by Nahlah Abdur-Rahman
February 11, 2026
Hamer obtained the distinction in 2025, almost 50 years after her demise.
The Presidential Medal of Freedom that was posthumously awarded to Fannie Lou Hamer is formally out there for public viewing.
The award, granted to the late civil and girls’s rights activist in January 2025, has discovered its new residence on the Mississippi Civil Rights Museum in Jackson, part of the Two Mississippis Museum. Her household opted to reward the award to the Mississippi Division of Archives and Historical past, permitting guests to view it in Hamer’s residence state.
Hamer obtained the award for her work with voting rights, civil rights, and girls’s rights.
“I’m gratified that Aunt Fannie’s Presidential Medal of Freedom might be exhibited within the Mississippi Civil Rights Museum,” Hamer’s niece, Marilyn Mays, advised BLACK ENTERPRISE. “Her braveness and perseverance within the face of adversity are a shining instance of patriotism and a reminder of our duty to safeguard our rights and freedoms for all and for future generations.”
Hamer, born in Montgomery County, Mississippi, in 1917, skilled the hardships of the Jim Crow South all through her upbringing. Her involvement with the Pupil Nonviolent Coordinating Committee within the Nineteen Sixties made her a champion of voting rights advocacy and an organizer for Mississippi’s Freedom Summer season of 1964.
Her famed “I Query America” speech, delivered on the 1964 Democratic Nationwide Conference, helped safe the help wanted for the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
All through her lifetime, she used her voice to impact change and spark justice for marginalized teams, particularly Black folks and girls. Her management additionally prolonged to co-founding the Nationwide Girls’s Political Caucus, which aimed to assist all girls run for elected workplace.
Her legacy for gender and racial fairness continues to resonate with Black Mississippians and the nation at massive. Now, her residence state will carry her legacy ahead for future guests.
“I’m so completely satisfied we have been in a position to reward this award to the museum and to the folks of Mississippi,” added Hamer’s different niece, Monica Land. “Aunt Fannie Lou cherished Mississippi and, hopefully, this donation will spark or additional curiosity in her life and all that she fought so exhausting to perform for all folks—not simply Black folks.”
Hamer died of breast most cancers in 1977. She was 59.
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