Selma Bridge Crossing Jubilee

Susannah Heschel was invited to Selma for commemorations of Bloody Sunday. These events commemorate Bloody Sunday and the Voting Rights Act, that hard earned victory that was gutted by the Supreme Court and is being supported by Republican legislators around the nation. It's time to fight for the passage of the John Lewis Voting Rights Act.

Affectionately called "The Jubilee" it was founded in Selma, Alabama as a nonprofit 501 (c)(3) organization. Our commitment is to the commemoration and preservation of the spirit of the struggle for the right to vote in this country and the world. Our goal is to inspire people of all ages and ethnic backgrounds to respect and appreciate the power to vote.

This annual event in Selma, Alabama, commemorates "Bloody Sunday," which occurred March 7, 1965, when a group of about 525 African American demonstrators gathered at Browns Chapel to demand the right to vote. They walked six blocks to Broad Street, then across the Edmund Pettus Bridge, where they were met by more than 50 state troopers and a few dozen postmen on horseback. When the demonstrators refused to turn back, they were brutally beaten. At least 17 were hospitalized, and 40 others received treatment for injuries and the effects of tear gas.

The attack, which was broadcast on national television, caught the attention of millions of Americans and became a symbol of the brutal racism of the South. Two weeks later, the Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. and 3,200 civil rights protesters marched the 49 miles from Selma to the state capital, Montgomery—an event that prompted Congress to pass the Voting Rights Act.

Every year the Bridge Crossing Jubilee, Inc., hosts the commemoration of this historic event and the struggle for the right to vote, by gathering at the foot of the Edmund Pettus Bridge in a festival of music, art, and historical remembrance.

Several years ago, this yearly event was dubbed "The Annual Pilgrimage to Selma". Tens of thousands of freedom-loving people flock to Selma the first weekend of every March to hear personal stories from surviving freedom fighters from the movement and walk hand in hand with history makers who were willing to lay down their lives for the right to have a voice in the country they helped to build. For over a decade the heroes of the movement and a host of other civic, political, and national leaders have made the annual pilgrimage to Selma, AL to join us in this event.

Selma Bridge Crossing Jubilee
Moment Magazine