March 19, 2005 marked the 40th anniversary of the Selma to Montgomery March for Voting Rights, the most significant of all the civil rights marches and the one that led directly to the Voting Rights Act of 1965. The March attracted Americans from all over the county and every walk of life. Alabama Black people came from every corner of the state to witness the March, and many joined it. The sight of 25,000 black and white people marching freely and without fear through the center of their state must have caused many Alabamans to doubt the evidence of their eyes. It was a sight most never expected to see, and it changed Alabama and the South forever.
Although Martin Luther King, Ralph Bunch, Rabbi Abraham Heschel, and many other notables led the initial 4,000 marchers out of Brown’s Chapel and onto Highway 80 heading to Montgomery, the March was really the creation and the expression of ordinary people. Responding to the violence that preceded the March and the two unsuccessful attempts to stage it (see Violence page) thousands of Americans from every corner of the country left their jobs and their homes and journeyed to Selma to lend their support to the cause of voting justice for black Southerners. Clergy came in overwhelming numbers, but so did housewives, students, and blue and white collar workers. For civil rights activists, who had struggled for more than a decade to awaken the nation to the cause of racial justice, the March was concrete evidence that mainstream American had finally gotten their message.
The spirit of the March was unforgettable. The singing was almost continuous. Lines of marchers would spontaneously break into chants or freedom songs, and although the weather was by turns cold and rainy, or blazing hot, nobody seemed to mind weather or fatigue. As one Montgomery resident put it: “My feets is tired but my soul is rested!” For myself, it seemed as if I walked the whole 54 miles backwards, peering through the lenses of my cameras, drinking in the spirit, the faces, the expressions of those who marched. At the end of each day I was exhausted, but I have no memory of where I slept, what I ate, or how I cared for my person.
The spirit on Thursday morning March 25th, was triumphant as 25,000 marchers formed up for their entrance into Montgomery. In Washington Congressmen were debating the Voting Rights Act, which would be passed in early August. But before the steps of the Alabama State Capitol, Martin Luther King foresaw the difficulties that waited. “The road ahead is not altogether a smooth one. There are no broad highways to lead us easily and inevitably to quick solutions. We are still in for a season of suffering.” But he continued, “However difficult the moment, however frustrating the hour, it will not be long, because truth crushed to the earth will rise again…because the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice. Because mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.”
The words of Martin Luther King -- his hopes and his warnings -- must inform us today. We have recently passed through several seasons of voting irregularities. Most of us are familiar with events in Florida during the 2000 Presidential election when large numbers of African-Americans and others were systematically disenfranchised. And many of us have doubts about the integrity of the 2004 vote in Ohio. These issues must not be ignored.
The Selma marchers of 1965 suffered beatings, arrest and even murder because they demanded the right to vote for everyone. Forty years later their struggle is not finished. It is the responsibility of each of us to carry forward that fight until the principle of One Person One Vote is not just a cherished ideal, but an actual reality.
Matt Herron
All photographs in the exhibition are the work of Matt Herron, one of the major civil rights photographers of the time, and are drawn from his archive of 27,000 civil rights images. Herron is also responsible for the selection, design and labeling of the show.