We’ve all heard of Rosa Parks. She’s the Black woman who refused to give up her but seat for a white woman. She’s credited for starting the Civil Rights Movement which fought for Black rights in the USA.
But have you heard of Claudette Colvin? She did exactly the same thing as Rosa Parks, 9 months earlier. How come history left her out?
Let’s Set the Scene
We’re in 1950s America. Specifically, 1955. The nation is afflicted with institutional racism, a constant throughout US history. The idea that Black people are genetically inferior to others is taken for granted. The South is particularly bad, with Jim Crow laws enforcing racial segregation.
But the US Supreme Court made a decision last year which found educational segregation unconstitutional. So civil rights talk is stirring, and it’s about ready to kick off.
What Did Claudette Colvin Do?
Claudette Colvin, a 15 year old Black girl, has been learning about Black history and the US Constitution in school. She’s an A grade student, a bookworm. So she knows her stuff.
She’s also angry. Her classmate, Jeremiah Reeves, is facing horrendous mistreatment because he’s a Black guy who got with a white woman. (He’ll soon be sentenced to death for his crime.) Racial segregation is normal and accepted. Everywhere she looks, Black people are facing injustices.
2 March, 1955. Claudette’s on a segregated bus in Montgomery, Alabama. She gets told to give up her seat, solely because she is Black and the person getting on is white. She refuses.
All she can think is, this racism isn’t fair. It’s not constitutional, and it’s not right. She explains, ‘I wanted the young African-American girls also on the bus to know that they had a right to be there, because they had paid their fare just like the white passengers. […] We shouldn’t be asked to get up for the white people just because they are white. I just wanted them to know the Constitution didn’t say that.’
I wanted the young African-American girls also on the bus to know that they had a right to be there
-Claudette Colvin
A policeman is called, and Claudette is arrested for refusing to get up. She’s dragged off the bus and chucked in jail. She goes to trial and is found guilty of breaking the law.
9 months later, in the same town, Rosa Parks does the same thing.
Why Didn’t Claudette’s Arrest Start a Civil Rights Movement?
Claudette’s arrest did get attention. Rumours of what had happened travelled fast, and the Black community rallied together. Black activists called meetings to discuss the event. Letters of support for Claudette came from as far as Oregon and California. Rosa Parks, a feminist and Black activist, invited her to NAACP youth meetings, and considered getting her to raise money with speeches around town.
But just as the case was beginning to gain attention, Claudette fell pregnant. It was a traumatic time in her life. ‘Nowadays, you’d call it statutory rape, but back then it was just the kind of thing that happened,’ she said.
A 15 year old single mother – this was not the ideal face of the movement. Everyone knew that. Parks said, ‘If the white press got ahold of that information, they would have had a field day. They’d call her a bad girl, and her case wouldn’t have a chance.’
That wasn’t the only thing working against Claudette. Even before pregnancy, she wasn’t the most palatable Black person for white middle class America. She was poor and dark-skinned. Colourism and classism were prevalent back then, too. Civil rights activist Gwen Patton explains why Claudette wasn’t chosen to be a prominent figure in the movement: ‘It was partly because of her colour and because she was from the working poor. She lived in a little shack.’
Claudette agrees with these reasons. Asked why the civil rights movement didn’t use her more, she said, ‘Mrs Parks was the desirable image.’ Even now, she thinks ‘if I had lived in a different place or been light-skinned, it would have made a difference’.
If I had lived in a different place or been light-skinned, it would have made a difference.
-Claudette Colvin
So Claudette was a tricky sell to begin with. When she became pregnant, that was the nail in the coffin. She was completely dropped from the movement, and activists went back to waiting for a better face of the movement to get arrested on a bus.
The Story of Rosa Parks
On 1 December 1955, Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on a bus for a white person. It wasn’t a spontaneous decision, like it was for Claudette. This was the first move planned by the NAACP to start a bus boycott that lasted a full year.
Her protest was carefully calculated to spark a movement. The day after she was thrown off the bus, activists were already handing out leaflets about the event, calling for a boycott. Martin Luther King was chosen to lead the boycott, and the rest is history.
Parks didn’t resist arrest. When told by the police to get off, she complied. It wasn’t because she was an advocate of only peaceful protest like Martin Luther King – she wasn’t. She was a supporter of Malcom X, and believed sometimes violence is justified. But she knew from Claudette’s case, which she had followed closely, that cooperating would help her legal challenge.
Claudette hadn’t been found guilty of breaking segregation laws. She had been charged with disturbing the peace, violating the segregation law, and assaulting a police officer. But the prosecutors dropped the other two charges and got her on assaulting a police officer, when she was dragged off the bus.
Jeanne Theoharis, author of The Rebellious Life of Mrs. Rosa Parks, has argued that Parks learned from those mistakes. She complied with police officers, so all they could charge her with was violating bus segregation laws. And that’s what the legal challenge in the US Supreme Court would be. That’s what led to the ruling on 5 June, 1956, which stated racially segregated buses were unconstitutional.
Was Rosa Parks the Perfect Image?
Rosa Parks was chosen to be the face of the Montgomery bus boycotts, not Claudette Colvin. So what made her different?
She was a married woman, for starters. She was light-skinned. She was middle class. E.D. Nixon, civil rights activist and former head of Montgomery’s NAACP chapter, painted a picture of Parks as ‘morally clean’. He said, ‘If there was ever a person we would’ve been able to [use to] break the situation that existed on the Montgomery city line, Rosa L Parks was the woman to use’.
The way Martin Luther King talked, it was as if fate wanted Rosa Parks to be the image of the bus boycotts. He told his Church congregation, ‘I’m happy it happened to a person like Mrs Parks. For nobody can doubt the boundless outreach of her integrity. Nobody can doubt the height of her character, nobody can doubt the depth of her Christian commitment and devotion to the teachings of Jesus.’
Parks wasn’t completely perfect though. She was an active member of the NAACP, which was a pretty controversial organisation back then. It was banned in Alabama less than a year after Parks began the bus boycotts, on the grounds that it was Communist. She was a radical activist, and a feminist. She had, in her own words, a ‘life history of being rebellious’. Parks was not the innocent, tired old lady that she’s sometimes remembered as. She was fiery too.
I had almost a life history of being rebellious against being mistreated against my colour
-Rosa Parks
So maybe she wasn’t the perfect image of a victim of racism. She wouldn’t be able to get the whole of the US on board (there was a lot of backlash against the Civil Rights Movement). But she would certainly have a better image than Claudette. And activists knew that at the time. So Rosa Parks was chosen, and Claudette Colvin was forgotten.
Were Activists Right to Drop Claudette Colvin?
Claudette Colvin was dropped by the Civil Rights Movement because activists knew they needed someone more ‘acceptable’ to make a difference. White people needed to get on board with this whole Black rights thing. And that meant white people had to be pleased.
At the same time, Black would people have to be on board with the movement too. Many were religious enough to have been horrified by Claudette’s single mother status. Her darker skin also would have made her seem inferior to other choices (colourism was a thing even within the Black community).
All these factors meant Rosa Parks was a more acceptable choice than Claudette Colvin. But does this mean it was right to choose her?
Was erasing Claudette from the narrative and applauding Rosa instead the right choice? Did this perpetuate the sexism, classism and colourism that made Claudette less acceptable to begin with?
Yes, almost certainly. But if they had picked Claudette, the movement may not have been as successful as it was. They needed as much support as they could get. For that, they needed a figurehead who would be acceptable to society. You’ve got to play the game. Even if the game is sexist, colourist, classist – just downright unfair. If you want to make change in this world, you have to make these calculations, and make a compromise.
For the record, Claudette agreed. She said, ‘They picked the right person. They needed someone who could bring together all the classes. […] They wanted someone who would shake hands and go to banquets. They wanted someone they could control…’
They picked the right person.
-Claudette Colvin
Protests are not all successful. Just because you’re right, doesn’t mean you’ll win the battle. To make change, you have to make compromises. Even if all your principles are telling you to be as radical as possible, it’s not always the best solution. If you want to persuade enough people to make a difference, you’ve got to make some sacrifices with how you’re delivering the message. You’ve got to make your agenda palatable for those you’re trying to persuade. Those are the compromises a protest movement must make.
Rooting Through History 
Great article – I have read M K Gandhi had to go through similar choices – and so did many others who have brought about change – not straight forward as some narratives have us believe – on you tube I have heard Sadhguru say – if you want to bring about change – you have to create a movement – for the number to tip the scales – a critical mass so to speak – just saying
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Thank you! Yeah definitely exactly, creating a movement like that usually involves strategy, like you say if you want to effect change you have to make choices like that. Thanks for reading!
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