Thousands of people from across the country descended on Montgomery, Alabama, on Saturday - arriving by bus, car, and plane - for the All Roads Lead to the South rally. The gathering followed the Supreme Court’s Louisiana v. Callais decision last month, which essentially gutted the Voting Rights Act and severely limited protections against voting discrimination. Because nothing says “democracy” like making it harder to vote.
The rally, organized by a coalition of national and local civic engagement groups, took place outside the Alabama state capitol building, in the same plaza where the 1965 Selma to Montgomery voting rights marches are enshrined. History, it seems, has a way of repeating itself - though this time the marchers brought better signs.
“We’re here, Montgomery, not at a stopping point, but at a starting point,” said Steven L. Reed, Montgomery’s mayor and the first Black person to hold the position. He was referencing the spirit and courage of forefathers and foremothers - presumably not the ones currently drawing maps.
Following the Supreme Court decision, Republican-led states rushed to redraw voting maps in ways that weaken Black political power. Tennessee and Florida have already passed new maps, while Alabama, Louisiana, and Georgia seem poised to follow. Mississippi temporarily paused redistricting efforts, with the governor promising to revisit the issue soon - because “soon” is exactly what voting rights advocates want to hear.
Voting activists from affected states - along with local and national elected officials including Senators Cory Booker and Raphael Warnock, and Representatives Terri Sewell, Shomari Figures, and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez - took the stage to mobilize attendees. “We need to fight with all we got,” said Charlane Oliver, a Tennessee state senator who protested her state’s redistricting by standing on her desk last week. “They may draw some racist maps, but we are the south, this is our south. The south belongs to us. The south got something to say, and we gon’ speak real loud and clear in November.”
Throughout the event, spontaneous chants of “vote, vote, vote” emerged from the audience. At times, All Roads Lead to the South felt like a worship service, harkening back to the Black church’s vital role in the civil rights movement. It began with a prayer; when an attendee had a medical event, an emcee asked those gathered to “put their praying hands together.” Multiple gospel songs were performed - because nothing says “fighting for democracy” like a good hymn.
For many attendees, being at the rally was personal. Their family members fought for voting rights. Now, they said, it’s up to them to take up the banner. “My grandmama, my momma, my mother-in-law - our ancestors did not cross that bridge, walk during the bus boycott, my cousins got locked in the First Baptist Church [in Montgomery], across from the police station in the 60s, my other cousin got beat up by a horse up on Jackson Street - we didn’t do all that for this,” said Carole Burton, a Montgomery resident.
The day began in Selma with a prayer service at the historic Tabernacle Baptist Church, followed by a silent walk across the Edmund Pettus Bridge - the site of the brutal “Bloody Sunday” violence against civil rights marchers in 1965. From there, attendees traveled by bus to Montgomery, where they were joined by thousands.
All Roads Lead to the South was not an isolated event - more than 50 satellite events were scheduled across the country for those who couldn’t make it to Alabama. Speakers also noted that the fight would continue elsewhere. “Our task is bigger than defending the past,” said Rukia Lumumba, director of the Mississippi VRA Rapid Response Coalition and M4BL Action Fund. “Our task is to build a democracy worthy of the people who bled to create it in the first place.”