CLAUDETTE COLVIN
SAD HISTORY
Another from a favourite web page . . . . . .
On 2nd March 1955, in Montgomery, Alabama, Claudette Colvin, a 15-year-old Black schoolgirl, refused to give up her seat on a bus that she had been ordered to vacate for a white passenger. She was arrested and charged with multiple offences for violating the city’s segregation laws. Leaders of the Black community considered attempting to make her case a cause célèbre and a test case for the civil rights movement, but, according to some local activists, Claudette’s dark skin and working class background caused concern. One, Gwen Patton, told Guardian journalist Gary Younge, “It was partly because of her colour and because she was from the working poor… . It was a case of ‘bourgey’ Blacks looking down on the working class Blacks.” After Colvin became pregnant as a result of a statutory rape, the leadership decided against pursuing her case.
When Rosa Parks – educated, married, and lighter-skinned – was arrested later that year, civil rights leaders had their standard-bearer.
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