“You must never be fearful about what you are doing when it is right.” –Rosa Parks
The woman that uttered those words changed American history forever. In a single moment, our world shifted toward a better horizon for all Americans, one full of compassion, understanding and equality. While we are always working toward that goal, we know that we are far further on our journey because a brave woman was not fearful…and she was right.
Rosa Parks (February 4, 1913 – October 24, 2005) was an African American civil rights activist, whom the Congress has called “the first lady of civil rights” and “the mother of the freedom movement”. On December 1, 1955, in Montgomery, Alabama, Parks refused to obey
bus driver James F. Blake’s order that she give up her seat in the colored section to a white passenger, after the white section was filled. Parks was not the first person to resist bus segregation. Others had taken similar steps. NAACP organizers believed that Parks was the
best candidate for seeing through a court challenge after her arrest for civil disobedience in violating Alabama segregation laws.
Ms. Parks eventually decided to move to Detroit, where Parks’ brother resided. Parks became an administrative aide in the Detroit office of Congressman John Conyers Jr. in 1965, a post she held until her 1988 retirement. Her husband, brother and mother all died of cancer between 1977 and 1979. In 1987, she co-founded the Rosa and Raymond Parks Institute for Self-Development, to serve Detroit’s youth. In the years following her retirement, she traveled to lend her support to civil-rights events and causes. In 1999, Parks was awarded the Congressional Gold Medal. (Other recipients have included George Washington, Thomas Edison, Betty Ford and Mother Teresa.) When she died on October 24, 2005, she became the first woman in the nation’s history to lie in state at the U.S. Capitol. Recently, a statue of her was installed in the U.S. Capitol.
As young women today face challenges large and small, it is important that we hold up examples such as Rosa Parks. We need to shine a light on their strength and compassion, their perseverance in the face of adversity and their belief in themselves – for really, it is
this belief that allows women to rise up and reveal in their inherent power as women to change the world in both large and small ways.