Bloody Sunday and the Voting Rights Act

" I gave a little blood on that bridge in Selma, Alabama for the right to vote. I am not going to stand by and let the supreme court take the right to vote away from us."- John Lewis (2013)

Prior to the 1965 Voting Rights Act, the Kennedy Administration negotiated an agreement with people of the civil rights movement in 1961. This was called The Voting Rights Pact of 1961. This pact also “funded voter registration efforts by these civil rights organizations” (Valelly 2004; pg.173). The pact was unstable. Instead of quelling racial tensions, however, it provoked even more racial tension and violence by white supremacists. Nonetheless, the pact remained and was reestablished. Kennedy’s successor, Lyndon b. Johnson had gave black civil rights leaders a chance to renegotiate the 1961 pact, which occurred in Selma, Alabama. On March 7th of 1965, a peaceful protest march led by Martin Luther King Jr. from Selma to Montgomery turned into a “brutal assault by Alabama state troopers” (Valelly 2004; pg.174). The incident caught Johnson’s attention, causing him to address a joint session of Congress. He also called for a swift passage of a voting rights statute.

Valelly, Richard M. The Two Reconstructions The Struggle for Black Enfranchisement. University of Chicago Press, 2009.