http://www.michigancitizen.com/default.asp?sourceid=&smenu=76&twindow=Default&mad=No&sdetail=2096&wpage=1&skeyword=&sidate=&ccat=&ccatm=&restate=&restatus=&reoption=&retype=&repmin=&repmax=&rebed=&rebath=&subname=40th Anniversary of the Voting Rights Act
By Congressman John
Conyers, Jr.
On August 6th, we celebrated the 40th anniversary of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. This Act has been widely hailed as the single most important achievement of our civil rights laws. In its 40 years, the Voting Rights Act has enabled political empowerment and voter enfranchisement for all Americans.
When the Act passed in 1965, I was one of six African-American, five Latino, and four Asian-American Members of Congress. The civil rights era was in full bloom, with sit-ins and marches across the South in response to the massive resistance to the call for equal rights. Brave Americans of different races, ethnicities, and religions risked their lives to stand up for political equality.
The pursuit of equal voting rights was most dramatically displayed on the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama on March 7, 1965, a day that would come to be known as “Bloody Sunday.” On this day, nonviolent civil rights marchers, like John Lewis, were beaten, hit, kicked, spit on, brutalized, and demeaned.
The news media brought home to all Americans the horror and violence that propped the system of segregation, forcing us to a decision point about our nation’s democratic ideals. Without sacrifice by countless individuals in Selma and across the South, the struggle for equality could not have been won nor this legislation passed by Congress.
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