Ms. Nash was a strategist and leader in the Civil Rights movement, particularly among students. She organized the first successful campaign to integrate lunch counters (in Nashville, TN) and the Freedom Riders, who de-segregated interstate buses. She co-founded the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and helped found the Alabama Voting Rights Project. She helped organize the Selma Voting Rights Movement, which led to the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Later, she became active in the peace movement. Ms. Nash was arrested many times for her activism. In 1962, while four months pregnant, she was threatened with a two year jail sentence for contributing to the delinquency of minors – by encouraging them to become Freedom Riders. She wrote, "I believe that if I go to jail now, it may help hasten that day when my child and all children will be free — not only on the day of their birth but for all their lives."
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