1955年3月2日,阿拉巴马州一个热情洋溢的黑人女孩,因为受够了种族隔离制度的种种不公,拒绝在巴士上给一个白人妇女让座。仅仅九个月后,著名的罗莎·帕克斯因同样的行为,引发了蒙哥马利市长达381天的黑人抵制公交车运动。然而九个月前刚满15岁的克劳戴特·科尔文,并没有得到任何支持,反而在学校和社区遭到了孤立与指责。科尔文并没有因此而退缩,一年后,民权律师弗雷德·葛雷将蒙哥马利市的威廉·盖尔勒市长
Mayor William A.
Gayle,告到美国联邦地区法院:他和蒙哥马利市的巴士公司,侵犯和剥夺了他的客户美国联邦宪法赋与的不可让渡的权利。这就是美国近代民权运动史上著名的艾瑞丽亚·包尔德对威廉·盖尔勒案(Aurelia
Browder V. William A. Gayle),科尔文作为一名关键的原告出席了此案,并最终赢得了“种族隔离”的废止。
"When it comes to justice, there is no easy
way to get it. You can’t sugarcoat it. You have to take a stand and
say, ‘This is not right.’” – Claudette Colvin
On March 2, 1955, an impassioned teenager, fed
up with the daily injustices of Jim Crow segregation, refused to
give her seat to a white woman on a segregated bus in Montgomery,
Alabama. Instead of being celebrated as Rosa Parks would be just
nine months later, fifteen-year-old Claudette Colvin found herself
shunned by her classmates and dismissed by community leaders.
Undaunted, a year later she dared to challenge segregation again as
a key plaintiff in Browder v. Gayle, the landmark case that struck
down the segregation laws of Montgomery and swept away the legal
underpinnings of the Jim Crow South.
Based on extensive interviews with Claudette
Colvin and many others, Phillip Hoose presents the first in-depth
account of an important yet largely unknown civil rights figure,
skillfully weaving her dramatic story into the fabric of the
historic Montgomery bus boycott and court case that would change
the course of American history.
Claudette Colvin is the 2009 National Book Award
Winner for Young People''s Literature and a 2010 Newbery Honor
Book
關於作者:
Phillip Hoose is an award-winning author of books, essays,
stories, songs and articles. Although he first wrote for adults, he
turned his attention to children and young adults in part to keep
up with his own daughters. Claudette Colvin won a National Book
Award and was dubbed a Publishers Weekly Best Book of 2009. He is
also the author of Hey, Little Ant, co-authored by his daughter,
Hannah, It’s Our World, Too!, The Race to Save the Lord God Bird,
and We Were There, Too!, a National Book Award finalist. He has
received a Jane Addams Children’s Book Award, a Christopher Award,
and a Boston Globe-Horn Book Award, among numerous honors. He was
born in South Bend, Indiana, and grew up in the towns of South
Bend, Angola, and Speedway, Indiana. He was educated at Indiana
University and the Yale School of Forestry. He lives in Portland,
Maine.
內容試閱:
CHAPTER ONE Jim Crow and the Detested Number Ten
I swear to the Lord
I still can’t see
Why Democracy means
Everybody but me.
—Langston Hughes Claudette Colvin: I was about four years old the
first time I ever saw what happened when you acted up to whites. I
was standing in line at the general store when this little white
boy cut in front of me. Then some older white kids came in through
the door and started laughing. I turned around to see what they
were laughing at. They were pointing at me. The little white boy
said, “Let me see, let me see, too.