March 10, 1903

Black leaders assembled at the First Baptist Church in Little Rock (Pulaski County) and demanded the halt of legislative efforts aimed at segregating streetcars. The Streetcar Segregation Act, adopted by the Arkansas legislature in 1903, had assigned African-American and white passengers to “separate but equal” sections of streetcars. Such protest meetings usually fell on deaf ears in the Arkansas General Assembly since no black lawmakers remained in the legislature after post-Reconstruction disfranchisement. However, boycotts were organized to carry the protest of such meetings to the streetcar companies themselves.