Importance

Rosa Parks’s importance in the nation is that she took a stand against segregation. When Rosa Parks gave a speech in Williamsburg, Virginia, she said, “As I look back on those days it’s just like a dream, and… the only thing that bothered me was that we waited so long to make this protest and to let it be known wherever we go that all of us should be free and equal and have all opportunities that others should have”. When she died she became the first woman in history to lie in state, which was only reserved for presidents. “In 1999, Parks was awarded the Congressional Gold Medal, the highest honor the United States bestows on a civilian”. Her courage gave other black people the strength to stand up for what they believed in and what they thought was just.