March 25, 1965 – Martin Luther King, Jr. Brings Marchers to Montgomery

On this day in history, Martin Luther King, Jr., leading thousands of nonviolent demonstrators, arrived at the steps of the state capitol in Montgomery, Alabama, after a 5-day, 54-mile march from Selma, Alabama, where local African Americans, the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) had been campaigning for voting rights. In his address to the crowd at the conclusion of the march, King said:

They told us we wouldn’t get here. And there were those who said that we would get here only over their dead bodies, but all the world today knows that we are here and we are standing before the forces of power in the state of Alabama saying, “We ain’t goin’ let nobody turn us around.”

You can get a sense of his charismatic speaking prowess as he acclaimed to the crowd:

Today I want to tell the city of Selma, today I want to say to the state of Alabama, today I want to say to the people of America and the nations of the world, that we are not about to turn around. We are on the move now.

Yes, we are on the move and no wave of racism can stop us. We are on the move now. The burning of our churches will not deter us. The bombing of our homes will not dissuade us. We are on the move now. The beating and killing of our clergymen and young people will not divert us. We are on the move now. The wanton release of their known murderers would not discourage us. We are on the move now. Like an idea whose time has come, not even the marching of mighty armies can halt us. We are moving to the land of freedom.”

You can read the transcript of the entire speech here.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. speaks in front of the Alabama State Capitol to an estimated 30,000 demonstrators who followed him on the last leg of the Selma-Mongomery Civil Rights Marches on March 25, 1965.