Rosa Parks boarded a bus in Montgomery, Alabama. It was December 1, 1955. The city’s buses were . Unfair laws made Black passengers ride at the back. But on this day, Parks took a stand — by sitting. When the front of the bus filled up, the driver told Parks to give her seat to a white passenger. Parks said no.
Police arrested Parks for this act. But her bravery helped spark other protests. One was the Montgomery bus when people stopped riding the city’s buses. Parks was also part of the U.S. civil rights movement. The movement fought to end segregation.
Now, 68 years later, people still remember Parks. Museums and textbooks tell her story. And there are statues of Parks in Montgomery and in Washington, D.C. Some lawmakers in D.C. want to do even more. They are trying to make December 1 a federal holiday called Rosa Parks Day.
There are 11 federal holidays across the United States. They include New Year’s Day, Independence Day, and Christmas. Martin Luther King Jr. Day honors another civil rights hero. To make a new holiday, members of Congress must vote on the idea.
Terri Sewell is a lawmaker in the U.S. House of Representatives. The leader from Alabama wrote a called H.R. 308. The bill is backed by more than 30 members of Congress. All of them are part of the Congressional Black Caucus. That’s a group of Black leaders in Congress. If passed, the bill would create Rosa Parks Day. It would be the first U.S. federal holiday for a woman.
However, there is a lot going on in Congress. It can take a long time for a bill to finally be voted on. Some bills never even make it to a vote. So, no one knows if Rosa Parks Day will become an official holiday. The lawmakers aren’t giving up though. On November 29, some of them spoke out in Washington, D.C.
Sewell called Parks “a true American hero.” She said, “This is not just about Black history. It’s about American history.” The leader added, “I know that all of us, this whole nation, have benefited from the courage of this one woman.” Sewell said the holiday would make sure Parks’s “brave is never forgotten.”
Updated December 4, 2023, 5:02 P.M. (ET)
By Ashley Morgan
