National March Into Literacy Month on March, 2025: Why was Bloody Sunday, Selma, Alabama, (March 7, 1965) important?& also how important?

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Why was Bloody Sunday, Selma, Alabama, (March 7, 1965) important?& also how important? President Lyndon Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act of 1965 less than six months later after Bloody Sunday, Selma, Alabama, --------------------------------------------. Voting Rights Act of 1965

89th United States Congress

Date passed: August 3, 1965 (House)

August 4, 1965 (Senate)

The National Voting Rights Act of 1965 (42 U.S.C. § 1973–1973aa-6)[1] outlawed discriminatory voting practices that had been responsible for the widespread disenfranchisement of African Americans in the United States. Echoing the language of the 15th Amendment, the Act prohibited states from imposing any "voting qualification or prerequisite to voting, or standard, practice, or procedure ... to deny or abridge the right of any citizen of the United States to vote on account of race or color."[2] Specifically, Congress intended the Act to outlaw the practice of requiring otherwise qualified voters to pass literacy tests in order to register to vote, a principal means by which southern states had prevented African-Americans from exercising the franchise.[3] The Act was signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson, a Democrat, who had signed the landmark Civil Rights Act of 1964 into law.

The Act established extensive federal oversight of elections administration, providing that states with a history of discriminatory voting practices (so-called "covered jurisdictions") could not implement any change affecting voting without first obtaining the approval of the Department of Justice, a process known as preclearance. These enforcement provisions applied to states and political subdivisions (mostly in the South) that had used a "device" to limit voting and in which less than 50 percent of the population was registered to vote in 1964. Congress has amended and extended the Act several times since its original passage, the most recent being the 25-year extension signed by President George W. Bush on July 27, 2006. The Act is widely considered a landmark in civil-rights legislation, though some of its provisions have sparked political controversy. During the debate over the 2006 extension, some Republican members of Congress objected to renewing the preclearance requirement (the Act's primary enforcement provision), arguing that it represents an overreach of federal power and places unwarranted bureaucratic demands on Southern states that have long since abandoned the discriminatory practices the Act was meant to eradicate.[4] Conservative legislators also opposed requiring states with large Spanish-speaking populations to provide bilingual ballots.[5] Congress nonetheless voted to extend the Act for twenty-five years with its original enforcement provisions left intact.[6]

-------------------------------------------------------- Impact of voting rights march still felt 40 years later

By Sebastian Kitchen, Montgomery (Ala.) Advertiser

People from throughout the world will meet in central Alabama this weekend to remember the 40th anniversary of "Bloody Sunday" and the Selma-to-Montgomery voting rights march.

Alabama state troopers swing nightsticks to break up a civil rights voting march in Selma, Ala., in this March 7, 1965 photo.

Historians, civil rights leaders and former presidents believe the march and Bloody Sunday, in which 17 people were hospitalized after they were beaten by state troopers and local law enforcement officers, galvanized national support for voting rights for all Americans. Activities to mark the annual Bridge Crossing Jubilee in Selma continue through March 12, when a reenactment of the march will conclude at the steps of the Alabama state Capitol, where the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. addressed more than 25,000 people in 1965.

"Though we were traumatized by the horror at the hands of the state and its extralegal apparatus, the posses and vigilantes, we never doubted that the right to vote, one person one vote, would become a reality in the state of Alabama," said Gwen Patton, who helped with the 1965 march and is an organizer of anniversary events in Montgomery, Ala. "And when that happened, it was a joyous day."

The televised broadcast of the march brought national attention to the mistreatment of blacks and the need for equal voting rights.

The first attempt, March 7, 1965, failed as state troopers beat back marchers as they attempted to cross the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma.

With the protection of a federal court order, about 3,200 people set out from Selma on March 21. The march ended March 25 at the steps of the state Capitol. The number of marchers swelled as they neared the Capitol.

President Lyndon Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act of 1965 less than six months later.

Ella Bell, who turned 17 on the last day of the origin

What was the purpose of the voting right act of 1965?

All of the above.

In the century following Reconstruction, African Americans in the South faced overwhelming obstacles to voting. Despite the Fifteenth and Nineteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution,which had enfranchised black men and women, southern voter registration boards used poll taxes, literacy tests, and other bureaucratic impediments to deny African Americans their legal rights. Southern blacks also risked harassment, intimidation, economic reprisals, and physical violence when they tried to register or vote. As a result, African Americans had little if any political power, either locally or nationally. In Mississippi, for instance, only five percent of eligible blacks were registered to vote in 1960.

The Voting Rights Act of 1965, grew out of both public protest and private political negotiation. Starting in 1961, CORE joined SCLC in staging nonviolent demonstrations in Georgia, and Birmingham. They hoped to attract national media attention and pressure the U.S. government to protect Black's constitutional rights. Newspaper photos and TV broadcasts of Birmingham's racist police commissioner, Eugene "Bull" Connor, and his men violently attacking the protesters with water hoses, police dogs, and nightsticks awakened the consciences of whites.

Selma, Alabama was the site of the next campaign. In the first three months of 1965, Local residents and visiting volunteers held a series of marches demanding an equal right to vote. As in Birmingham, they met with violence and imprisonment. In the worst attack yet, on Sunday, March 7, a group of Alabama state troopers, local sheriff's officers, and unofficial possemen used tear gas and clubs against 600 peaceful marchers. By now, the nation was watching.

President Lyndon B. Johnson made civil rights one of his administration's top priorities, using his formidable political skills to pass the Twenty-Fourth Amendment, which outlawed poll taxes, in 1964. Now, a week after "Bloody Sunday" in Selma, Johnson gave a televised speech before Congress in which he denounced the assault. Two days later, the President sent the Voting Rights bill to Congress.

The resolution, signed into law on August 6, 1965, empowered the federal government to oversee voter registration and elections in counties that had used tests to determine voter eligibility or where registration or turnout had been less than 50 percent in the 1964 presidential election. It also banned discriminatory literacy tests and expanded voting rights for non-English speaking Americans.

The law's effects were wide and powerful. By 1968, nearly 60 percent of eligible African Americans were registered to vote in Mississippi, and other southern states showed similar improvement. Between 1965 and 1990, the number of black state legislators and members of Congress rose from two to 160.

weekly topics for daycare?

I use "themes" in my class as a way to help the children connect skills we work on with their environment and what's going on around them. I would suggest starting with things that are concrete and personally relevant (self-concept related topics like all about me, names, the senses and familiar ideas like family, friends, homes) and gradually working towards more abstract ones. I try to make sure that if a theme is more abstract, it is something that the children are very interested in, like dinosaurs and/or relates to the season or time of year (transportation between Thanksgiving and Christmas when families are doing a lot of travel, pumpkins during fall, just before halloween, polar animals in the winter, construction and building around Father's Day). Children absorb information better and are more interested when it is relevant to them. You need topics that are neither too broad nor too specific. Too specific and it's hard to come up with ideas, too broad and there's too much to fit into one week of learning activities. Here is the schedule I came up with for my class (Keep in mind that the theme we learn about is just one aspect of our curriculum, so there is more than just "coming up with a theme". Math, literacy, motor skills, social skills, etc. are our main focus and are weaved throughout all the activities we do) I've included in parentheses the connection for some of the themes that may be unclear:

September:

Names

All About Me

My Five Senses

Fall Season and Harvest

Apples

October

Fire Safety and Prevention (October is National Fire Prevention Month. During this time we also focus on emergencies, other emergency workers like police and EMTs, 9-1-1, etc.).

Leaves

Pumpkins

Halloween

November

Friends and Friendship

Families

Houses and Homes

Thanksgiving

December

Transportation and Things That Go

Winter Season

Polar Animals

Holiday Celebrations

New Year’s Around the World

January

Bears

Animals in Winter

Kindness and Getting Along With Others (Martin Luther King Day is in January)

Community Helpers

February

Opposites, Light and Shadows (Groundhog Day is February 2nd)

Valentine’s Day

Dental Health (February is National Children's Dental Health Month)

Dinosaurs

March

Happy Birthday Dr. Seuss and Celebrating Reading (March is National Reading Month, with March 2nd, Dr. Seuss's birthday being Read Across America Day)

Weather

Spring Season

Health and Nutrition (March is National Nutrition Month)

Baby Animals

April

Flowers, Plants, and Trees

Caterpillars and Butterflies

Our Earth and Taking Care of the Environment (Earth Day is April 22)

Fairy Tales

May

Pets

Down on the Farm

The Zoo

Pond Animals

June

Feelings

Buildings and Construction (Father's Day is the third Sunday in June)

Summer

These topics, I've found, are easy to develop ideas for, but aren't so broad that it's hard to find a focus. Some teachers also include Colors and Shapes as themes. I haven't because colors, shapes, numbers, letters, etc. are things that we incorporate every day, but for very young children (toddlers rather than preschool or pre-k) it might be beneficial to build a whole theme around them as a way to introduce them.

Best of luck!