The leadership of Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. in this protest aided in propelling him into the national spotlight. Montgomery was forced by the Supreme Court to integrate it's bus system. When Rosa Parks "The First Lady of Civil Rights" kept her seat on that bus, she stood up for the dignity and civil rights of every African American in the United States.
Her very patriotic and brave act was a symbol of the Montgomery Bus Boycott and civil rights demonstrations around the country. Her arrest for refusing the bus drivers demand to give up her seat on the bus to a white person helped initiate support for the cause of eliminating segregation.