By Alabama Public Radio
Montgomery, AL – A former congressman and current pastor of New Bethel Baptist Church in Washington, D-C will help mark the 48th anniversary of the Montgomery bus boycott Monday night. The Reverend Walter Fauntroy was one of the late Reverend Martin Luther King Junior's top aides. He'll be in Montgomery to speak at the historic First Baptist Church on North Ripley Street. That's where many mass meetings were held during the boycott. Fauntroy says he's deeply honored to have been invited to speak at this year's celebration, which is called "The People Speak." The Montgomery bus boycott began after Rosa Parks was arrested because she would not give up her bus seat to a white passenger. That happened December First 1955 and has been described as the birth of the Civil Rights movement.