During this time, segregation was legal and common. White people were considered the superior race, and African Americans did not have many rights. For example, busses were segregated, which means that there was a strict separation between whites and blacks. Rosa Parks was an African American woman who took a "white" seat on a bus. Later, she was asked to give up the seat on the bus so that a white person could take it. She refused, which lead to her arrest.