Who Were the Freedom Riders?

The late Congressman John Lewis was an imposing figure in American politics but his legacy of confronting racism directly, while never swaying from his commitment to nonviolence, started long before he became a national figure. 

Lewis was among the 13 original Freedom Riders who encountered violence and resistance as they rode buses across the South, challenging the nation’s segregation laws in 1961. The original Freedom Riders were 13 Black and White men and women of various ages from across the United States. As the movement grew, so did the number of participants.

Freedom Riders tried to use “whites-only” restrooms and lunch counters at bus stations in Alabama, South Carolina, and other Southern states. The groups were confronted by arresting police officers—as well as horrific violence from white protestors—along their routes, but also drew international attention to the civil rights movement.

The mission of the rides was to test compliance with two Supreme Court rulings: Boynton v. Virginia, which declared that segregated bathrooms, waiting rooms, and lunch counters were unconstitutional, and Morgan vs. Virginia, in which the court ruled that it was unconstitutional to implement and enforce segregation on interstate buses and trains. The Freedom Rides took place as the Civil Rights movement was gathering momentum, and during a period in which African-Americans were routinely harassed and subjected to segregation in the Jim Crow South.

On May 4, 1961, the first crew of 13 Freedom Riders left Washington for New Orleans in two buses. The group encountered some resistance in Virginia, but they didn’t encounter violence until they arrived in Rock Hill, S.C. At the bus station there, Mr. Lewis and another rider were beaten, and a third person was arrested after using a whites-only restroom.

When they reached Anniston, Ala., on May 14, Mother’s Day, they were met by an angry mob. Local officials had given the Ku Klux Klan permission to attack the riders without consequences. The first bus was firebombed outside Anniston while the mob held the door closed. The passengers were beaten as they fled the burning bus.

When the second bus reached Anniston, eight Klansmen boarded it and attacked and beat the Freedom Riders. The bus managed to continue on to Birmingham, Ala., where the passengers were again attacked at a bus terminal, this time with baseball bats, iron pipes, and bicycle chains.

At one point during the rides, Mr. Lewis and others were attacked by a mob of white people in Montgomery, Ala., and he was left unconscious in a pool of his own blood outside the Greyhound Bus Terminal. He was jailed several times and spent a month in Mississippi’s notorious Parchman Penitentiary. Hundreds of protesters, Black and White, were arrested and hastily convicted of breach of peace. Many of the Freedom Riders spent six weeks in prison, sweltering in filthy, vermin-infested cells.

The attacks on the Freedom Riders received widespread attention in the news media. The initial campaign ended early with the Freedom Riders finishing their journey to New Orleans by plane. Many more Freedom Rides followed over the next several months. Ultimately, 436 riders participated in more than 60 Freedom Rides.

On May 29, 1961, Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy petitioned the Interstate Commerce Commission to ban segregation in interstate bus travel, according to PBS. The order, which was issued on Sept. 22 and went into effect on Nov. 1, led to the removal of Jim Crow signs from stations, waiting rooms, water fountains, and restrooms in bus terminals.

The riders, White and Black, were continuously attacked and beaten. Their rides and protest changed the way people traveled and set the stage for the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

As reflected in the number of Black and White people that protested together, that were beaten together, that were arrested together, and that lost their lives together to demand Black rights, it is clear that Black History is American History.