Our Walk To Freedom
America just marked the 50th anniversary of the first march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama in 1965. At the height of the Civil Rights Movement, the right to vote was at the top of the agenda for African Americans throughout the country. The Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), led by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., shifted its focus on Selma, Alabama.
The state itself was plagued with staunch racial hatred. The Governor of Alabama, George Wallace was a well-known opponent to desegregation. The governor and the local county sheriff Jim Clark did all they could to prevent African Americans from voting in Selma. A month before the 600 people sought to march to Montgomery on Sunday March 7th, Jimmie Lee Jackson was beaten and killed by Alabama State Troopers that February of 1965. His death, along with the countless acts of violence and senseless murders of African Americans, inspired the demonstration to be held.
The air was crisp that Sunday morning on March 7th. The walk to Montgomery from Selma was 54 miles. The marchers ranged from young to old, Black and White, and all economic and social backgrounds. Leading the march was young SNCC leader John Lewis and other SCLC leaders. At the edge of the bridge, Alabama State Trooper awaited the arrival of the demonstrators.
The crowd grew closer and refused to leave, against the orders of the state trooper and local police officers. After a few minutes of refusal, the Alabama State Troopers attacked the crowd with billy clubs, tear gas, horse whips and fists. They punched, they kicked, they ran over, they stomped and beat the marchers bloody, running them back into Selma. This day went down in history as Bloody Sunday. Ultimately over fifty people were hospitalized.
Bloody Sunday was televised all over the world focusing international attention to Selma, Alabama. Dr. King and the SCLC planned a second demonstration, just two days after Bloody Sunday on Tuesday March 9th. This march did not follow through due to King’s confliction. On March 21st, the final and successful march took place. The marchers were under federal protection and the crowd was even bigger. President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act of 1965 on August 9th that would prohibit discrimination from the voting process. This essentially dissolved all forms literacy tests, fees and lengthen applications that hindered African Americans from voting.
This piece of history has taught us the importance of faith and believing in something greater than ourselves. The marchers on that bridge, the ones who were killed while trying to create a better world, and the ones who are still alive today fighting the same battles of the 1960s, did not act in vain. Blood was not shed on the Edmund Pettus Bridge, on the streets on Alabama, on the walls of 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, and on the branches of Maple trees throughout the South for Americans of this generation to be silent, tired and content.
We still have a long walk to freedom. Our Promised Land has not yet been reached although African Americans and Americans as a whole have reach milestones in civil rights. Despite the doubts of our youth and our inadequacies, we have the power to change our present states. We underestimate ourselves when we think about the leaders of the civil rights movement and their impactful involvement.
We must remember that leaders such as Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr., though dynamic and powerful leaders, once started out just passionate young men who wanted to see their country turn around. We also must remember to examine the Movement of the 1960s from a “trenches” point of view. We must examine the not-so-well-known leaders who made small, but grand impacts that resulted in change. Those smaller people were everyday citizens with working class jobs, families, no education and led small organizations.
Change can be done, and we do not need to be famous in order to achieve it.
In the words of President Barack Obama,
“Change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time. We are the ones we've been waiting for. We are the change that we seek.”
