On March 7, 1965, civil rights marchers were violently attacked when attempting to cross the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama. More than 15 marchers were hospitalized for their injuries—including a young student activist named John Lewis, who was beaten unconscious. 

Despite the violence inflicted upon them, these activists didn’t quit. It took two more years of hard and often bloody work till President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act of 1965 into law. 

John Lewis, who would of course become the legendary representative of Georgia’s 5th district, said, "President Johnson signed that Act, but it was written by the people of Selma."

Now, fifty-nine years since Bloody Sunday, it’s only right that John Lewis’s name be attached to the legislation meant to restore and strengthen the landmark 1965 Voting Rights Act, which defended the rights he put his body on the line for. 

In two clicks, send an email to your lawmakers urging them to make the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act a priority.

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For 50 years, the 1965 Voting Rights Act stood as a pillar protecting communities from anti-voter and discriminatory voting laws. But the Supreme Court gutted the VRA in 2013 with Shelby County v. Holder. 

Gutting the Voting Rights Act was catastrophic. Since 2013, nearly 100 restrictive voting laws have been passed across the country, millions of voters have been purged from the rolls, strict voter ID laws have been enacted, and thousands of voting locations have been closed. 

We need Congress to protect our freedom to vote. Last week, Senator Raphael Warnock (D-GA) and Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL) led the entire Senate Democratic Caucus in reintroducing the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act. Now it’s up to us to urge them to get it passed. 

Let’s be real. Congress should have passed this bill the second we got Trump out of the White House. But as the memory of John Lewis and the other Selma marchers reminds us, the most important victories are often neither swift nor easy.

Send an email to your lawmakers to make sure they know that a new Voting Rights Act should still be a top priority in Congress.

Thanks for all that you do. 

Sami & Chloe
Digital Team, Stand Up America