A chara, - I would like to correct the account of the protest by Rosa Parks over segregated seating in a Montgomery bus in December 1st, 1955, given by Paul O'Connor (July 14th). Since, as he says, this was a historically significant event in the civil rights struggle in the US, it is important to get the facts of the protest right.
Rosa Parks did not demand the right to sit at the front of the bus with the whites, as it is commonly supposed. She was on her way home, and she was seated in the first row of seats allocated to blacks at the back of the bus. The bus was almost full. Then three whites boarded the bus. There were not enough seats left in the rows allocated to whites. So the driver asked Rosa Parks to give up her seat. Her feet, as she told interviewers years later, were tired and sore. So she refused to give up her seat, a seat which was rightfully hers (since she was sitting in a row of seats allocated to blacks). For this she was arrested.
As I think everyone will agree, the facts of the case make her protest even more justified than the usual summary. - Is mise, James Mahon, BA, MPhil,
C/o Dept of Philosophy, Duke University, Durham, NC, USA.