In 1865, the creation of the "Black Codes" was announced and passed after the abolishment of slavery. Through the usage of the black codes, it forced black Americans to sign one-sided contracts, stripped away their rights to vote, control where they live, and even take away their children for labor purposes. In 1880, the Black Codes later became the roots to Jim Crows laws which fully legalized segregation in the south.

Due to Jim Crows laws, it resulted in public parks, theaters, and restaurants being forbidden for black American, as well as segregated waiting rooms, buses, and trains. Subsequently, it required them to sit in the back of the city buses, and white Americans had the right to demand a seat if needed.

One particular bus rider Rosa Parks, a black American lady who sat in the front row of the bus refused to offer her seat to a white rider. It resulted in her getting arrested and fined. After the news of her arrest spread to the general public, it was at this time a young Pastor, Martin Luther King Jr., led a boycott of the municipal bus company. The boycott lasted 381 days and finally, on June 5th, 1956, the federal district court declared segregated seating on buses to by unconstitutional, and the federal decision went into effect on December 20, 1956. Furthermore, the end result of the Montgomery Bus Boycott led other Black communities in the south to protest racial discrimination and galvanized the direct nonviolent resonance phase of the civil rights movement.