Fannie Lou Hamer Testimony Before The Democratic National Convention (August 22, 1968)

Описание: On August 22, 1964, Fannie Lou Hamer appeared before the convention's credentials committee and told her story about trying to register to vote in Mississippi. On August 31, 1962, she boarded a bus to Indianola with seventeen others to try to register to vote. The next day she was kicked off the plantation where she had lived and worked for eighteen years. Her husband lost his job, too.

Hamer immediately went to work as a field organizer for SNCC. Returning home from a training workshop in June 1963, Hamer's bus was intercepted by policemen. She and two others were taken to jail in Winona, Mississippi, and mercilessly beaten. Hamer suffered permanent damage to her kidneys. After recovering from her injuries, she traveled across the U.S. telling her story.

The Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party (MFDP), which had formed the MFDP to expand black voter registration and challenge the legitimacy of the state's all-white Democratic Party, gave support to Hamer. At the 1964 Democratic National Convention, MFDP members intent on unseating the official Mississippi delegation or, failing that, getting seated with them.

President Lyndon Johnson felt threatened by the MFDP's presence at the convention and quickly preempted Hamer's televised testimony with an impromptu press conference. However, later that night Hamer's story was broadcast on all the major networks and got higher viewership.

Fannie Lou Hamer (1917-1977) was a Mississippi civil rights activist. She was a leading figure in the Voting Rights Fight. When the civil rights movement began in Mississippi, Hamer became first a participant and then a leader. She is best known for her 1964 national television appearance in which she described the plight of black voters in Mississippi. Hamer passed away March 14, 1977, in the hospital at Mound Bayou, Mississippi. Her funeral was conducted in Ruleville, and she was laid to rest on March 21 at Freedom Farms Cooperative, which she helped to found.

#FannieLouHamer #VotingRights #CivilRightsMovement