was beaten and left unconscious lying in the street. Ambulances refused to take the wounded to the hospital. Local blacks rescued them, and a number of the Freedom Riders were hospitalized.

On the following night, Sunday, May 21, more than 1500 people packed Reverend Ralph Abernathy
Ralph Abernathy
Ralph David Abernathy, Sr. was a leader of the American Civil Rights Movement, a minister, and a close associate of Martin Luther King, Jr. in the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. Following King's assassination, Dr. Abernathy took up the leadership of the SCLC Poor People's Campaign and...

's First Baptist Church
First Baptist Church (Montgomery, Alabama)
The First Baptist Church on North Ripley Street in Montgomery, Alabama is a historic landmark. Founded in downtown Montgomery in 1867 as one of the first black churches in the area, it provided an alternative to the second-class treatment and discrimination African-Americans faced at the other...

 to honor the Freedom Riders. Among the speakers were Martin Luther King, Jr.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Martin Luther King, Jr. was an American clergyman, activist, and prominent leader in the African-American Civil Rights Movement. He is best known for being an iconic figure in the advancement of civil rights in the United States and around the world, using nonviolent methods following the...

, Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth, and James Farmer. Outside, a mob of more than 3,000 whites attacked blacks, with a handful of the United States Marshals Service
United States Marshals Service
The United States Marshals Service is a United States federal law enforcement agency within the United States Department of Justice . The office of U.S. Marshal is the oldest federal law enforcement office in the United States; it was created by the Judiciary Act of 1789...

 protecting the church from assault and fire bombs. With city and state police making no effort to restore order, President Kennedy
John F. Kennedy
John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy , often referred to by his initials JFK, was the 35th President of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963....

 threatened to commit federal troops, but Governor Patterson forestalled that by ordering the Alabama National Guard
Alabama National Guard
The Alabama National Guard comprises both Army and Air components. The Guard is part of the Alabama Military Department, seemingly overseen by the Adjutant General of Alabama....

 to disperse the mob.

Freedom Rider Bernard Lafayette has distinctively different remembrances of 21 May 1961 and if he is correct then the above description is a sanitized version of what actually occurred. Lafayette gave his version to the BBC's program 'Witness.' Suffice it to say that according to Lafayette the US Marshalls assigned to protect the Baptist Church were from Alabama and they did nothing to prevent the white mob from tossing bricks and rocks through the church's stained glass windows and setting off tear gas canisters by the broken windows in an effort to force people out of the church. In his speech to the rally inside the church, Martin Luther King blamed Governor Patterson for "...aiding and abetting the forces of violence..." and called for federal intervention, declaring that "...the federal government must not stand idly by while blood thirsty mobs beat nonviolent students with impunity." According to Lafayette, while the white mob was threatening the church, a large black mob had formed and armed themselves with baseball bats and other weapons. To prevent violence, Dr. King requested ten volunteers to escort him through the white mob. He requested that each volunteer be committed to non-violence even if personally attacked. With these ten men, King walked out the front door of the church followed by pairs of men, everyone dressed in formal attire. The white mob parted to let King and his escorts pass. King approached the forming black mob and pleaded with its leaders to disperse, promising them that the people in the church would not be harmed. Once the black mob dispersed, King and his escorts marched back through the white mob into the church. It was Dr. King who called the White House to request Robert Kennedy's assistance in obtaining Governor Patterson's use of Alabama's National Guard. The full story of what occurred at the First Baptist Church has never been fully presented as exemplified by the conflicting views of those present. The US Department of Justice web site provides some support for Lafayette's version of events; in any event, it provides additional details.

Into Mississippi

On the next day, Monday, May 22, more Freedom Riders from CORE and SNCC arrived in Montgomery to continue the rides and replace the wounded riders still in the hospital. Behind the scenes, the Kennedy administration arranged a deal with the governors of Alabama and Mississippi. The governors agreed that state police and the National Guard would protect the Riders from mob violence (thereby ending embarrassing media coverage of bloody lawlessness), and, in return, the federal government would not intervene to stop local police from arresting Freedom Riders for violating segregation ordinances when the buses arrived at the depots (even though such arrests violated the Supreme Court's Boynton decision).

On Wednesday morning, May 24, Freedom Riders boarded buses for the journey to Jackson, Mississippi
Jackson, Mississippi
Jackson is the capital and the most populous city of the US state of Mississippi. It is one of two county seats of Hinds County ,. The population of the city declined from 184,256 at the 2000 census to 173,514 at the 2010 census...

.
Surrounded by Highway Patrol and the National Guard, the buses arrived in Jackson without incident, and the riders were immediately arrested when they tried to use the white-only facilities at the depot.
In Montgomery, Freedom Riders including Yale University
Yale University
Yale University is a private, Ivy League university located in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701 in the Colony of Connecticut, the university is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States...

 chaplain William Sloane Coffin
William Sloane Coffin
William Sloane Coffin, Jr. was an American liberal Christian clergyman and long-time peace activist. He was ordained in the Presbyterian church and later received ministerial standing in the United Church of Christ....

, Gaylord Brewster Noyce, Shuttlesworth, Abernathy, Wyatt Tee Walker
Wyatt Tee Walker
Wyatt Tee Walker is a United States black pastor, national civil rights leader, theologian, and cultural historian. He was a Chief of Staff for Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and in 1958 became an early board member of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference . He helped found the Congress for...

, and others were similarly arrested for violating local segregation ordinances.

This established a pattern followed by subsequent Freedom Rides, most of which traveled to Jackson, where they were arrested and jailed. The strategy became one of trying to fill the jails. Once the Jackson and Hinds County
Hinds County, Mississippi
As of the census of 2000, there were 250,800 people, 91,030 households, and 62,355 families residing in the county. The population density was 288 people per square mile . There were 100,287 housing units at an average density of 115 per square mile...

 jails were filled to overflowing, Freedom Riders were transferred to the infamous Mississippi State Penitentiary
Mississippi State Penitentiary
Mississippi State Penitentiary , also known as Parchman Farm, is the oldest prison and the only maximum security prison for men in the state of Mississippi, USA....

 ("Parchman Farm"). Their abusive treatment included placement in the Maximum Security Unit (Death Row
Death row
Death row signifies the place, often a section of a prison, that houses individuals awaiting execution. The term is also used figuratively to describe the state of awaiting execution , even in places where no special facility or separate unit for condemned inmates exists.After individuals are found...

), issuance of only underwear, no exercise, no mail, and, when Freedom Riders refused to stop singing freedom songs, they took away mattresses, sheets, and toothbrushes and removed the screens from the windows. When the cell block became filled with mosquito
Mosquito
Mosquitoes are members of a family of nematocerid flies: the Culicidae . The word Mosquito is from the Spanish and Portuguese for little fly...

es, they hosed everyone down with DDT
DDT
DDT is one of the most well-known synthetic insecticides. It is a chemical with a long, unique, and controversial history....

 at 2 AM.

Notable Freedom Riders

  • Stokely Carmichael
    Stokely Carmichael
    Kwame Ture , also known as Stokely Carmichael, was a Trinidadian-American black activist active in the 1960s American Civil Rights Movement. He rose to prominence first as a leader of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and later as the "Honorary Prime Minister" of the Black Panther Party...

  • James L. Farmer, Jr.
    James L. Farmer, Jr.
    James Leonard Farmer, Jr. was a civil rights activist and leader in the American Civil Rights Movement. He was the initiator and organizer of the 1961 Freedom Ride, which eventually led to the desegregation of inter-state transportation in the United States.In 1942, Farmer co-founded the Committee...

  • US Representative Bob Filner (D-CA)
    Bob Filner
    Robert Earl Filner is the U.S. Representative for , and previously the 50th, serving since 1993, and Chairman of the House Committee on Veterans' Affairs since 2007. He is a member of the Democratic Party...

  • US Representative John Lewis (D-GA)
  • William Mahoney
  • Wally Nelson
    Wally Nelson
    Wallace Floyd Nelson was an American civil rights activist and war tax resister.Wally Nelson died at the age of 93 after more than a half-century of war tax resistance and activism...

  • James Peck
    James Peck (pacifist)
    James Peck was an American activist who practiced nonviolent resistance during World War II and in the Civil Rights movement...

  • Ruby Doris Smith-Robinson
    Ruby Doris Smith-Robinson
    Ruby Doris Smith-Robinson worked with the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee from its earliest days in 1960 until her death in October 1967. She served the organization as an activist in the field and as an administrator in the Atlanta central office. She eventually succeeded James Forman...

  • Diane Nash
    Diane Nash
    Diane Judith Nash was a leader and strategist of the student wing of the 1960s Civil Rights Movement. A historian described her as: "…bright, focused, utterly fearless, with an unerring instinct for the correct tactical move at each increment of the crisis; as a leader, her instincts had been...

  • James Zwerg
    James Zwerg
    James Zwerg is an American former minister who became famous for his involvement with the freedom riders in the early 1960s.-Early life:...

  • Carol Ruth Silver
    Carol Ruth Silver
    Carol Ruth Silver is an American lawyer and former politician. She was a Freedom Rider arrested and incarcerated for 40 days in Jackson, Mississippi,...

  • Rev. James L. Bevel
  • Rev. Bernard Lafayette
    Bernard Lafayette
    Bernard Lafayette Jr. is a longtime civil rights activist and organizer, who was a leader in the 1960s Civil Rights Movement...

  • Rev. Malcolm Boyd
    Malcolm Boyd
    Malcolm Boyd is an American Episcopal Priest and author.-Biography:In the 1960s Boyd became known as “The Espresso Priest” for his religiously-themed poetry-reading sessions at the “Hungry i” nightclub in San Francisco. Boyd went on to become a prominent white clergyman in the American Civil...

  • William E. Harbour
    William E. Harbour
    William E. Harbour was a freedom rider who participated in the civil rights movements. He was considered to be one of the eight children along with: John Lewis, William Barbee, Paul Brooks, Charles Butler, Allen Cason, Catherine Burks and Lucretia Collins...

  • Charles Neblett

Members of CORE Freedom Ride May 4-17, 1961

  • Fraces Bergman
  • Walter Bergmman
  • Albert Bigelow
  • Ed Blankenheim
    Ed Blankenheim
    Edward Norval "Ed" Blankenheim was one of the original thirteen freedom riders who rode Greyhound buses in 1961 as part of the US civil rights movement, in an effort to desegregate transit systems.-Biography:...

  • Benjamin Elton Cox
  • James Farmer
  • Robert G. Griffin
  • Herman Harris
  • Genevieve Hughes
    Genevieve Hughes
    Genevieve Hughes Houghton is known for as one of two women participants in the original 13-person Congress of Racial Equality Freedom Rider and a staff member of CORE. She grew up in the upper middle class suburb community of Chevy Chase in Washington. Hughes studied at Cornell and upon her...

  • John Lewis
  • Jimmy McDonald
  • Ivor Moore
  • Mae Frances Moultrie
  • James Peck
  • Joseph Perkins
  • Charles Person
  • Isaac ("Ike") Reynolds
  • Henry ("Hank") Thomas

Impact

The Kennedys called for a "cooling off period" and condemned the Rides as unpatriotic because they embarrassed the nation on the world stage at the height of the cold war. Attorney General
Attorney General
In most common law jurisdictions, the attorney general, or attorney-general, is the main legal advisor to the government, and in some jurisdictions he or she may also have executive responsibility for law enforcement or responsibility for public prosecutions.The term is used to refer to any person...

 Robert Kennedy—the chief law-enforcement officer of the land—was quoted as saying that he "does not feel that the Department of Justice
United States Department of Justice
The United States Department of Justice , is the United States federal executive department responsible for the enforcement of the law and administration of justice, equivalent to the justice or interior ministries of other countries.The Department is led by the Attorney General, who is nominated...

 can side with one group or the other in disputes over Constitutional rights." His comment angered Civil Rights supporters who considered the Justice Department duty-bound to enforce Supreme Court rulings and defend citizens exercising their Constitutional rights from mob violence.

Defying the Kennedys, CORE, SNCC, and SCLC
Southern Christian Leadership Conference
The Southern Christian Leadership Conference is an African-American civil rights organization. SCLC was closely associated with its first president, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr...

 rejected any "cooling off period". They formed a Freedom Riders Coordinating Committee to keep the Rides rolling through June, July, August, and September. During those months, more than 60 different Freedom Rides criss-crossed the South, most of them converging on Jackson, where every Rider was arrested, more than 300 in total, plus an unknown number of riders arrested in other Southern towns. It is estimated that almost 450 riders participated in one or more Freedom Rides. About 75% were male, and the same percentage were under the age of 30, mostly evenly divided between black and white.

During the summer of 1961, Freedom Riders also campaigned against other forms of racial discrimination. They sat together in segregated restaurants, lunch counters and hotels. This was especially effective when it targeted large companies, which, fearing boycotts in the North, began to desegregate their businesses.

In mid-June, a group of Freedom Riders had scheduled to end their ride in Tallahassee, Florida
Tallahassee, Florida
Tallahassee is the capital of the U.S. state of Florida. It is the county seat and only incorporated municipality in Leon County, and is the 128th largest city in the United States. Tallahassee became the capital of Florida, then the Florida Territory, in 1824. In 2010, the population recorded by...

, with plans to fly home from the Tallahassee airport. They were provided a police escort to the airport from the city's bus facilities. At the airport, they decided to eat at a restaurant that was signed "For Whites Only". The owners decided to close rather than serve the Freedom Riders. Although the restaurant was privately owned, it was leased from the county government. Canceling their plane reservations, the Riders decided to wait until the restaurant re-opened so they could be served. They waited until 11:00 pm that night and returned the following day. During this time, hostile crowds gathered, threatening violence. On June 16, 1961, the Freedom Riders were arrested in Tallahassee for unlawful assembly. That arrest became known as Dresner v. City of Tallahassee, which made its way to the US Supreme Court in 1963, in which a hearing was refused based on technical reasons.

On May 29, 1961, bowing to the demands of the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Martin Luther King, Jr. was an American clergyman, activist, and prominent leader in the African-American Civil Rights Movement. He is best known for being an iconic figure in the advancement of civil rights in the United States and around the world, using nonviolent methods following the...

 and other leaders, as well as international outrage, Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy
Robert F. Kennedy
Robert Francis "Bobby" Kennedy , also referred to by his initials RFK, was an American politician, a Democratic senator from New York, and a noted civil rights activist. An icon of modern American liberalism and member of the Kennedy family, he was a younger brother of President John F...

, in an unorthodox legal maneuver, sent a petition to the Interstate Commerce Commission
Interstate Commerce Commission
The Interstate Commerce Commission was a regulatory body in the United States created by the Interstate Commerce Act of 1887. The agency's original purpose was to regulate railroads to ensure fair rates, to eliminate rate discrimination, and to regulate other aspects of common carriers, including...

 (ICC) to comply with a bus-desegregation ruling it had issued in November, 1955, Sarah Keys v. Carolina Coach Company
Sarah Keys v. Carolina Coach Company
Sarah Keys v. Carolina Coach Company, 64 MCC 769 is a landmark civil rights case in the United States in which the Interstate Commerce Commission, in response to a bus segregation complaint filed in 1953 by a Women's Army Corps private named Sarah Louise Keys, broke with its historic adherence to...

. That ruling had explicitly repudiated separate but equal
Separate but equal
Separate but equal was a legal doctrine in United States constitutional law that justified systems of segregation. Under this doctrine, services, facilities and public accommodations were allowed to be separated by race, on the condition that the quality of each group's public facilities was to...

 in the realm of interstate bus travel, but, under the chairmanship of South Carolina
South Carolina
South Carolina is a state in the Deep South of the United States that borders Georgia to the south, North Carolina to the north, and the Atlantic Ocean to the east. Originally part of the Province of Carolina, the Province of South Carolina was one of the 13 colonies that declared independence...

 Democrat
Democratic Party (United States)
The Democratic Party is one of two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Republican Party. The party's socially liberal and progressive platform is largely considered center-left in the U.S. political spectrum. The party has the lengthiest record of continuous...

 J. Monroe Johnson, the ICC had failed to enforce its own ruling.

In September 1961, bowing to pressure from the Attorney General and the civil rights
Civil rights
Civil and political rights are a class of rights that protect individuals' freedom from unwarranted infringement by governments and private organizations, and ensure one's ability to participate in the civil and political life of the state without discrimination or repression.Civil rights include...

 movement, the ICC issued the necessary orders, and the new policies went into effect on November 1, 1961, a full six years after the ruling in Sarah Keys v. Carolina Coach Company
Sarah Keys v. Carolina Coach Company
Sarah Keys v. Carolina Coach Company, 64 MCC 769 is a landmark civil rights case in the United States in which the Interstate Commerce Commission, in response to a bus segregation complaint filed in 1953 by a Women's Army Corps private named Sarah Louise Keys, broke with its historic adherence to...

. After the new ICC rule took effect, passengers were permitted to sit wherever they pleased on interstate buses and trains, "white" and "colored" signs came down in the terminals, separate drinking fountains, toilets, and waiting rooms were consolidated, and the lunch counters began serving people regardless of race.

The Freedom Rides sent shock waves through American society. People worried that the Rides were evoking widespread social disorder and racial divergence. This attitude was supported and strengthened in many communities by the press. The press in white communities condemned the direct action approach CORE was taking, while the national press negatively portrayed the Riders.

Yet, the Freedom Rides established great credibility with blacks and whites throughout the United States, who became motivated to engage in direct action for civil rights. Perhaps most significantly, Freedom Riders, facing such danger on their behalf, impressed blacks living in rural
Rural
Rural areas or the country or countryside are areas that are not urbanized, though when large areas are described, country towns and smaller cities will be included. They have a low population density, and typically much of the land is devoted to agriculture...

 areas throughout the South who later formed the backbone of the civil rights movement. This credibility inspired many subsequent civil rights campaigns, including voter registration, freedom schools, and the black power movement
Black Power
Black Power is a political slogan and a name for various associated ideologies. It is used in the movement among people of Black African descent throughout the world, though primarily by African Americans in the United States...

.

Commemorations

In celebration of the 50th anniversary of the Freedom Rides, Oprah invited all living Freedom Riders to join her for a special program celebrating their legacy. The episode aired on May 4, 2011.

In conjunction with the taping of the Oprah Show, a Conference/Reunion of Freedom Riders was held in Chicago April 28 — May 2, 2011. See Traveling Down Freedom's Main Line for program, participant bios, and other information.

On May 16, 2011 PBS aired a documentary called Freedom Riders.

On May 19-21, 2011, the Freedom Rides were commemorated in Montgomery Alabama at the new Freedom Ride museum in the old Greyhound Bus terminal where some of the violence took place. See Freedom Rides Museum for additional information.

On May 22-26, 2011, the arrival of the Freedom Rides in Jackson, Mississippi were commemorated with a 50th Anniversary Reunion and Conference in Jackson. See Mississippi Freedom 50th: Return of the Freedom Riders for additional information.

See also

  • "He Was My Brother", a Simon & Garfunkel song about the Freedom Riders
  • Reverse freedom rides
    Reverse freedom rides
    Reverse freedom rides were attempts in 1962 by Southern segregationists to send African Americans from cities such as New Orleans to New York City, Chicago, and Cleveland by bus. They were given free bus tickets, and were told that there were high paying jobs waiting for them. They were given...


External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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