THE POLICY-MAKING PROCESS AND CIVIL RIGHTS| 401the ruling. As white school boards and local governments resisted integration,
black leaders became convinced that the only way to change the laws was to get
the public, both black and white, to demand change.
The spark came in 1955 in Montgomery, Alabama, when Rosa Parks refused to
give up her seat on a bus to a white person, as she was required to do by law. When she
was arrested, local civil rights leaders organized a boycott of the bus company. Whites
in Montgomery tried to stop the boycott, including arresting and fi ning blacks who
arranged a car pooling system to get to work: people waiting for a ride were arrested
for loitering, and car pool drivers were arrested for lacking appropriate insurance
or having too many people in their car. Martin Luther King Jr., the group’s elected
leader, was subjected to harassment and violence—his house was fi rebombed, and he
was arrested several times. Finally a federal district court ruled that the segregation
policy was unconstitutional, and the Supreme Court upheld the ruling.NONVIOLENT PROTEST
In 1960, four black students in Greensboro, North Carolina, went to a segregated
lunch counter at a local Woolworth’s and asked to be served. They waited for an
hour without being served and had to leave when the store closed. When 20 stu-
dents returned the next day, national wire services picked up the story. Within
two weeks the sit-ins spread to 11 cities. In some cases the students encountered
violence; in others they were simply arrested. However, they continued to respond
with passive resistance, and succeeding waves of protesters replaced those who
were arrested. The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) wasFIGURE » 13.21962 19631964, July 2
President Johnson signs
the Civil Rights Act.1965, March 7
Six hundred voting rights marchers are attacked by police
with clubs and whips on the Edmund Pettus Bridge outside Selma,
Alabama. On March 21, about 3,200 marchers head out again on a
four-day march to Montgomery in support of voting rights.1963, September 15
Four little girls are killed when
a Baptist church in Birmingham,
Alabama, is bombed.1963, August 28
Martin Luther King Jr. delivers
his “I Have a Dream” speech at
the March on Washington.
1964, June 21
Three civil rights workers are
murdered outside Philadelphia,
Mississippi.1965, August 6
The federal Voting Rights Act
prohibits denying anyone the
vote on the basis of color or race.1963, April 16
Martin Luther King Jr. writes his
“Letter from the Birmingham Jail,”
defending nonviolent civil
disobedience against unjust laws.1964 1965 1966 1967 1968 19691965, February 21
Malcolm X is shot and killed
in New York.1968, April 4
Martin Luther King Jr. is slain
in Memphis, Tennessee.