The really powerful thing is not her passing in death but her being a giant as she passed our way in her life. This giant of a woman was affectionately called Mother Amelia Boynton because she was the mother of the modern day Voting Rights Movement. She was born Amelia Platts and married three times, outliving each husband. To most, she was Mrs. Amelia Boynton. She and her first husband, Samuel Boynton, registered and voted in Selma during the early '30s. They were giants because they risked their very lives to organize African Americans to register and vote and to purchase land so they could be independent and respected as citizens of this city, state and country. They risked their lives by continuously organizing in the dangerous times during the 1930s through the 1960s.
Mother Amelia Boynton was a giant passing our way, risking her life by inviting the first SNCC (Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee) organizers in Selma to initially stay at her home. She openly worked with these youthful community organizers knowing full well that this made her a marked woman and her home a marked place.
Mother Amelia Boynton was a giant passing our way, turning her husband’s 1963 funeral into a mass meeting for voting rights when no church in Selma would allow a mass meeting. They were fearful of their churches being burned or bombed. She found a way to overcome.
Mother Amelia Boynton was a giant passing our way, holding meetings of the Courageous Eight, of which she was a key member, in her home in spite of a court order prohibiting three or more persons from meeting or attempting to meet anywhere in Selma or Dallas County about voting or civil rights. She risked jail for contempt of court, but she daily risked her life for freedom.
Mother Amelia Boynton was a giant passing our way as she wrote a solitary letter inviting Dr. Martin Luther King to Selma in 1963. She subsequently joined other members of the Courageous Eight in a second letter in 1964 inviting Dr. King to Selma for a voting rights mass meeting. Dr. King would not come any place without an open invitation, and such invitations were clear violations of the court’s injunction.
Mother Amelia Boynton was a giant passing our way, risking her life along with 600 others on the Edmund Pettus Bridge on March 7, 1965, forever known as Bloody Sunday. She was knocked unconscious and left for dead. She lived and continued to serve for another 50 years. She was one of only three women who marched the entire 54 miles on the Selma-to-Montgomery March from March 21- March 25, 1965.
Mother Amelia Boynton was a giant passing our way, laying the foundation of the Voting Rights Movement which culminated in the 1965 Voting Rights Act, the legislation that made the United States of America a real democracy for the first time by providing the right to vote to every citizen. President Lyndon Baines Johnson made certain that she was present as he signed the 1965 Voting Rights Act.
Mother Amelia Boynton was a giant passing our way, commencing voting rights work with her mother in her early teens and continuing with voting and other human rights work for nearly 100 years, right up until a month or so before she passed. She was a founding member of the National Voting Rights Museum and the Bridge Crossing Jubilee, which continue her voting rights legacy.
Her life and work were recently celebrated in the play, Selma, The Musical. She was also a character in the movie, Selma. An active campaign urging President Barack Obama to award her the Presidential Medal of Freedom gathered momentum while she was still passing our way. Perhaps the Medal of Freedom will be awarded to her posthumously so many more will better perceive the way to freedom. Many are asking that the Edmund Pettus Bridge, now named after a Grand Dragon of the Ku Klux Klan, be renamed the Amelia Boynton Robinson Bridge.
Whether or not Amelia Platts Boynton Robinson is further recognized, we know for certain that a giant passed our way. She lifted others as she passed our way. Now, she has passed from this earth. However, she left clear footprints for us to follow. She left clear examples of active courage and long-term commitment to inspire us. She left proud accomplishments for us to build on. She left a light for us to see the path to freedom and follow faith fully.
EPILOGUE – Sometimes we don’t know the giants as they pass our way. We know their names and a little of their stories, but we don’t know they are giants until they pass from us. I am so glad that I and others knew Amelia Platts Boynton Robinson was a giant as she passed our way. I hope others will also know.
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