Policing Passengers

“Before the issue of Driving While Black gained prominence, the phenomenon of Riding While Black involved the state criminalizing Black passengers for resisting racist and sexist abuse, as well as physical and sexual violence by white drivers and passengers. Mary-Elizabeth Murphy’s Policing Passengers blends a wide-ranging scope, sharp insights, and thorough research to uncover the struggle against dignitary and physical violence on municipal buses from the Great Migration through the post–World War II era. Focusing on the first generation of bus protests, Murphy fleshes out Black women’s overlooked roles in using the law to spearhead African Americans' fight to travel safely and with dignity during Jim Crow. This is a much-needed contribution to the story of African American women’s survival, strength, and unyielding pursuit of justice.”—Kidada E. Williams, author of I Saw Death Coming: A History of Terror and Survival in the War Against Reconstruction

“Using a wealth of archival material—including industry newsletters and magazines, bus routes, legal trials, and newspapers—Mary-Elizabeth B. Murphy produces a rich contribution to the history of Black women, mobility, civil rights, and American travel.”—Miriam Thaggert, author of Riding Jane Crow: African American Women on the American Railroad

“In this beautifully written and field-defining book, Murphy tells the story of how Black women transformed the bus industry and the law through direct resistance, legal activism, and powerful assertions of their rights to mobility, dignity, and womanhood.”—Traci Parker, author of Department Stores and the Black Freedom Movement: Workers, Consumers, and Civil Rights from the 1930s to the 1980s

“Nuanced, sophisticated, and engaging. Murphy explores the key roles that Black women played in the post–World War II civil rights movement and shows us what happened when racist ideologies and practices met modern innovations in travel.”—Stephen A. Berrey, author of The Jim Crow Routine: Everyday Performances of Race, Civil Rights, and Segregation in Mississippi