Why did the Boycott of Montgomery's Buses Succeed? (Essay Sample)

Why did the boycott of Montgomery’s buses succeed?
Name
Course
Institution
Date
The 1955 incident where Mrs. Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on a city bus was the ignition of one of the famous historical boycotts. Rosa was incarcerated for the act, and the African Americans went to a city-wide bus boycott. The African Americans shun from using the city's bus services until their grievances were addressed. The boycott was led by Martin Luther King and other strong leaders such as Robinson, Irene West and Jonnie Carr. The boycott continued to 1956 and even after many failed negotiations with officials, the resolve end mistreatment of African Americans in the city buses was still strong. There are several reasons that made the boycott successful. The reasons that made the arrest of Rosa Parks a key historical event in the fight against racism are presented in this paper.
The success of the mass action is not based on the Rosa Parks incident entirely. It owes its success to a number of well-coordinated events, planning, leadership and historical contexts. The first reason the boycott was successful was planning. The African American community has planned for a boycott of the city buses long before the arrest of Rosa Parks. In 1954 Robinson wrote to the Mayor W. Gayle, he stated, "There has been talk from twenty-five or more local organizations of planning a city-wide boycott of busses”. Apart from that, there have been many meetings with city council officials to abolish laws that were discriminating against African Americans. The careful planning and coordination with various organizations made it possible to have an effective nonviolent boycott.[Jo Ann Robinson. Letter to the Mayor. (1954): n.p. http://historicalthinkingmatters.org/rosaparks/0/assignment/main/source/]
Another key aspect was strong leadership. The boycott was led by strong leaders who had great influence and charismatic following. One of the strong leaders who led the boycott was Sir. Martin Luther King. He was bold and vocal on matters of human and civil rights. There had been similar arrests to the arrest of Mrs. Parks, but those never sparked a huge revolution that led to the citywide boycott. For instance, before Mrs. Parks’s incident, Mary Smith was also incarcerated for refusing to give her seat. Even though Mary's and Rosa's incidents were identical, Rosa's arrest had a huge impact on the community. Rosa's arrest was effective in triggering the boycott because Rosa was an active civil rights activist. In Martin Luther King's Memoirs, he stated that Mrs. Parks had impeccable character and performed a historical role.
In addition to leadership and planning, the boycott was successful due to the cooperation and coordination among the African Americans. Once the boycott begun, the communities cooperated with each other to get alternative means of transport to work, outing, school and shopping among others. The neighbors bonded together and had to look for different ways to substitute the city buses. Some could take a ride on neighbor’s cars and they managed to get along with normal life activities with minimal interruption. The result was over ninety percent of the African American populace participated in the boycott. There were many attempts to sabotage the boycott and declare it illegal but since no violence was involved. However, the boycott continued and more people participated in it.
Moreover, African Americans formed about three-quarters of the population of bus users in the city. This was a huge percentage of the customers of the buses. The bus companies were losing a lot of revenue as a result of the boycott. Even though the bus companies were owned by the whites, they experienced challenges as a result of the boycott. The boycott a...