President Barack Obama was in Selma, Alabama on Saturday to commemorate the 50th anniversary of events that sparked the 1965 Voting Rights Act. Obama was introduced by US representative John Lewis, a Democrat from Georgia who marched in Selma 50 years ago. The president spoke at the Edmund Pettus Bridge, where police and state troopers used violence and tear gas against peaceful marchers advocating against racial discrimination at the voting booth. Obama said the bridge joined sites such as Gettysburg that helped determine the nation's future.