Circumstances

Barack Obama delivered his Selma speech on 7th of March, 2015, from the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama, to commemorate fifty years since the Selma to Montgomery marches.

The Selma to Montgomery marches

The Selma to Montgomery marches were three protest marches organized in  Alabama in 1965 by non-violent civil rights activists who wanted to express the desire of the African-American community to exercise their right to vote. The marches were planned to take place on the highway from Selma to the state capital of Montgomery. They were a response to discriminatory laws in the Southern states of the US that were used to prevent African-Americans from registering to vote and voting. The marches were also part of a larger movement for civil rights.

The first peaceful march took place on 7th of...