The Freedom Riders were civil rights activists who rode interstate buses into the segregated Southern United States in 1961 to challenge the non-enforcement of Supreme Court decisions that ruled segregated public buses unconstitutional. The Freedom Riders faced violence and arrests as they traveled through the South, but their actions helped to expose the injustices of segregation and inspire a wave of activism that ultimately contributed to the desegregation of interstate transportation and the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The Freedom Riders were instrumental in bringing national attention to the ongoing struggle for civil rights and equality for Black Americans.