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Practice of Non-Violence
to be tried in the court. Not one of the fifty thousand Negroes of the city rode in a bus that day. Mrs. Parks was tried and fined ten dollars. She filed an appeal in a higher court. In a mass meeting held that night in one of the churches, it was decided unanimously to continue the boycott until: (1) courteous treatment by the bus operators was guaranteed; (2) passengers were seated on a first-come-first-served basis-Negroes seating from the back of the bus toward the front, while whites seated from the front toward the back; (3) Negro bus operators were employed on predominantly Negro routes. Furthermore, an organization called the Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA) was created; president of this Association was a young, highly educated Negro minister, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. He was entrusted with the work of directing the protest. Dr. King was familiar with Gandhi's non-violent satyagraha technique and from the beginning he carried his campaign forward on similar lines.
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As the bus boycott continued, a Negro taxi driver stopped beside an elderly Negro woman who was trudging with obvious difficulty. "Jump in, grandmother," he said, "You do not need to walk." She waved him to go on. "I am not walking for myself," she called out, "I am walking for my children and grandchildren." Another Negro woman said she preferred tired feet to a tired soul.
Mass meetings were held twice a week in the Negro churches, rotating from one to another. Programmes included prayers, scripture readings, singing of hymns and reading of reports by different committees. Dr. King explained in great detail the effectiveness and application of non-violence and love of the opponent. Possible situations were provocative violence might be used against them, and how to behave under such circumstances, were even demonstrated to people.
The boycott of buses was complete. The Government tried to break it on various occasions by having Negro car drivers arrested on all sorts of pretexts, pressurizing the insurance companies into cancelling the insurance on Negro cars, spreading false rumours that Negro leaders had agreed to call off the boycott, attempting to disrupt the unity of the Negro leaders by inciting jealousy etc. Dr. King was arrested and jailed for allegedly speeding in his car. But the crowd of Negroes that
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