Mississippi Freedom Summer and the Selma March as SNCC's major efforts
Lewis describes the major activities of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) during his tenure as the organization's chairman. Arguing that SNCC adopted the slogan "one man, one vote" after the 1963 March on Washington, Lewis argues that the work SNCC did during the Mississippi Freedom Summer of 1964 and in Selma, Alabama, in 1965 constituted SNCC's major efforts in the movement. The majority of this passage focuses on Lewis's belief that the Selma March in 1965 was directly resonsible for the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and that it also brought tensions between SNCC and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) to a head. In addition, he describes the march from Selma to Montgomery, particularly the violent opposition it faced, in detail.
Citing this Excerpt
Oral History Interview with John Lewis, November 20, 1973. Interview A-0073. Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007) in the Southern Oral History Program Collection, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Full Text of the Excerpt
- UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER:
-
How would you describe the major activities of SNCC, especially when you
were present?
- JOHN LEWIS:
-
The major effort of SNCC during the period of 1963 to the early part of
1966 are probably the most significant effort, I think, was probably the
Mississippi summer project of 1964. and the Selma effort. You see, SNCC
first went into Selma, for example, in 1962. The first SNCC organizer
went into Selma with just trying to make some contacts based on a
limited amount of research. In 1962, only 2.1% of the black people in
Selma were registered to vote. And it was at this point in the history
of SNCC, an attempt to organize the people around the right to vote.
SNCC was one of the organizations which received some support from the
first VEP. So, SNCC people working in Selma in 1962 and in Mississippi
and also in Albany and southwest Georgia, did receive some sort of
funding from Voter Education to try to help organize local voter
registration. I think the effort of SNCC to dramatize SNCC interest and
involvement in politics came with the March on Washington in 1963 in the
speech that I gave. We emphasized the whole question of the vote. Tried
to make the point that Kennedy opposed Civil Rights legislation, would
not make it possible for people without a sixth
grade education . . . would make it almost impossible for them to
register and to be considered literate. His bill said, in effect, that
someone with a sixth grade education should be considered literate, but
it didn't go as far as we wanted it to go. That's when we atarted this
whole idea of one man, one vote is the African cry; it should be ours
too. It must be ours. And that became a slogan of SNCC. It was on our
literature on our letter-head, on posters, on everything. And in late
September of '63, after the bombing in Birmingham of the
church-September 16th was the day of the
bombing-some of us went straight from the funeral of the four
girls in Birmingham to Selma where we atarted organizing
the whole push around the right to vote. On
October 18th, 1963 we had one of the first, what we call
"Freedom Day", in Selma. For more than eight hundred
black people stood in line all day at the County Court House to register
to vote. By the end of the day only five people had passed through that
line. That effort sort of got side-tracked because at the same time we
were planning for the big effort in Mississippi-the
Mississippi Summer Project of '64. And at the same time with all of the
concentration in Mississippi during the early part of '64 we did have
some limited work going on in Selma. But I would
say that the Sema effort and the Mississippi summer . . . .
- UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER:
-
When was the confrontation in Selma?
- JOHN LEWIS:
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March 7th, 1965. We had what had been a series of . . . .
- UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER:
-
You said that the voting rights act resulted directly from this?
- JOHN LEWIS:
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If there is any single event that gave birth to the Voter Rights Act, it
was the Selma effort. March 7th was just sort of a combination of
things. We had had a series of protests, organizing efforts in Selma in
late '63 and some in '64 and '65. I will never forget when therewas some
attempt on the part of SNCC as an organization not to bring SCLC in. But
the local people-Mrs. Boynton head of
Dallas County Voters' League, Rev. Frederick Reid, who is now a member
of the Selma City Council-these two emerging local leaders of
Selma wanted to bring Dr. King in. Some of the people in SNCC felt that
Martin King shouldn't come into Sema and some of us felt that he should.
I was one of the ones that felt that he should, that he would bring some
attention to the problem and help dramatize
the problem.
- UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER:
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What was the opposition's feeling?
- JOHN LEWIS:
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Well, some people felt that, you know, SNCC had been there since 1962
working and organizing and we have a vital local movement going and why,
at this , should an organization like SCLC come
in. Some people felt that SCLC operated on one level and sort of a
crisis oriented and a mass effort for a particular
day or a particular week to dramatize and then they were gone. People
in SNCC felt that you stay there and you work and you organize and you
bring the community along. That you don't go in and do for the community
but you bring the community to a point where it can do for itself. The
people did make a decision to invite SCLC in and they came and joined
in. And they started a series of dramatic
demonstrations which culminated in the March 7th. But even in the early
part of January, we had one of the first mass demonstrations. Jim Clark,
on that particular day in January said to me, I was leading that
particular march, "John Lewis, you are an outside
agitator." I didn't consider myself an outside agitator because
I am a native of Alabama. Did grow up truthfully all the way from Selma
about ninety miles. "You are an outside agitator and an
agitator is the lowest form of humanity," and just sort of
walked away and we kept walking toward the
County Court House and got arrested. That type of
action kept going.
In the meantime, it was not just a demonstration going on in the city of
Selma. There were many SNCC people and SCLC people working out in the
rural part of the country organizing a community group trying to get
people to come down to the Court House to register. After the violence
in Selma, and the violence in Perry County and Merrian, Alabama where
Jackson was shot, some people felt that we
had to march on Montgomery. Made a decision to march. Some people
opposed the march and some people supported it. We decided to march on
March 7th, '65, but when I look back I'm really not sure on that
particular day when a group of us about six
hundred of us decided to march, whether we were literally prepared to
march from Selma to Montgomery that day. Because we hadn't really made
any plans as to where to stop along the way. We did have bags and
knapsacks and that type of thing, but we hadn't made any plans to have
food and necessary supplies along the way. We gathered together at Brown
Chapel A. M. E. Church that Sunday afternoon about two o'clock. Dr. King
for some reason didn't come to Selma that day.
Andy Young, Hosea Williams, James Bevel from SCLC-they had to
draw to find out what person from their organization
would lead the march. I was leading the march from SNCC and Hosea
represented SCLC, and we started marching. After we crossed the bridge,
Governor Wallace in the meantime warned us that the march would not be
allowed. But we insisted that we had to the right to march. We crossed
the bridge and we met a sea of State Troopers. One of the State Troopers
identified himself as Major Cloud and said on
the bullhorn, "This is an unlawful march and it will not be
allowed to continue. I give you three minutes to disperse." We
waited the three minutes and just stood and when the three minutes were
up he told the Troopers to advance and they had the helmets and the gas
masks on and the bull whips and clubs. And they came in.
- UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER:
-
How did you feel at that moment when you saw them coming?
- JOHN LEWIS:
-
I felt frightened. I felt that we had to stay there. I felt that we had
to stand there. There was something that was said and you couldn't turn
back. We had to stay there and I didn't believe that the Troopers would
do what they did, for some strange reason, but I felt that we had to
stay there. And we stayed there. I remember, we were beaten.
- UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER:
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You got a fractured skull in that?
- JOHN LEWIS:
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Yes, I did.
- UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER:
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Was that a single blow from a Trooper?
- JOHN LEWIS:
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A single blow apparently from a club, I guess, of a Trooper, but I felt
like when that whole thing from the gas that this is really the end. I
guess the greatest concern was also for the people. Most of the march
was made of young teen-agers and women. A lot of the people had just
left the church and came straight to Brown Chapel A. M. E. Church. It
was a frightening moment, really terrifying.
- UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER:
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Was that the most frightening moment you have ever had?
- JOHN LEWIS:
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Yes, without question. I think we were literally lucky, all of us, for no
one to be seriously hurt or killed. You know, Sherrif Clark had a posse
that he had organized. He had people with bull whips, with ropes running
through the marchers on horses beating people. But people got together
and I think that helped to electrify the black community in Selma and
the whole area of Alabama. It had a tremendous impact on the country.
People couldn't believe that that could happen. And the response of
people, particularly people who had supported SNCC and SCLC all across
the country . . . A series of demonstrations
took place, I think, by that Tuesday by friends of
SNCC in different cities. There were about eighty sympathy marchers.
Protests had been organized; some people slipped into the Justice
Department in Washington. The year that President Johnson served, his
daughter couldn't sleep because people had been singing, "We
shall overcome" all around the White House.