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Sep 29, 2020 · On March 15, 1965, President Johnson called upon Congress to create the Voting Rights Act of 1965. He said, In our system the first and most vital of all our rights is the right to vote. Jefferson described it as 'the ark of our safety.'. It is from the exercise of this right that all our other rights flow. President Lyndon Johnson’s Speech ...
Aug 6, 2015 · Aug. 6, 2015. Fifty years ago today, on Aug. 6, 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act, which effectively ended centuries of black disenfranchisement by banning barriers to ...
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- Overview
- “We Shall Overcome”: LBJ and the 1965 Voting Rights Act
- “How Long, Not Long”: Selma to Montgomery
On March 15, just over a week after Bloody Sunday, Pres. Lyndon B. Johnson introduced voting rights legislation in an address to a joint session of Congress. In what became a famous speech, he identified the clash in Selma as a turning point in U.S. history akin to the Battles of Lexington and Concord in the American Revolution. Invoking the protest song that had become the unofficial anthem of the American civil rights movement, Johnson said:
What happened in Selma is part of a far larger movement which reaches into every section and State of America. It is the effort of American Negroes to secure for themselves the full blessings of American life.
Their cause must be our cause too. Because it is not just Negroes, but really it is all of us, who must overcome the crippling legacy of bigotry and injustice.
And we shall overcome.
On March 15, just over a week after Bloody Sunday, Pres. Lyndon B. Johnson introduced voting rights legislation in an address to a joint session of Congress. In what became a famous speech, he identified the clash in Selma as a turning point in U.S. history akin to the Battles of Lexington and Concord in the American Revolution. Invoking the protest song that had become the unofficial anthem of the American civil rights movement, Johnson said:
What happened in Selma is part of a far larger movement which reaches into every section and State of America. It is the effort of American Negroes to secure for themselves the full blessings of American life.
Their cause must be our cause too. Because it is not just Negroes, but really it is all of us, who must overcome the crippling legacy of bigotry and injustice.
And we shall overcome.
On March 17, after several days of testimony, Judge Johnson ruled in favour of the protestors, saying,
The law is clear 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.
Under the terms of the ruling, an unlimited number of people would be permitted to begin and finish the march (which was required to be completed in five days), but only 300 marchers were to be allowed to cover the 22-mile (35-km) two-lane portion of U.S. Highway 80 that passed through Lowndes county.
In the days before the start of the renewed march, Governor Wallace indicated (or at least implied) in a phone call with President Johnson that the Alabama National Guard would protect the marchers. Then, addressing the state legislature, the governor announced that he expected the federal government to “provide for the safety and welfare of the so-called demonstrators.” Ultimately, Wallace sent a telegram to the president saying that Alabama could not afford to provide protection for the marchers and asking the federal government to do so. On March 20 a furious President Johnson responded by federalizing the command of elements of the Alabama National Guard and dispatching the U.S. Army.
On March 21 King led marchers (estimates of their number vary but generally fall between 3,000 and 8,000) out of Selma, over the Pettus Bridge, and on the road to Montgomery. En route protection was provided by more than 1,800 Alabama National Guardsmen and about 2,000 soldiers, as well as federal marshals and FBI agents. The marchers, whose numbers swelled to about 25,000 along the way, covered the roughly 50 miles (80 km) to Montgomery in five days, arriving at the state capital on March 25.
There King addressed the crowd, delivering what would become known as his “How Long, Not Long” speech, which culminated in his recitation of “The Battle Hymn of the Republic”:
Nov 16, 2009 · On August 6, 1965, President Lyndon Baines Johnson signs the Voting Rights Act, guaranteeing African Americans the right to vote. The bill made it illegal to impose restrictions on federal, state ...
Johnson states that every man should have the right to vote and that the civil rights problems challenge the entire country, not one region or group. The President asks Congress to help him pass legislation that dictates clear, uniform guidelines for voting regardless of race or ethnicity and that allows all citizens to register to vote free ...
Nov 9, 2009 · The Voting Rights Act of 1965, signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson, aimed to overcome legal barriers at the state and local levels that prevented African Americans from exercising their ...
On 6 August 1965 President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act into law, calling the day “a triumph for freedom as huge as any victory that has ever been won on any battlefield” (Johnson, “Remarks in the Capitol Rotunda”). The law came seven months after Martin Luther King launched a Southern Christian Leadership Conference ...
