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NEWS & LETTERS, April - May 2007Black/Red ViewPoliticians distort Selma march legacyby John Alan The 42nd anniversary of the historic 1965 march in Selma, Alabama, has entered into today's Democratic presidential politics. On March 4, 2007 both Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton acknowledged that event as opening up presidential politics for the likes of them. They would not be in position to be candidates without this historic turning point in U.S. history. But the meaning of the march in Selma goes far beyond any candidate's political ambitions or even politics itself. The real purpose of the original march, the African Americans' struggle for full recognition of their humanity, is a struggle that remains unfinished to this day. In 1965 Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s organization, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) joined the protest march from Selma, Ala., to the state capital in Montgomery. This proposed 54-mile march petitioned Gov. George C. Wallace for protection for Blacks who wanted to register to vote. They got nothing from the Governor then. Instead, on Sunday, March 7, 1965, 600 marchers out of Selma were attacked at the Edmund Pettus Bridge by state troopers. They were clubbed and gassed and driven back to Selma. Sheriff's deputies rioted in Black neighborhoods, sending dozens more to the hospital. The event became known as "Bloody Sunday." The whole nation became outraged as they watched it on TV. This outrage drew many thousands to join the march two weeks later for the whole 54-mile route at the end of which 30,000 rallied when Martin Luther King Jr. addressed the conclusion of the march in Montgomery. The march did ultimately lead to the passage of the Voting Rights Act in August of 1965, which suspended the use of literacy tests and other voter qualification tests that were used to prevent African Americans from registering to vote. Today's candidates are relating to African Americans through their window on this history, simply as voters, contending for their share of that bloc of votes. But the right to vote in 1965 was only a particular aspect of the African-American struggle for self-determination. The demand of the Civil Rights Movement was "Freedom NOW!" As events were unfolding Raya Dunayevskaya wrote that freedom cannot be confined to "legalisms" and addressed how to make it more concrete: "What is needed now is a unity of theory and practice in which the masses are not only participants in action, but in thought. Instead of never-ending dialogue with the administration, it is time that the leadership of the civil rights movement started one with its own ranks. The dialogue must no longer be put off on the grounds that 'we are an activity organization.' Thinking, too, is an activity. An awareness of the significance of an action is itself a step toward total freedom. It is imperative that what has been implicit in the freedom struggles all along, now become explicit. Dialogue with the ranks involved in direct actions can make it so. Nothing else will fully arm them in their struggle against the forces of reaction. Nothing else will transform the goal of freedom into a reality." Today's politicians' attempts to truncate the historic march to just a question of voting reflects the limits of their concept of freedom, which is only political emancipation. Political emancipation of the "abstract citizen" is the most a capitalist society can offer. It has to be carried through to full HUMAN emancipation where everyone realizes their social power and freedom in their everyday lives. We can't let the politicians steal our history for their narrow purposes and divert us from the quest for full freedom. |
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