Fannie Lou Hamer was a powerhouse in the fight for civil rights. From voter registration to challenging systemic exclusion, she fearlessly led the charge for equality in Mississippi. Despite violence and intimidation, she co-founded the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party, challenging the all-white Democratic Party’s exclusion of Black Americans. Her legacy reminds us that every voice matters and every vote counts. In 1964, Hamer helped organize Freedom Summer, which brought hundreds of college students, Black and white, to help with African American voter registration in the segregated South. In 1964, she announced her candidacy for the Mississippi House of Representatives but was barred from the ballot. A year later, Hamer, Victoria Gray, and Annie Devine became the first Black women to stand in the U.S. Congress when they unsuccessfully protested the Mississippi House election of 1964. She also traveled extensively, giving powerful speeches on behalf of civil rights. In 1971, Hame...