【美国精神】第84期

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Explanation:

  The U.S. Declaration¹ of Independence says that “all men are created equal” (or the same), but in reality (or in real life), this isn’t really true. The United² States has always struggled (or had problems) with racial³ discrimination⁴, which means⁵ treating people differently and unfairly because of the color of their skin.

  Racial discrimination is still a problem today, but it is less of a problem now than it used to be. In the early 1900s, blacks and other people who were not white couldn’t do many of the things that white people could do. For example, they were not allowed to drink out of the same drinking fountains⁶ (or places where people can drink water on the street) or use the same bathrooms as white people could. They also had to go to different schools and shop in different stores. They even had to ride in the back of busses, because only white people could sit in the front.

  In 1955, a black woman named Rosa Parks was very tired of all these rules and she decided⁷ to sit in the front of a bus in Montgomery, Alabama, a city in the southern part of the United States. The driver ordered (or told) her to sit in the back, but she wouldn’t do it. This was an act of civil disobedience, because she was breaking the rules as a way to try to change those rules. She was arrested (or forced to go to jail) because of it.

  The black community in Montgomery wanted to support (or help) Rosa Parks and fight for their rights. So they began to boycott⁸ the busses in Montgomery. This means that they refused to ride in busses because they were tired of having to sit in the back. Their boycott lasted for more than one year until the laws were changed. The bus companies lost a lot of money during the boycott. Many of the busses stopped running (or going on the streets).

  Rosa Parks’ refusal⁹ or saying ‘no’ to sitting in the back of the bus became a famous story in the national news and began the civil rights movement, or the period of time when many people were working to have equal rights for whites and nonwhites. Rosa Parks is sometimes called the “Mother of the Civil Rights Movement.”

 

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