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Tuesday, October 25, 2005

One person can still make a difference
Posted by Jill | 6:44 AM

It's interesting that on the day Cindy Sheehan is getting ready to lash herself to the fence outside the White House, the woman with whose name she's often been linked in progressive circles has passed away.

Rosa Parks has died:

This mild-mannered black woman refused to give up her seat on a city bus so a white man could sit down.

Jim Crow laws had met their match.

Parks' refusal infused 50,000 blacks in Montgomery with the will to walk rather than risk daily humiliation on the city's buses.

This gentle giant, whose quietness belied her toughness, became the catalyst for a movement that broke the back of legalized segregation in the United States, gave rise to the astounding leadership of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and inspired fighters for freedom and justice throughout the world.

Parks, the beloved mother of the civil rights movement, is dead, a family member confirmed late Monday.

But already it's evident that her spirit lives in hundreds of thousands of people inspired by her unwavering commitment to work for a better world - a commitment that continued even after age and failing health slowed her in the 1990s.

In death as in life, she touched the well known and the little known people of the world.


The fact that it's so difficult today to imagine a refusal to give up a bus seat as a profoundly subversive act is a testimony to the courage and influence of this one woman. It's not an exaggeration to call her the mother of the civil rights movement. Since that day in 1955, Rosa Parks has inspired activists of all stripes. It's impossible to overstate her importance and influence.

Rest well, Mrs. Parks. And thank you.

(hat tip: Radical Russ at Pam's House Blend)
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