The Voting Rights Act at 60: Remembering a Hard-Fought Fight

The Legacy of Selma and the Ongoing Fight for Voting Rights

Charles Mauldin stood near the front line of voting rights marchers as they crossed the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama, on March 7, 1965. This day would become known as "Bloody Sunday," a moment that shocked the nation and ultimately led to the passage of the U.S. Voting Rights Act just months later. Now, as the 60th anniversary of this landmark legislation approaches, those who were at the center of the struggle reflect on their experiences and express concerns that the hard-won rights are once again under threat.

A Day That Changed History

Mauldin was just 17 when he joined the ill-fated "Bloody Sunday" march. John Lewis, who later became a long-serving Georgia congressman, and Hosea Williams were among the first to lead the march. Mauldin was part of the third group. He recalls how, by that point, fear had been replaced by determination. “What was happening in Selma and to us was so unjust that we were determined to fight it regardless of the consequences,” he said, now 77.

The state troopers, dressed in gas masks and helmets, gave the marchers two minutes to disperse. Hosea Williams asked for a moment to pray, but the violence quickly followed. State troopers, along with deputies and men on horseback, attacked the marchers—men, women, and children alike. They used billy clubs, tear gas, and even cattle prods, while horses trampled through the crowd.

A Cause Worth Dying For

Richard Smiley, then 16, was also among the marchers. He carried candy in his pockets, hoping to have something to eat if they ended up in jail. As they approached the bridge, he saw about 100 white men on horseback. “The only qualification they needed was to hate Blacks,” Smiley recalled. He admitted that their knees were shaking, not knowing if they might be killed. “We weren’t going to let fear stop us,” he said. “At that point, we would’ve given up our life for the right to vote.”

Selma in 1965 was a poor and racist city, according to Smiley. While there were some white supporters of the cause, they were too afraid to speak out. “They couldn’t stand up because of what would happen to them,” he said.

The Impact of the Voting Rights Act

The Voting Rights Act brought sweeping changes across the American South, dismantling discriminatory voting practices and increasing Black voter turnout. President Lyndon Johnson called the act “a triumph for freedom as huge as any victory won on any battlefield” when he signed it into law on August 6, 1965.

However, both Mauldin and Smiley see echoes of the past in today’s political climate. While not as extreme as the Jim Crow-era policies, they note that there are still attacks on the voting rights of Black and brown Americans. “The same struggle we had 61 years ago is the same struggle we have today,” Mauldin said.

Current Challenges to Voting Rights

Some states have enacted laws that make voting more difficult, including strict voter ID requirements, limits on mail-in voting, and other changes. Republican-led states, under the leadership of former President Donald Trump, have pushed back against diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives. Trump claimed he “ended the tyranny” of such programs.

The Justice Department, which once focused on protecting voting access, is now investigating alleged voter fraud and noncitizen voting. It has also joined Alabama in opposing a request to require future congressional maps to be precleared, calling it “a dramatic intrusion on principles of federalism.”

An Unfinished Struggle

Hank Sanders, a former state senator and organizer of the annual Bloody Sunday commemoration in Selma, emphasizes that the fight for voting rights is far from over. “The fight for voting rights was a long struggle, and so is the struggle to maintain those rights,” he said.

Two weeks after Bloody Sunday, Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. led another march to Montgomery, Alabama. Sanders was among the thousands who completed the final stretch of the journey. He recalls the powerful moment when King declared, “How long, not long.” But reality set in when Black candidates lost in an overwhelmingly Black county the following year.

For decades, the Voting Rights Act required states with a history of discrimination to get federal approval before changing election procedures. However, in 2013, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the provision determining which states were covered was outdated and unconstitutional. This led to a surge of new voting laws across the country.

“I never thought that 50 years later, we’d still be fighting,” Sanders said. “Not just to expand voting rights, but to protect the ones we already have.”