Freedom Highway (The Staple Singers album)

Freedom Highway is a 1965 album by The Staple Singers (Epic LN24163/ BN26163). The title song was written for the 1965 Selma to Montgomery march for voting rights and reflects not only on the actions of the activists but what suffering they had endured to get there, even referencing the murder of Emmett Till at Tallahatchie River. The lyrics begin “March up freedom's highway / March, each and every day.” and continue “Made up my mind / And I won't turn around." Mavis Staples reprised the song in 2008 on Live: Hope at the Hideout, which was released on November 4, 2008, the same day that Barack Obama won the presidential election.

Staples, joined by Jeff Tweedy, performed "Freedom Highway" on the Late Show with Stephen Colbert at Chicago's Auditorium Theater on August 22, 2024, on the occasion of the closing night of the Democratic National Convention.