Today, March 7, marks the commemoration of Bloody Sunday.
On March 7, 1965, approximately 600 civil rights demonstrators were attacked by police while marching from Selma, AL to Montgomery, AL. They were charged at by state troopers on horseback and fired at by police with tear gas.
The purpose of the march was to promote black voter registration and to protest the killing of Jimmie Jackson. News of "Bloody Sunday" fled across the country in almost every newspaper and on every television network.
The picture below is said to be one of the most iconic image taken on that day. It is a photograph of Mrs. Amelia Boynton lying unconscious on the ground. Over 50 people were injured and one was killed.
Eight days later, President Lyndon B. Johnson presented a bill to Congress that would become the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
On March 9, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. arrived in Selma and arranged a second "symbolic" march to the Edmund Pettus bridge.
A third march took place. This time 3,200 people took part at the starting point. By the time they reached Montgomery, the march included almost 25,000 participants.
Less than five months later the Voting Rights Act of 1965 was passed.
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