With the death of Rep. John Lewis’, the online support is growing to rename Pettus Bridge Selma for the icon of the civil rights

With the death of Rep. John Lewis’, the online support is growing to rename Pettus Bridge Selma for the icon of the civil rights

In the wake of Rep. John Lewis he died on Friday, aged 80, asks the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama rose., After civil rights icon renamed. Lewis marched on the Edmund Pettus Bridge during the movement for civil rights the “Sunday of blood” March 7, 1965 Peaceful 150 Alabama State Troopers attacked the demonstrators as they tried to cross the bridge, while marching to Montgomery to vote request rights. Many demonstrators were severely beaten, then including the 25-year-old Lewis, whose skull was fractured. Despite his injuries, Lewis, as the chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) is listed on the attack during a hearing Federal less than a week later. “Bloody Sunday” has proven to be a critical moment in the movement for civil rights to be, the Voting Rights Act in 1965, Lewis helped spur that has been represented in Congress on the 5th District of Georgia and others held annual commemorative marches activists through the bridge in the following decades, even for the 50th anniversary in 2015, delivered a speech former President Barack Obama on the importance gear. Even if he had been diagnosed with stage 4 pancreatic cancer, Lewis still marched across the bridge last March “Bloody Sunday” to celebrate the 55th anniversary. The bridge in Selma is named in honor of Edmund Pettus, a US senator at the turn of the 20th century, it was a Confederate General during the Civil War and a Grand Dragon in Alabama Ku Klux Klan by Smithsonian Magazine. Now many online requests after the Democratic congresswoman is renamed, he said that their current names represent all that Lewis has faced. As of Saturday morning, a Change.org petition for the bridge is renamed after Lewis has over 390,498 signatures. “And ‘well beyond the time Edmund Pettus Bridge by Rep. John Lewis, a civil rights icon who was nearly his life on this bridge to the call,” the author Michael Starr said Hopkins petition in a statement on the petition page. “A bitter racist who awarded him unworthy of honor was Edmund Pettus. As we kill this long fanaticism bush country, we must erase the names of men like Edmund Pettus.” “There is a bridge that [the] need a new name, “the former prosecutor Preet Bharara tweeted on Saturday with a Lewis photos on the Pettus Bridge. Author Jill Filipovic tweeted their support renaming the bridge on Saturday. In June the draft Hopkins John Lewis Bridge started a campaign to rename the Edmund Pettus Bridge on Lewis and other names associated with other public interest to remove. There’s a bridge that needs a new name pic.twitter.com/RjwrzAAZrA – Preet Bharara (@PreetBharara) 18 Jul 2020 ‘would be the conscience of the Congress of renaming Edmund Pettus Bridge in John Lewis appropriate, “NBC News correspondent Andrew Mitchell tweeted Saturday. “When I told him how the brothers Kennedy not for the meeting with Dr. King Oval agree before March ’63 at the latest because they feared it would be violent.” It would be befitting the Edmund Pettus Bridge to John Lewis to name the conscience of the Congress. He once told me how the Kennedy brothers did not agree to the Oval Office meeting with Dr. King would be fierce before March ’63 at the latest because they feared. – Andrea Mitchell (@mitchellreports) July 18, 2020 Former US ambassador to the UN, Samantha Power also support renaming the bridge on Saturday and shared on the bridge project The John Lewis tweeted a link. The Project of Lincoln, a political action committee formed of several prominent Republicans who do not support President Donald Trump – between Steve Schmidt strategic policy and lawyer George Conway – also announced its support for the bridge on Saturday for renaming . Alabama, America has noted. Edmund Pettus was a traitor to the United States of America and the Grand Dragon of the Ku Klux Klan. Rename the bridge. – Steve Schmidt (@SteveSchmidtSES) July 18, 2020 on top of the bridge was renamed for a renewed focus on the reason why many called marched also in 1965, that fateful day Lewis: the right to vote in demand. John Lewis for the honor? Rename Edmund Pettus Bridge, sure. But (Lee Highway, also.): Restoration of Voting Rights Act. If you pass its proposals for the automatic registration of voters. Especially … rating. – Michael Waldman (@mawaldman) 18 Jul 2020 ‘Fifty-five years tried to march some of our children … on this bridge. We were beaten, tear gas were. I thought I would die on that bridge. But in some way and somehow, the Almighty God helped me here, “Lewis said in march during the memorial march 55th anniversary, according to CNN. “We have to go and vote because we never, never voted before.”
Photo copyright by Bill Clark / CQ Roll Call Getty Images