Registering to vote as a Black citizen in Selma was a difficult procedure for decades. This was due to interference from the Voter Registration Office and later the White Citizen's Council. It didn't take much effort to keep Blacks off the Voter Rolls, due to a status quo apathy. There was a small influential group that pushed to educate the local Blacks of their rights, but it was not until SNCC and Rev. Martin Luther King brought a well organized group to Selma that change was a reality.
On February 17th 1965 in the nearby town of Marion, a nighttime protest went wrong and Jimmie Lee Jackson was killed. This death was the catalyst for the Selma to Montgomery March.
On March 7th the first march was led by Hosea Williams and John Lewis. They were met by Alabama State Troopers and Dallas County's Flood Posse, headed by Sheriff Jim Clark. The marchers were routed back into Selma after not obeying the demand to disperse. Tear gas was used and some were beat with clubs. Many were taken to the Good Samaritan Hospital, but most were chased back to the Brown Chapel area. This day is known as Bloody Sunday.
King attempted a second march on March 9th with many clergymen and nuns, but decided to call it off, when they got down HWY 80 and were met by the same group of law enforcement. This march is called Turnaround Tuesday.
A week later a Federal Judge ruled the marchers could not be blocked and after 5 days of walking they arrived in Montgomery. In August of '65 President Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act into law. The Edmund Pettus Bridge is now a National Historic Landmark, because the marchers had to walk over it on the way to Montgomery.