Four panelists addressed a nearly packed house of community members and UW-Madison students in the Humanities Building Monday, sharing their stories of struggle against racial oppression in Selma, Ala., and in Milwaukee.
While the speakers hailed from different parts of the country, many in the audience said they were inspired by universal desires to fight for equality.
The panel included Joanne Bland, a co-founder of the National Voting Rights Museum in Selma and participant in the \Bloody Sunday"" march in 1965; Gordon Sellers, a Southern community activist; Joe McClain, a Madison resident and former leader of a group that protected marchers in Milwaukee; and Vel Phillips, the first woman elected to Milwaukee's Common Council and the first African American woman to graduate from the UW-Madison law school.
Entitled ""Local People, Local Movements: Struggles for Civil Rights in Milwaukee and Selma,"" the panelists said they found similarities in the activist movements in both cities.
Selma was a center of the civil rights movement, with the notorious ""Bloody Sunday"" march violently suppressed by Alabama state troops wielding night sticks and other marches led by Martin Luther King Jr.
Marchers in Milwaukee encountered similar violence during 200 consecutive nights of marching before the Common Council that finally resulted in the passage of a strong citywide open housing ordinance.
The discussion commenced with Sellers leading the audience of approximately 200 in songs of the civil rights era. The panelists said protest songs were at the heart of many marches.
Phillips said marches were community events that drew tens of thousands of participants during the height of the movement.
""It was an exciting, exhilarating time,"" Phillips said. ""You never even felt the cold. You never felt the stones, the rotten eggs and the urine that were thrown.""
McClain said he was also caught up in the urgency of the Milwaukee movement. The brutality he said he encountered in his first march did not deter him from joining the Commandos and protecting other marches from similar attacks.
""I just knew I had to go out there,"" he said. ""In the process of going out there I got my tooth knocked out and got put in jail.""
All four panelists commented on contemporary political causes including welfare reform, burgeoning prison rolls and voter disenfranchisement.
Many students said the panelists reconfirmed their commitment to political activism.
""If their stories help other people connect to the activism they find within themselves, that's a wonderful agent for social change,"" said Kate Jorgensen, a UW-Madison senior.
Bland and Sellers will also discuss their Selma experiences tonight in the Multicultural Student Center Lounge in the Red Gym from 5 to 7 p.m.
