Religion Practice and Science of Non Violence

Author(s): O P Jaggi
Publisher: Munshiram Manoharlal Publishers Pvt Ltd

Page 88

Religion, Practice and Science of Non-Violence
country became aware and active in the cause of attaining independence and ultimately succeeded in getting it, is largely due to these satyagraha struggles.
Struggles based on non-violent resistance have been waged in other countries as well; one of the most important is the struggle of the Negroes in the United States against segregation.
The American Negro's Non-Violent Resistance Against Racial Discrimination
The present-day Negro in America is continually forced to confront his past: the two elements of history are the fact of his forefathers' slavery and the white man's complex amalgam of victory and guilt. Negroes had been slaves of the white people formerly but gradually as education, awareness of their rights as human beings, and their economic status improved, they resented discriminatory treatment and indignities. But the majority of them were discouraged and unwilling to assert their rights.
In Montgomery, Alabama, according to State laws and convention, the first four rows of seats from the front, holding about ten persons, were reserved for whites. The last three rows of seats were in theory reserved for Negroes, but if a white person boarded the bus when the front four rows were filled with whites, he had the prior choice of sitting wherever he wished, even if a Negro, male or female, had to get up to accomodate him.
On December, 1, 1955, a Negro seamstress, Mrs. Rosa Parks, boarded a bus to get home after her day's work. She sat down in the first seat behind the section reserved for whites. Soon after she took her seat, some white people got on the bus and the driver ordered Mrs. Parks and three other Negroes in that row to move back in order to accomodate the whites. By that time all the other seats were occupied. The other three Negroes complied with the order, but Mrs. Parks quietly refused. The driver called the police and had her arrested.
Mrs. Parks was a dignified and highly respected member of the Negro community. Her arrest proved to be a trigger which released the long-smoldering resentment of the Negro community into action. In protest the Negroes boycotted the use of buses on 5th December, the day when Mrs. Parks was