Dr. King’s first successful protest was the Montgomery Bus Boycott. A black woman named Rosa Parks decided not to give up her seat on the bus when a white man demanded it. She was arrested for simply saying “no.” In response, the black community of Montgomery refused to ride the bus for an entire year. Thanks to this boycott, the government of Montgomery lost a lot of money, the world took notice of the injustice of segregation laws, and the United States Supreme Court declared that it was illegal to segregate public transportation all over the country.
The success of the boycott in Montgomery proved that it was possible to change unjust laws and promote equality without the use of violence. Urged on by this success, Dr. King and the other civil rights leaders decided to continue the fight against segregation in other cities. The city of Birmingham, Alabama, was the largest industrial city in the south, and it was highly segregated. Black individuals could not eat at the same lunch counters, pray in the same churches, or read at the same libraries as white individuals. When people argued against segregation, the segregationists fought back with violence and hate.
In Birmingham, Dr. King and his friends boycotted segregated businesses, much like in Montgomery. In addition to boycotts, Dr. King also used sit-ins as a form of non-violent protest. Boycotts entailed people refusing to enter buses and other places that had unfair segregation laws. Sit-ins consisted of black and white people calmly entering white-designated businesses, such as libraries and lunch counters, where they would sit for hours and hours to draw attention to their cause. This action was against the law, but it was also non-violent. The police responded by arresting hundreds of protesters, sometimes through violent means. Even when faced with violence, the protesters would go to jail without putting up a fight. Newspapers all over America reported on the overwhelming peaceful and civil tone of these protests.
Since the protesters remained nonviolent and did not fight when the police took them away, these sit-ins painted a clear picture of segregation to the whole country. This picture showed the real people whose rights were being denied and showed a city torn apart by segregation.
In addition to the sit-ins, Dr. King filled the streets of Birmingham with marches and other protests, and told the government of Birmingham that the protests would continue until the city agreed to desegregate. The government did not want to give in to the protester’s demands, so it declared the marches illegal. Dr. King and his organization, the Southern Christian Leadership Council (SCLC) decided to disobey and continued to march and fight the unjust segregation laws. They hoped that the nonviolent protests in Birmingham would draw so much attention to injustice and cost the city so much money that President John F. Kennedy himself would pass a law to end segregation across the country.
People who continued to march were arrested, but they continued to be arrested peacefully. During one march, The New York Times reported that protesters “voluntarily stepped forward and lined up to enter … waiting police vans.”[1] Dr. King agreed that it was worth going to jail for what he believed in. On April 12, 1963, Dr. King led a march down the streets of Birmingham. Detectives grabbed Dr. King off the street and arrested him in front of a crowd of supporters.[2] During Dr. King’s incarceration he was denied his right to consult with his attorney, was not permitted to call his wife, and was held for many days. A group of ministers criticized Dr. King for breaking the law and causing so much trouble. In response to this criticism, he wrote his famous “Letter from Birmingham Jail” on scraps of paper and the margins of newspapers. In his letter, Dr. King replied that it was his duty to fight against unjust laws. He wrote, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”
After awhile, the nonviolent protests began to work just as planned. White businesses started to lose a lot of money, and the city gained bad publicity due to the media’s coverage of the marches, sit-ins, and other protests. And, just as Dr. King hoped, President John F. Kennedy expressed his support for the protesters in Birmingham. In a news conference on May 8, 1963, the President said, “all bars to equal opportunity and treatment [must] be removed as promptly as possible.” He called the demands of the black community “justifiable needs” and pledged his support for the protesters in Birmingham.[3]
By the middle of May, there were many steps towards desegregation in Birmingham. The city elected a new mayor, and the businesses of Birmingham agreed to negotiate with the protesters. These business leaders agreed to desegregate the stores and lunch counters. They also agreed not to discriminate based on race when they hired new employees.
Not everyone in Birmingham accepted this compromise; the former mayor called the business leaders “a bunch of quisling, gutless traitors,”[4] and other leaders refused to make these agreements into a city law. Some people were so upset by these negotiations that they responded with violence. Dr. King’s brother’s house was bombed, and there were also bombs near the hotel where Dr. King was staying and at a church in Birmingham. This struggle, clearly, was not over. It culminated on August 28, 1963 with the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom.
Nonviolent Protest and Unjust Laws
| “One who breaks an unjust law must do so openly, lovingly, and with a willingness to accept the penalty. I submit that an individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him is unjust and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the highest respect for law.”
- Dr. King, Letter from Birmingham Jail |
Go to the “Dr. King’s Words” section of this website to read Dr. King’s entire Letter from Birmingham Jail. Consider Dr. King’s argument about fighting injustice. Do you think Dr. King’s definition of injustice comes from a moral belief, an intellectual decision based on his studies of America’s founding documents, or some combination of the two?
Think about what Dr. King says about breaking an unjust law lovingly. In his day, this entailed boycotts, sit-ins, and marches where he was willing to be arrested. What do you think Dr. King would do to fight injustice today? What issues matter most to you? How would you fight for what matters most to you while still respecting the law.
[1] Foster Hailey, “Dr. King Arrested at Birmingham,” New York Times, April 13, 1963.
[2] Ibid.
[3] “Transcript of the President’s News Conference on Domestic and Foreign Affairs,” New York Times, May 9, 1963.
[4] “Sanity in Birmingham,” New York Times, May 11, 1963.
