to the creation of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party. When white Democrats in Mississippi refused to accept black members in their delegation to the Democratic National Convention of 1964, Hamer and others went to the convention to challenge the white Democrats' right to represent Mississippi. In a televised interview, Hamer detailed the harassment and abuse experienced by black Mississippians when they tried to register to vote. Her testimony attracted much media attention, and President Johnson was upset by the disturbance at the convention where he expected to be nominated for president. National Democratic Party officials offered the black Mississippians two convention seats, but the MFDP rejected the compromise offer and went home. Later, however, the MFDP challenge did result in more support for blacks and other minorities in the Democratic Party In early 1965 SCLC employed its direct-action techniques in a voting-rights protest initiated by SNCC in Selma, Alabama. When protests at the local courthouse were unsuccessful, protesters began a march to Montgomery, the state capital. As the marchers were leaving Selma, mounted police beat and tear-gassed them. Televised scenes of that violence, called Bloody Sunday, shocked many Americans, and the resulting outrage led to a commitment to continue the Selma march. MLK and the SCLC then led hundreds of people on a five-day, 50 mile march to Montgomery. The Selma march created broad national support for a law to protect Southern blacks' right to vote. President Johnson persuaded Congress to pass the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which suspended the use of literary and other voter qualification tests. Later amendments banned these tests, which often prevented blacks from voting. In the three years following its enactment, almost a million more blacks in the South registered to vote. By 1968 black voters were having a significant effect on Southern politics. During the 1970s blacks wer...
