Editing Condoleezza Rice (section)

==Racial discrimination==
Rice experienced firsthand the injustices of Birmingham's discriminatory laws and attitudes. She was instructed by her parents to walk proudly in public and to use the facilities at home rather than subject herself to the indignity of "colored" facilities in town. As Rice recalls, "they refused to allow the limits and injustices of their time to limit our horizons."<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB110605897675528846 |title=Condoleezza Rice's Opening Statement |work=[[The Wall Street Journal]] |date=January 18, 2005 |access-date=September 12, 2018 |archive-date=August 23, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200823023109/https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB110605897675528846 |url-status=live }}</ref>

[[File:Bush signs Rosa Parks statue bill.jpg|thumb|President Bush signing the bill for a [[Rosa Parks]] statue at [[Statuary Hall]], Washington, D.C.]]
However, Rice recalls various times in which she suffered discrimination on account of her race, which included being relegated to a storage room at a department store instead of a regular dressing room, being barred from going to the circus or the local amusement park, being denied hotel rooms, and even being given bad food at restaurants.<ref name=ice>{{cite news|url=http://www.cnn.com/CNN/Programs/people/shows/rice/timeline.html|title=CNN Programs: People in the News|access-date=June 25, 2010|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100528193901/http://www.cnn.com/CNN/Programs/people/shows/rice/timeline.html|archive-date=May 28, 2010|url-status=live}}</ref> Also, while Rice was mostly kept by her parents from areas where she might face discrimination, she was very aware of the civil rights struggle and the problems of [[Jim Crow laws]] in Birmingham. A neighbor, Juliemma Smith, described how "[Condi] used to call me and say things like, 'Did you see what [[Bull Connor]] did today?' She was just a little girl and she did that all the time. I would have to read the newspaper thoroughly because I wouldn't know what she was going to talk about."<ref name=ice /> Rice herself said of the segregation era: "Those terrible events burned into my consciousness. I missed many days at my segregated school because of the frequent bomb threats."<ref name=ice />

During the violent days of the [[Civil Rights Movement]], Reverend Rice armed himself and kept guard over the house while Condoleezza practiced the piano inside. Reverend Rice instilled in his daughter and students that black people would have to prove themselves worthy of advancement, and would simply have to be "twice as good" to overcome injustices built into the system.<ref>{{cite news |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/1561791.stm |title=Profile: Condoleezza Rice |work=[[BBC News]] |date=September 25, 2001 |access-date=August 2, 2006 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060628131220/http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/1561791.stm |archive-date=June 28, 2006 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last=Jackson |first=Derrick Z. |date=November 20, 2002 |title=A lesson from Condoleezza Rice |url=http://www.racematters.org/lessononlifecondoleezzarice.htm |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060314060249/http://www.racematters.org/lessononlifecondoleezzarice.htm |archive-date=March 14, 2006 |access-date=February 21, 2006 |website=racematters.org}}</ref>

Rice said "My parents were very strategic, I was going to be so well prepared, and I was going to do all of these things that were revered in white society so well, that I would be armored somehow from racism. I would be able to confront white society on its own terms."<ref>{{cite news |last=Russakoff |first=Dale |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A54664-2001Sep6.html |title=Lessons of Might and Right: How Segregation and an Indomitable Family Shaped National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice |work=[[Washington Post Magazine]] |date=September 9, 2001 |access-date=April 2, 2007 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070807200300/http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A54664-2001Sep6.html |archive-date=August 7, 2007 |url-status=live }}</ref>
While the Rices supported the goals of the civil rights movement, they did not agree with the idea of putting their child in harm's way.<ref name=ice />

Rice was eight when her schoolmate Denise McNair, aged 11, was murdered in the bombing of the primarily black [[16th Street Baptist Church bombing|Sixteenth Street Baptist Church]] by [[white supremacy|white supremacists]] on September 15, 1963.<ref name=slate2000 /> Rice has commented upon that moment in her life:

{{blockquote|I remember the bombing of that Sunday School at 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham in 1963. I did not see it happen, but I heard it happen, and I felt it happen, just a few blocks away at my father's church. It is a sound that I will never forget, that will forever reverberate in my ears. That bomb took the lives of four young girls, including my friend and playmate, Denise McNair. The crime was calculated to suck the hope out of young lives, bury their aspirations. But those fears were not propelled forward, those terrorists failed.<ref name = "RiceBomb">{{cite news |first=Stan |last=Correy |url=http://www.abc.net.au/rn/talks/bbing/stories/s1338813.htm |title=Condoleezza, Condoleezza |work=[[Australian Broadcasting Corporation]]'s [[Radio National]] |date=April 3, 2005 |access-date=July 26, 2006 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20050911110023/http://www.abc.net.au/rn/talks/bbing/stories/s1338813.htm |archive-date=September 11, 2005 }}</ref>}}