First organized by CORE in 1961, integrated groups would travel on Greyhound buses from Washington, DC down through Alabama and Mississippi, and would refuse to conform to the segregationist practices in the bus stations regarding washroom facilities.

Such practices had been outlawed for terminal accommodations associated with interstate travel by the Supreme Court in the 1960 decision of Boynton v. Virginia.

After one bus was fire bombed in Anniston, and another was attacked in Birmingham, students fresh from the lunch-counter sit-ins joined the rides and insisted that they continue, against the opposition of Attorney-General Robert Kennedy. Kennedy agreed to protect the riders with National Guardsmen, but many were arrested on arrival in Jackson, Mississippi.