However, most don't know, many women before her had taken the same stand, and were arrested for the same crime, yet these women aren't typically taught. The landmark case of Browder v. Gayle puts a spotlight on the women whom had endured the same hardships that Rosa had, for they are the ones that had caused the case that abolished bus segregation to go to court. About eight months before Rosa Parks’s infamous arrest, four lesser known women had experienced racially based discrimination on a segregated bus, and had each refused to give up their seat for a white patron. Teaching Tolerance had summed up the actions of these women, "the [arrest of Rosa Parks and her refusal to move from her seat when being told to by a bus driver] could be the story of a number of brave, mostly unheralded African America women in Montgomery who refused to yield their bus seats to white patrons — months before Rosa Parks' …show more content…
Gayle, the party who initiated the lawsuit consisted of Aurelia Browder, Susie McDonald, Claudette Colvin and Mary Louise Smith. At the time, Claudette Colvin was the plaintiff who drew the most attention, for the fact that she was merely fifteen and the youngest of the four. The hero in this instance were the four plaintiffs that had taken a stand against the segregation and racism that was being experienced throughout the slave states. In court cases, the defendant would be seen as the villain, and in this case, the defendant consisted of "Mayor William A. Gayle, the city’s chief of police, representatives from Montgomery’s Board of Commissioners, Montgomery City Lines, Inc., two bus drivers, and representatives of the Alabama Public Service Commission." These defendants were the people in power in the town, and had supported the “separate but equal” seating on buses. The reason the defendants are seen as the villains, is because the defendants supported the oppression of a basic human right that was spelled out in the 14th amendment of the Constitution, “no state shall deprive any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of law nor deny to any citizen the equal protection of the