Organizers Ready to Commemorate 60th Anniversary of ‘Bloody Sunday’

Selma, Alabama, has a population less than 20,000 people.

As organizers welcome thousands of visitors to commemorate the 60^th anniversary of Bloody Sunday in Selma, Alabama, planners say 2025 feels different.

“This year feels heavy, especially here in Alabama,” Tafeni English-Relf, director of the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Alabama Office, tells BLACK ENTERPRISE.

Selma has a population of less than 20,000 people. However, it has a significant role in the Civil Rights Movement.

On March 7, 1965, nearly 600 peaceful protestors began marching from Selma to Montgomery to confront Governor George Wallace. Led by Hosea Williams and John Lewis, advocates were fed up with lack of justice for Jimmie Lee Jackson.

Alabama State Trooper James Bonard Fowler shot and killed the 26-year-old Baptist deacon during a civil rights protest in Marion, Alabama. In addition to protesting Jackson’s death, demonstrators protested the violation of their constitutional right to vote.

However, marchers from Selma were met with hostile law enforcement at the east end of the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma. Following Wallace’s orders, law enforcement told marches they had two minutes to disperse.

Williams asked to speak to the officer who had given the command, but the officer refused. Moments later, the commanding officer ordered state troopers to advance. Demonstrators were spat on, attacked with billy clubs and bullwhips, and overrun by horses. More than 50 people were hospitalized, including Lewis.

The attack is known as Bloody Sunday.

Fighting Forward In Selma

A little more than a week after Bloody Sunday in Selma, President Lyndon B. Johnson introduced voting rights legislation to protect the constitutional right to vote. He signed it into law on August 6, 1965.

“Since we’re centering Selma and the 60th anniversary of the bridge crossing, we have seen in Alabama since the Shelby County v. Holder case, the rapid rollback of voting rights legislation that was passed in 1965,” says English-Relf. “We’re [also] seeing lawmakers across the Deep South and across the nation continue to propose, pass, and adopt anti-voter bills into law that are hurting people in the South.”

According to English-Relf, this year’s commemoration theme is “Reimagining Democracy: A Call To Action.” The week will be filled with a series of events and workshops to engage voters throughout Alabama, especially high school and college students.

“It is so important that we convene young people, establish coalitions, and remind them that young people had a significant role in moving this country forward in the past and they can do that now,” English-Relf adds.

There will also be cultural celebrations, the annual wreath laying ceremony, which has been in place since John Lewis’ death. Guests will then convene on Alabama Capital Steps with a number of local organizations, including the ACLU of Alabama, Faith in Action, Alabama Arise, the Local Fair Housing Center.

“We will continue to fight back against these anti-democracy laws that deny communities of color an equal voice in government. We know that education is under attack, so we will fight against those, those types of things right, equal funding for education and equal investment in the infrastructure of the Deep South.”