The Rebellious Life of Mrs. Rosa Parks - Jeanne Theoharis by Jeanne Theoharis

Author:Jeanne Theoharis
Language: eng
Format: epub

River Rouge NAACP branch president Lasker Smith (also of Local 600) explained to Gloster Current, director of branches, that Parks was “experiencing acute financial hardships stemming from her sparking the Montgomery, Alabama bus boycott,” that she had been of service to the branch, and that they felt “an organized effort to aid Mrs. Parks is a responsibility which cannot be evaded.”228 Indeed, it was the militant trade unionists of this little branch that forced the Detroit and national NAACP offices to address Mrs. Parks’s plight.

The River Rouge-Ecorse NAACP branch under Smiths leadership had cut a far different path from the larger, more middle-class Detroit branch. The branch had drawn controversy in 1959 for boycotting the River Rouge Savings Bank because of its refusal to hire black people. The national office disapproved of the boycott.229 Smith, a self-described militant autoworker, was elected branch president in i960. Under his leadership, the branch invited militant NAACP leader Robert F. Williams to speak and—to the chagrin of the national office, which asked them to retract—sponsored a resolution decrying the assassination of Congo prime minister Patrice Lumumba and calling on the national NAACP to condemn the murder.230 Smith alludes to Parks’s participation in various branch events, though it is unclear from public records which ones she attended. However, River Rouges activism likely corresponded more to her political sensibility than the Detroit branch did in this period.

In November i960, long after Mrs. Parks had been hospitalized with ulcers, after numerous articles had run in the black press about her situation, and after the hospital bill had gone into collection, the national NAACP finally responded to her need. Current asked Smith to look into Parks’s situation. Smith wrote that Parks was seeking employment, “however, at present, her health is a definite threat to her ability to undertake any type of permanent employment,” and concluded, “Mrs. Parks is experiencing a number of anxieties, but she has a great reticence for making a major issue of her needs; she is reluctant to become the charge’ of any group or agency.... Because of her reservations to discuss these things we did not get into matters such as the present extent of her indebtednesses or estimates of the cost of her present medical needs.”231 Smith finished his report, dutifully adding that Parks thanked Current for his concern.

Current followed up, asking Smith to arrange a meeting with Parks to talk about her situation in person. Dismayed by Parks’s troubled situation and angered by the media coverage, Current wrote privately to Wilkins after seeing the Jet article, “This case may well plague us in the future.”232 For his convenience, Current met Parks at Detroit’s Metro Airport, avoiding going out to her apartment. There he assured Mrs. Parks “that the NAACP was interested in her welfare and that of her husband; that we have always been interested in those who have worked with us, and who because of no fault of their own were victimized by experiences such as her own.”233 Current sought to

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