Civil Rights Era (EOTO 2)

    On February 18, 1965 state troopers clubbed protesters and shot and killed 26-year year old Jimmie Lee Jackson, an african american demonstrator trying to protect his mother, who was being beaten by police. In response, civil rights leaders planned to take their cause straight to Alabama Governor George Wallace on a 54-mile march from Selma Alabama, to the state capital of Montgomery. Although Governor Wallace ordered state troopers “to use whatever measures are necessary to prevent a march,” on Sunday March 7th 1965, approximately 600 voting rights advocates led by John Lewis of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and Hosea Williams of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), set out from the Brown Chapel AME church. 

    The civil rights activists marched undisturbed and peacefully through downtown Selma. As they reached the Edmund Pettus Bridge—named after a Confederate general and Ku Klux Klan leader—they were met by a wall of state troopers and deputies slapping billy clubs in their hands. The marchers continued across the bridge and stopped about 50 feet from the authorities. Major John Cloud called out from his bullhorn, “it would be detrimental to your safety to continue this march” “This is an unlawful assembly. You have to disperse, you are ordered to disperse. Go home or go to your church. This march will not continue.” Williams and Lewis made the brave decision to stand their ground at the front line. After a few short moments, the troopers, wearing gas masks and once again slapping their clubs, advanced towards the marchers. They pushed back Lewis and Williams then their pace quickened. They struck them with sticks, and clouds of tear gas mixed with the screams of terrified marchers and the cheers of bystanders. The deputies on horses charged ahead and chased the men, women and children back over the bridge as they swung clubs, whips and rubber tubing wrapped in barbed wire. The protesters did not fight back. Amelia Boynton Robinson was brutally beaten by Alabama state troopers during the march. This photo drew national attention to the cause and captured the brutality of the struggle for African American voting rights.

    Nearby television cameras captured the entire attack and transformed the local protest into a national civil rights event.  Around 9:30 pm ABC newscaster Frank Reynolds interrupted the network's broadcast of “Judgment at Nuremberg”, A movie about Nazi bigotry and war crimes, to air the disturbing, newly arrived footage from Selma. Nearly 50 million Americans who had tuned into the film’s long-awaited television premiere could not escape the historical echoes of Nazi storm troopers in the scenes of the rampaging state troopers. Americans all over staged sit-ins, traffic blockades and demonstrations in solidarity with the marchers. Some even traveled to Selma where two days later, Martin Luthor King JR attempted another march but, to the surprise of demonstrators, turned back when state troopers yet again blocked the highway at the Edmund Pettus Bridge. After a federal court order permitted the protest, the voting rights marchers left Selma under the protection of federalized National Guard troops.  On March 25th, they reached Montgomery with the crowd growing to 25,000 by the time they reached the capital steps. The events in Selma drew Congress to pass the Voting Rights Act which President Johnson signed into law on August 6, 1965. Edmund Pettus Bridge is now a National Historic Landmark and March 7th 1965 is forever known as “Bloody Sunday”.