Browder V. Gayle the Most Important Civil Rights Case You’Ve Never Heard Of

Home , Aurelia Browder, Fred Gray (attorney)

46 TEACHING TOLERANCE Browder v. Gayle The most important civil rights case you’ve never heard of

BY JONATHAN GOLD

On November 14, 1956, the front page wider relationship to the boycott and of The New York Times, under the head- the crusade for racial equality. line “High Court Rules Bus Segregation Unconstitutional,” reported that “an The Browder in Browder v. Gayle Alabama law and a city ordinance On April 29, 1955, Aurelia Browder, requiring segregation of races on like so many other black residents intrastate buses were declared invalid of Montgomery, was mistreated on a by the Supreme Court today.” Three city bus. According to her testimony hundred and eighty-one days after the in the civil case, she was forced by Montgomery Bus Boycott began, the the bus driver “to get up and stand to Supreme Court had upheld a lower let a white man and a white lady sit court ruling in favor of desegregat- down.” Three other plaintiffs, Mary ing the buses, effectively overturning Louise Smith, Claudette Colvin and Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) and the doc- Susie McDonald, had reported sim- trine of separate but equal that had ilar mistreatment. The cumulative supported Jim Crow segregation in the effect of these “demeaning, wretched, Aurelia Browder was the lead plaintiff in the United States. landmark civil rights case Browder v. Gayle. A intolerable impositions and condi- It may be surprising that the case lifelong resident of Montgomery, Alabama, her tions,” as boycott organizer Jo Ann in question involved four female plain- home became a museum after her death in 1971. Robinson referred to them, inspired tiffs from Montgomery, none of whom Montgomery’s black community to was Rosa Parks, and that the events begin developing plans for a boycott it addressed took place before Parks’ has largely been left out of civil rights that eventually began after the arrest famous stand ignited the massive boy- instruction. The 60th anniversary of of Rosa Parks. cott. The case, Browder v. Gayle, is one Browder v. Gayle offers an opportunity If it seems odd that Parks’ name is of the most significant milestones in to get to know this critical case, the not listed among the plaintiffs’, it is

BROWDER FAMILY (AURELIA BROWDER); GETTY IMAGES (MONTGOMERY) GETTY IMAGES BROWDER); (AURELIA FAMILY BROWDER American civil rights history, but it unheralded women behind it, and its because her persona and that of Dr.

SUMMER 2016 47 Martin Luther King Jr. have dominated the cultural mythology of the boycott “If it’s worth teaching, (and the movement at large), a fact that poses special challenges to educa- tors who strive to capture the unseen it’s worth teaching and resist telling a simple story in their teaching about the civil rights movement. It is also a fact that has troubled Butler Browder, Aurelia Browder’s son, the whole story.” who laments that the world never got to know the woman behind the lawsuit. —BUTLER BROWDER “She believed in the power of unity. She believed in the power of togeth- erness. But she also believed that she had to be the one to stand because the others wouldn’t,” Browder says. “Five women had stories to tell: instances of individual mistreatment. They came together to change things for the world. Their concern at the time was not for their own personal thoughts or beliefs, but the beliefs and the theories of a whole. They felt like no price was too great to pay for achieving what they thought they could achieve.” Browder is not surprised his mother ended up as one of the plaintiffs. According to him, after being mistreated on the bus in April 1955, she talked of bringing her own suit, even approaching the NAACP about supporting her. But as Robinson notes in her book The Montgomery Bus Boycott and the Women initial goals were limited in scope: first- The Montgomery Bus Boycott began in December Who Started It, local leaders “hesitated come-first-served seating, more cour- 1955 and lasted for over a year. Browder v. Gayle was brought by four plaintiffs, including Claudette to file the [desegregation] cases because teous treatment and the hiring of more Colvin (top) Mary Louise Smith (middle) and of fear of reprisals they felt the filing black drivers. Susie McDonald (bottom). would evoke.” Browder also recalls an About two months in, those goals aunt warning his mother that agitating changed. Negotiations with the city could get her killed. She was undeterred, were proving unsuccessful. The city bombed by white supremacists a week reportedly reflecting that she had “to die refused to consider hiring “colored” later. Mounting hostilities within the for something. If you live and you hav- drivers and offered only conciliatory city convinced boycott leaders that a en’t stood for anything, you didn’t live measures that fell short of the MIA’s more robust legal strategy was neces- for anything either.” goals. Meanwhile, the support system sary. As legal scholar Robert Jerome of carpools and taxis grew stronger, and Glennon notes, “the [bombing] inci- The Boycott King’s star was rising. Voices within the dent changed the thinking of the [MIA] Jo Ann Robinson sounded the initial call movement called for a legal challenge leadership, which authorized Gray to for the black citizens of Montgomery to segregation beyond the mass protest; commence a federal suit.” The boycott to prepare for a one-day boycott; Montgomery attorney Fred Gray had continued, but now a parallel legal chal- after Parks’ arrest in December 1955, even begun to research potential cases. lenge to bus segregation was fighting its she and other organizers formed the On January 23, 1956, the mayor called way through the court system. Montgomery Improvement Association for a “get tough” approach to bring the Parks’ appeal was also pending in

(MIA) to formalize their efforts. Their boycott into check; King’s home was Montgomery court. (She had been (BUS BOYCOTT) GETTY IMAGES

48 TEACHING TOLERANCE charged and fined in December for Supreme Court upheld the lower court’s refusing the bus driver’s orders and for decision in Browder v. Gayle, legally end- disorderly conduct). However, because ing racial segregation on public transpor- hers was a criminal case, it would follow tation in the state of Alabama. a different path through the court system and prove harder to elevate to the Selective Memory Supreme Court. As Gray later wrote, “I The Browder v. Gayle ruling would wanted the court to have only one issue not be made official until December to decide—the constitutionality of the 20, when it was served to city officials. laws requiring segregation on the buses That is also the date history books typ- in the city of Montgomery.” If Browder, ically point to when declaring the boy- Smith, Colvin and McDonald sued the cott a success, but there is a problem city, they could make the claim that with that line of thinking. The signif- their 14th Amendment rights had been icance of the boycott as a conscious- violated by the segregationist practices ness-raising, galvanizing experience of the city and the bus company. cannot be overstated, but with segregationist obstruction continuing, black The Lawsuit resolve potentially waning and another Gray filed the case on February 1, 1956, winter approaching, scholars disagree with support from the MIA and the Hear Butler Browder reflect on his mother’s role about whether the boycott would have NAACP. (The defendant, William A. in the civil rights movement at tolerance.org/ succeeded without the ruling. Gayle, was the mayor of Montgomery browder. Aurelia Browder’s story has been at the time.) Because Browder v. Gayle marginalized in most accounts of civil challenged the constitutionality of a Montgomery officials became intransi- rights history. Most versions of this state statute, it was heard by a three- gent, ... arresting boycott organizers on desegregation story begin with Rosa judge panel, including Frank Johnson, fabricated charges, joining the citizens’ Parks’ courageous stand and end with who would overturn Governor George council, and failing to suppress violence the Supreme Court’s ruling, often fail- Wallace’s 1965 attempts to block the against boycott leaders.” Black taxi driv- ing to mention the case or the names of march from Selma. All four women ers had supported the boycott by agree- Browder and the other plaintiffs. Part testified to their mistreatment on city ing to ferry passengers at below-market of this likely stems from our preference buses while the city argued that it had rates, but the city banned this practice. for the lone hero standing against injus- been enforcing the laws as written. In a City officials also arrested King and more tice. For students studying the move- 2-1 decision, issued on June 5, the panel than 80 boycott leaders, using a 1921 law ment, the knowledge that the boycott ruled that “the enforced segregation of that prohibited actions obstructing law- was the carefully planned and meticu- black and white passengers on motor ful business—in this case, the private bus lously orchestrated work of thousands buses … violates the Constitution and company operations. (King was given jail of largely unknown activists is—in laws of the United States,” specifically time but did not serve his sentence; he and of itself—a revelation, and has the the equal protection clause of the 14th did pay hefty fines.) power to build understanding of the dif- Amendment. The city immediately By November 1956, Montgomery ficult process behind social change. But appealed the ruling, sending it to the officials had filed for an injunction that without a true picture of how legal activ- Supreme Court for review. would potentially eliminate the taxi- ism intertwined with grassroots orga- The boycott continued through the and-shuttle system altogether, an out- nizing to elicit change, the revelation remaining months of 1956, capturing come that could derail—or even end— will always be incomplete. Or as Butler attention and igniting passions across the the boycott. On the 12th of that month, Browder puts it: “If it’s worth teaching, country: Black citizens were finally par- as boycott leaders waited anxiously it’s worth teaching the whole story, not ticipating in a mass direct-action move- for the ruling on the injunction, King just a portion of it. … [T]he parts you ment to resist Jim Crow, but white resis- used a sermon to rally his followers, leave out may just turn out to make your tance was still formidable and segregated asking them to “believe that a way will story a lie.” buses were still the law. In his book From be made out of no way.” He says in his Jim Crow to Civil Rights, legal scholar memoir that he felt “the cold breeze of Gold teaches history in Providence, Michael Klarman notes that “rather pessimism passing through the audience” Rhode Island. He also blogs for

GETTY IMAGES (BUS BOYCOTT) GETTY IMAGES (BUTLER BROWDER) TOLERANCE TEACHING BROWDER); (AURELIA FAMILY BROWDER than making minimalist concessions, that day. But, on November 13, 1956, the Teaching Tolerance.

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