Six Arrested in Washington in Protest Over Russian Troops on Island, Pope Opens an Era by Celebrating Mass in Italian. At least 17 Negroes were hospitalized with injuries and about 40 more were given emergency treatment for minor injuries and tear gas effects. There is only the struggle for human rights. Our editors will review what you’ve submitted and determine whether to revise the article. In 1965, John Lewis was nearly killed as he led a group of protesters across the Edmund Pettus Bridge to protest racial discrimination in voting.
An old Negro who had just heard that officers had beaten a Negro on his own porch said to a friend, "I wish the bastard would try to come in my house.". The Rev. “The law is clear,” the judge wrote, “that the right to petition one's government for the redress of grievances may be exercised in large groups ... and these rights may be exercised by marching, even along public highways.”, On March 21, protected by federalized National Guard troops, about 3,200 voting rights advocates left Selma and set out for Montgomery, walking 12 miles a day and sleeping in fields. Reluctant to violate the restraining order, however, he turned the procession around, after leading it in prayer, when state troopers ordered it to halt. West Germany Also Decides to Maintain Diplomatic Relations With Cairo, Moses Asks Garage at 59th St. Bridge; Plan Angers Barnes, Governor Warns on Minimum Wage: Negroes lay on the floors and chairs, many weeping and moaning. [In Washington the Justice Department announced that agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation in Selma had been directed to make a full and prompt investigation and to gather evidence whether "unnecessary force was used by law officers and others"
The march became a landmark in the American civil rights movement and directly led to the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. The leader of the troopers, who identified himself as Maj. John Cloud said, "This is an unlawful assembly. Source: “ON THE ROAD TO FREEDOM,” BY CHARLES COBB (2008); U.S. LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. Scores of them streamed across the parking lot of the Selma Tractor Company. "I fought in World War II," Mr. Williams said, "and I once was captured by the German army, and I want to tell you that the Germans never were as inhuman as the state troopers of Alabama. As many as 25,000 people participated in the roughly 50-mile (80-km) march. In March 1965, thousands of people held a series of marches in the U.S. state of Alabama in an effort to get that right back. Tells the Legislature to Link Increase to U. S. Action or Risk Loss of Industry, Tax Withholding May Be Revised:
After Jackson died of his wounds just over a week later in Selma, leaders called for a march to the state capital, Montgomery, to bring attention to the injustice of Jackson’s death, the ongoing police violence, and the sweeping violations of African Americans’ civil rights. While U.S. District Court Judge Frank Johnson, Jr., agreed to hear the petition, he also issued a restraining order forbidding any further demonstrations in the interim. Demonstrators carrying a banner reading “We march with Selma!” in the Harlem section of New York City, March 1965. The other newsmen were finally allowed to follow the retreat. ... We have already waited 100 years and more, and the time for waiting is gone.”.
The officers left after an hour, and tonight the Negroes emerged from their houses and poured into Browns Chapel for a mass meeting. Doctors and nurses threaded feverishly through the crowd administering first aid and
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"There is no word to be had," the major replied. On March 9 King led more than 2,000 individuals on a march to the bridge. The troopers rushed forward, their blue uniforms and white helmets blurring into a flying wedge as they moved. After about 10 minutes, most of the Negroes were rounded up. "May we have a word with the major?" Gross Integration Plan Backs Allen on Schools; Omits Busing and Pairing:
Selma March, also called Selma to Montgomery March, political march from Selma, Alabama, to the state’s capital, Montgomery, that occurred March 21–25, 1965. When the other newsmen arrived, more than 100 possemen were packed into Sylvan Street a block from the church. Selma, Ala., March 7 - Alabama state troopers and volunteer officers of the Dallas County sheriff's office tore through a column of Negro demonstrators with tear gas, nightsticks and whips here Force 'Strictly Defensive' - Arrival Is Protested by Hanoi and Peking: Washington Is Striving to Influence Moscow Against Militancy: Russians Silent 2 Weeks They began to move toward the city through the smell of the tear gas, coughing and crying as they stumbled onto Pettus Bridge. The marchers had passed about three dozen more possemen Be on the lookout for your Britannica newsletter to get trusted stories delivered right to your inbox. Your march is not conclusive to the public safety. “We Shall Overcome”: LBJ and the 1965 Voting Rights Act, “How Long, Not Long”: Selma to Montgomery, Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, National Geographic Society - The Selma-to-Montgomery Marches, The White House - Selma to Montgomery: 50 Years Later, Public Broadcasting Service - George Wallace - Selma March, Selma March - Children's Encyclopedia (Ages 8-11), Selma March - Student Encyclopedia (Ages 11 and up). Mr. Gibson said the Negroes fell back momentarily, then surged forward and began throwing bricks and bottles. There is only the struggle for human rights. The Negroes roared
On this day in 1965, known in history as “Bloody Sunday,” some 600 people began a 54-mile march from Selma, Alabama, to the state Capitol in Montgomery.
Selma March, political march led by Martin Luther King, Jr., from Selma, Alabama, to the state’s capital, Montgomery, that occurred March 21–25, 1965. A state trooper swings a billy club at John Lewis (right foreground), chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, during a march for voting rights in Selma, Ala., March … On February 18, 1965, in Marion, the county seat of Perry county, near Selma, a state trooper shot Jimmie Lee Jackson, a young African American man, during a nighttime demonstration. Led by Hosea Williams, one of King’s SCLC lieutenants, and Lewis, some 600 demonstrators walked, two by two, the six blocks to the Edmund Pettus Bridge that crossed the Alabama River and led out of Selma. ABC News interrupted its television premiere of the movie “Judgment at Nuremberg,” about the postwar Nazi war-crimes trials, to show footage of the violence in Selma.
In Selma, where African-Americans made up more than half the population, they constituted about 2 percent of the registered voters. About 525 Negroes had left Browns Chapel and walked six blocks to Broad Street, then across Pettus Bridge and the Alabama River, where a cold wind cut at their faces and whipped their coats. In 1965, at the height of the modern civil rights movement, activists organized a march for voting rights, from Selma, Alabama, to Montgomery, the state capital. Civil Rights march ends as ‘Bloody Sunday,' March 7, 1965, Trump requires food aid boxes to come with a letter from him, Trump’s ex-national security adviser says president is ‘aiding and abetting’ Putin, Endangered Republicans back Senate Democrats' bill opposing Obamacare lawsuit, House approves $2.2 trillion Covid measure as bipartisan talks remain stalled, Trump basks in cheers of Minnesota rally, far from debate criticism. In late 1964, as SNCC intensified its registration campaign in response to the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, local law enforcement—led by the county’s militant segregationist sheriff, Jim Clark (who wore a button that read “Never!”)—resisted with increasing violence (including the use of electric cattle prods against demonstrators). | AP Photo. Mrs. Boynton lay semiconscious on a table. They stopped. The marchers were told that they had two minutes to disperse. The ground floor of the two-story patronage next to the church was turned into an emergency hospital for an hour and a half. their approval. The wedge moved with such force that it seemed almost to pass over the waiting column instead of through it. After the attack on the marchers, Dr. King issued a statement announcing plans to begin another march Tuesday covering the 50 miles from Selma to Montgomery.
George C. Wallace's order against a protest march from Selma to Montgomery. By early February 1965, with the SCLC’s organizing efforts in full swing, police violence had escalated and at least 2,000 demonstrators had been jailed in Dallas county. Led by Martin Luther King, Jr., the march was the culminating event of several tumultuous weeks during which demonstrators twice attempted to march but were stopped, once violently, by local police. They were commemorating the death of Jimmie Lee Jackson, who had been shot on Feb. 18 by a state trooper while trying to protect his mother during a civil rights demonstration. Ron Gibson, a reporter for The Birmingham News, reached Browns Chapel ahead of the other newsmen. In the ensuing melee, a state trooper shot Jimmie Lee Jackson, a 26-year-old church deacon from Marion, as he attempted to protect his mother from the trooper’s nightstick. Ultimately, they allowed their members to participate in the march as individuals, led by SNCC chairman John Lewis. The women lay still. The two men then set off another barrage of tear gas and the women struggled to their feet, blinded and gasping, and limped across the road. Mr. Williams answered from the head of the column. Johnson, however, remained largely noncommittal. The Negroes stood unmoving. John Lewis, chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, was among the injured. Hundreds of Negroes, including many who had not been on the march, milled angrily in front of the church.