What was the Tallahassee Bus Boycott Quizlet?
Florida The Tallahassee bus boycott was a citywide boycott in Tallahassee, Florida that sought to end racial segregation in the employment and seating arrangements of city buses.
What was the result of the bus boycott of 1956?
The boycott had an immediate impact on bus fare revenues. In November 1956, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that Alabama's segregated busing laws were unconstitutional. Florida Governor LeRoy Collins suspended all bus service in Tallahassee on January 1, 1957. On January 7, Tallahassee repealed the segregated seating ordinance. In Depth...
What was the Civil Rights Movement in Tallahassee?
Civil Rights Movement. in Florida. The Tallahassee Bus Boycott was a citywide boycott in Tallahassee, Florida that sought to end racial segregation in the employment and seating arrangements of city buses.
How did Rosa Parks start the Montgomery Bus Boycott?
On December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat to a white passenger, sparking the Montgomery bus boycott in Alabama. Five months later, two female students from FAMU sat down in the "whites only" section of a segregated bus.
What was the bus boycott in Tallahassee?
Black History Month: The Story of the Tallahassee Bus Boycott. In the decade after World War II, Tallahassee was a segregated town. This segregation included the seating arrangements of passengers on city buses: white people sat in the front, and Black people had to sit in the back.
What happened to the two women on the bus?
The two women took the only two vacant seats , which were in the whites-only section. Upon being told that they needed to move to the back to stand or leave without getting their fare returned, the two women refused. Since they refused to leave their seats, the police were called by the bus driver.
Did the bus boycott continue?
Once released on bond, the carpool drivers resumed their work which allowed the bus boycott to continue. Gradually, the Tallahassee Bus Boycott and its organizers began to see their objectives met. In month three of the boycott, their demand that African Americans could be hired as bus drivers was fulfilled.
When did the Civil Rights Movement start?
The Civil Rights Movement protesting such laws in Southern states began in 1954, and in 1955, Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on a Montgomery city bus. Five months later, two women took similar action in Tallahassee.
Did African Americans return to the Tallahassee bus?
At that time, the ICC declared that African-Americans would return to the Tallahassee buses – but only on a non-segregated basis. The City Commission responded by making all seats on the bus ‘by driver assignment only.’ Three students testing this seat-assignment ordinance were arrested. The process of integration on the buses took many more months, with African-Americans gradually returning to Tallahassee’s buses, and the seating ordinance being less rigorously enforced. The cases against Jakes and Patterson were remanded to FAMU and later dropped.
What was the success of the Tallahassee bus boycott?
The success of the Tallahassee bus boycott set a precedent for the desegregation of public transportation across Florida. Reverend C.K. Steele and Reverend H. McNeal Harris protesting segregated bus seating: Tallahassee (1956)
Who led the boycott of the city bus system?
Twenty-one members of the Inter-Civic Council were convicted on charges of operating an illegal transportation system for arranging the car pool without a franchise. Reverend C.K. Steele, pastor at the Bethel Baptist Church, led the boycott of the city-run bus system.
What happened to the whites only section of the bus?
Five months later, two female students from FAMU sat down in the "whites only" section of a segregated bus. When they refused to move to the "colored" section at the rear of the bus, the driver pulled into a service station and called the police.
What happened to the students in the 1956 Florida riot?
When they refused to move to the "colored" section at the rear of the bus, the driver pulled into a service station and called the police. Tallahassee police arrested Jakes and Patterson. The students were charged with "placing themselves in a position to incite a riot."
Why did African Americans boycott the bus system in Florida?
During the boycott, African-Americans in Tallahassee used car pools to get to and from work and for other necessary transportation. Twenty-one members of the Inter-Civic Council were convicted on charges of operating an illegal transportation system for arranging the car pool without a franchise.
Why did Cities Transit stop buses?
Cities Transit Company was forced to stop all buses for a month. They were losing too much money because of the boycott. Cities Transit tried to compromise. They offered to hire African-American drivers on the FAMU and Frenchtown routes. These routes ran through black neighborhoods in town.
When did the segregated seating ordinance end in Tallahassee?
On January 7, Tallahassee repealed the segregated seating ordinance.
When did the NAACP stop the bus boycott?
The Inter-Civic Council ended the boycott on December 22, 1956. On January 7, 1957, the City Commission repealed the bus-franchise segregation clause because of the United States Supreme Court ruling Browder v. Gayle (1956). In 1959, members of the Tallahassee InterCivic Council tested the success of the boycott by riding the newly integrated buses; they found that the integration was successful.
Who organized the Inter-Civic Council?
Reverend C. K. Steele organized a mass meeting that night. In the meeting, the Inter-Civic Council (ICC) was born. Its leaders held weekly meetings and the Council was highly active in civil rights-related activism. Three months into the boycott, the demand for the employment of black bus drivers was met. That still led to arrests of blacks who did not sit in the seats assigned to them. Efforts persisted in resisting bus segregation and enforcement of the ordinance became less strict when blacks again rode the buses.
What happened in the Jim Crow South?
In the Jim Crow South, not only were buses segregated, with white riders at the front and black ones in the back, if there were no free black seats black riders had to stand, even if there were free white seats. Furthermore, if there were more white riders than white seats, black riders had to surrender their seats. Wilhelmina Jakes and Carrie Patterson, two Florida A&M University students, boarded a city bus and sat in the only open seats, which were next to a white woman. The driver declared that the two women could not sit where they were sitting, and Jakes agreed to get off the bus if she received her bus fare in return. The driver would not return Jakes' bus fare and drove to a service station, where he then called the police, who subsequently arrested both women. Later that day, the students were bailed out by the Dean of Students.
What was the Tallahassee bus boycott?
The Tallahassee Bus Boycott received a boost when, in December 1956, the U.S. Supreme Court issued its ruling in a case that originated from the Montgomery Bus Boycott.
What was the significance of the boycott in Tallahassee?
Through courageous nonviolent protest, boycotters in Tallahassee achieved an important victory in the struggle for civil rights. The case of Tallahassee proved that Montgomery was not an anomaly and that a commitment to nonviolence could achieve significant results towards equality.
Why did the ICC suspend the Tallahassee bus?
On July 1, Cities Transit, the company that operated the Tallahassee bus franchise, announced that it was forced to suspend all routes because of the financial impact of the boycott.
What did the Supreme Court rule about Alabama busing?
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that Alabama's segregated busing laws were unconstitutional. Shortly thereafter, the court ordered Alabama to desegregate its public buses. ICC leaders in Tallahassee decided to test whether the U.S. Supreme Court decision would be enforced in Florida.
What happened to the two girls on the bus in 1956?
When they refused to move to the "colored" section at the rear of the bus, the driver pulled into a service station and called the police. Tallahassee police arrested Jakes and Patterson and charged them with "placing themselves in a position to incite a riot."
Who was the first African American to drive a bus?
Seth Gaines with his taxi in Tallahassee, ca. 1950. Gaines drove an independent taxi in the 1940s and 1950s. In response to demands from civil rights activists during the 1956-57 bus boycott, he became the first African American person to drive buses on a regular route for the Cities Transit Company in Tallahassee.
Why did Steele organize the Inter-Civic Council?
Reverend C.K. Steele orchestrated the formation of an organization known as the Inter-Civic Council (ICC) to manage the logistics behind the boycott. Steele and other leaders created the ICC because of unfounded negative publicity surrounding the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). The NAACP faced persistent attacks from segregationists who claimed that the organization was a front for communist activity. Despite the local origins of the boycott, segregationists seized upon the notion that outside agitators, meaning communists from the NAACP, intended to use the case of Jakes and Patterson to inflame racial tensions in Tallahassee.