Selma, Alabama

Last night we were in a small but historically signifigant town in the deep south called Selma, Alabama.

It is most known for its role in the civil rights movement of the 1960's when a huge group of civil rights supporters marched, or tried to at least, to Montgomery, AL from the town of Selma.

On "Bloody Sunday," March 7, 1965, referenced by the famous U2 song, some 600 civil rights marchers headed east out of Selma on U.S. Highway 80. They got only as far as the Edmund Pettus Bridge six blocks away, where state troopers and local sherrif's deputies attacked them with Billy clubs and tear gas and drove them back into Selma. Two days later, on March 9, 1965, Martin Luther King, Jr. led a "symbolic" march to the bridge. Then, civil rights leaders sought court protection for a third, full-scale march from Selma to the state capitol building in Montgomery. Judge Frank Minis Johnson, Jr., weighed the right of mobility against the right to march and ruled in favor of the demonstrators.
"The law is clear that the right to petition one's government for the redress of grievances may be exercised in large groups...," said Judge Johnson, "and these rights may be exercised by marching, even along public highways."
On Sunday, March 21, 1965, about 3,200 marchers set out for Montgomery, walking 12 miles a day and sleeping in fields. By the time they reached the capitol on Thursday, March 25, 1965, they were 25,000-strong. Less than five months after the last of the three marches, President Lyndon Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

Equality and the personal provision of men has really been at the forefront of my mind lately. It seems that we, as fellow humans, have fallen into a downward spiral of justification.... making whatever is right in our own eyes ok by our own set forth standards... I call it personalized doctrine. While we were in Birmingham for a much needed day off we all went to see the new movie "The Kingdom", which by the way is an amazing movie, but in the end it leaves you begging the question of who is actually right. This entire planet belongs to each of us yet for centuries we have waged war against each other for what? Land? Rights? Ownership? Money? All of which are completely fleeting. Now I know I am bordering on being a tree hugging idealist here but it seems like there must be some way that we as a small society, one by one, can begin to come together, combine our resources and live together as equals.... extending our blessings to even the lowliest homeless addicts of our society.

"I assure you, when you refused to help the least of these my brothers and sisters, you were refusing to help me." Matthew 25:45

Selma Alabama was a place that I went to play a show... but I found a lot more while I was there... alot about myself and alot about us, as a whole... I, for one, for my part intend on making a difference.

Mucho amo,

Clint