Bill Establishes Rosa Parks Day as a Federal Holiday on December 1

On December 1, 1955, a black woman named Rosa Parks refused to give up her Montgomery, Alabama bus seat for a white passenger. Her conviction and fine led to the Montgomery bus boycott, one of the pivotal events of the 1950s-60s civil rights movement.

There had been plans for such a boycott for some time, but Parks — a civil rights activist — provided the spark which actually made it happen. The boycott proved successful when the Supreme Court upheld the 2–1 Alabama district court decision Browder v. Gayle, which ruled that public transportation racial segregation was unconstitutional.

Parks, who died in 2005, would later receive both the Presidential Medal of Freedom (the highest award bestowed by a president) and the Congressional Gold Medal (the highest award bestowed by Congress).

Four states currently have Rosa Parks Day as an official state holiday. California and Missouri celebrate it on February 4, her birthday, while Ohio and Oregon celebrate it on December 1, the day of her arrest.

What the bill does

A new bill would create Rosa Parks Day as an official federal holiday.

If enacted, the holiday would fall on December 1, mere days after Thanksgiving — in some years supplanting the seven days between Christmas Day and New Year’s Day as the shortest distance between federal holidays. (Once every four years, including 2021, the federal holidays of MLK Day and Inauguration Day also occur mere days apart.)

The bill was introduced in the House on August 27 as H.R. 5111, by Rep. Jim Cooper (D-TN5). It does not appear to have another, more “official” title.

The one-time home of US civil rights legend Rosa Parks has gone on display inside the Royal Palace of Naples.

In 1955 Parks refused to give up her seat on a racially segregated bus in Alabama - a key moment in the US civil rights moment. She received death threats and moved north to Detroit, where she briefly lived in the white clapboard house with relatives. After a legal dispute in the US the house is now on display in Italy.

Before Rosa Parks

Few people know the story of Claudette Colvin: When she was 15, she refused to move to the back of the bus and give up her seat to a white person — nine months before Rosa Parks did the very same thing.

Most people know about Parks and the Montgomery, Ala., bus boycott that began in 1955, but few know that there were a number of women who refused to give up their seats on the same bus system. Most of the women were quietly fined, and no one heard much more.

Colvin was the first to really challenge the law.

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About Rosa Parks

Rosa Louise McCauley Parks was an African-American activist in the civil rights movement best known for her pivotal role in the Montgomery bus boycott. The United States Congress has honored her as "the first lady of civil rights" and "the mother of the freedom movement". 
Born: February 4, 1913, Tuskegee, AL / Died: October 24, 2005, Detroit, MI