Despite many attempts to reinstate the Voting Rights Act of 1965, all efforts to this day have failed. As a result, the idea of voting freely and safely is a right many Americans are still fighting for. For black people in this country, while the Emancipation Proclamation gave them freedom from enslavement, it did not ensure voting rights. In those uncertain and often dangerous years for black Americans at the polls following the Civil War, I found a piece of my own ancestry. As part of our partnership with 10 Million Names, I went on a journey to uncover my family's history.

As a journalist, my job is all about searching for the truth.

Tonight, there is renewed pressure on Israel and Hamas, regardless of the headlines or the datelines. What do we know about how the former President's criminal trial might affect voters?

In times of war, we are holding hands because we are afraid to lose each other.

Or national grief.

Her legacy is going to be one of love.

Even when the subject is my own family tree.

Very nice to meet you, Lindsay. Hi. So I'm not used to being surprised.

Well, I'm a professional genealogist, and I'm with the 10 Million Names Project. And today, we are here to talk about your family tree.

Which is very fascinating. Okay.

Like many African-Americans, I don't have any information about my family ancestry going back more than a few generations. It's one of the many tragic legacies of slavery, not knowing the full details of our roots. But genealogists from the 10 Million Names Project are changing that, laboriously piecing together family trees for people like me.

Anna Murray is your second great grandmother. Okay. Now, Anna's father was Tobey Murray, born in Georgia, about 1829. We can't say for sure whether he was enslaved or not, but more than likely given a time period, Georgia not finding on the 1860 census, he probably was. But on June 29, 1867, he registered to vote in Morgan County, Georgia.

Oh, wow. Which would mean I'm apparently a descendant of a man who was among the first Black Americans to ever vote in this country.

It's two years after the end of the Civil War. He's a young Black man, and he's the first person in your family to register to vote, and he does it in Georgia.

That's fascinating.

He was brave enough to go to the courthouse to register to vote.

Potentially risking his life?

Absolutely risking his life. Absolutely.

Do we know if he was literate?

We don't think he was literate. We don't know for sure. A lot of times when we doing this research, they'll sign documents with his mark, meaning that they were not literate.

This is a gift for my family and for me. I'm thinking about even my son to know his lineage now going back with seven generations, which is phenomenal.

I wanted to find out more, so I was off to Georgia. I am on my way to the airport to find out a little bit more about my roots. It's going to be really interesting. What we're able to dig up in the archives. On the outskirts of Atlanta, the Georgia Archives holds a massive collection of the state's most important historical documents.

We got it.

Detected by the Archives Director, Christopher Davidson and his team. There are several historic books containing original documentation, showing that my great, great, great grandfather was the first in my family to ever register to vote.

So this is Tobi Murray.

Yeah.

Susan O'Donovan is a top expert in African-American history of the reconstruction period. How old are these record books?

That one's '67. Wow.

So this is the original? This is the original. And this is also an original?

This is original.

But he was not able to write, correct?

No, he wasn't able to write. And so what we see between Tobi and Murray is an X, and over that is his mark. So we know then that Toby made the mark. Someone else, a clerk, filled in the rest of the writing.

And this may be a silly question, but when I'm touching this book, these pages, my great, great, great grandfather actually-He touched this page. That's just... I'm awestruck by that, that this is the original.

Following emancipation in 1863, most free black Americans were living among mostly white, mostly hostile people. They were denied education, wages, living primarily in rural poverty under the constant threat of violence.

The 29th day of June 1867. How rare was this to have a black male registering to vote in 1867?

Not at all rare by June, because earlier that spring, Congress had passed the Reconstruction Act of 1867.

Black men registered to vote in Mass, soon holding seats in public office at every level.

Former slaves have been waiting generations for this moment, and they came in in droves to register to vote. So So when we look over here, total white people who registered to vote that spring were 630, and then twice as many black men voted.

While voting records from the time were rarely preserved in Georgia, Professor O'Donovan says we can safely assume Toby cast a ballot.

We have accounts of them going in groups to register to vote. Part of it is safety.

More than 150 years later, Toby's record can be found in Georgia's historic oathbooks.

Fast forward a few decades into 1898, and we have the registered voter list for Morgan County. And so we have his name appears again.

In fact, he's 71 years old, and he's still an active voter.

Oh, and look at this. So occupation. Is this farmer?

That says farmer, yes. So he was working the land. One way or the other, he was involved in agriculture.

Okay. At '71. Yeah.

But '71, he's still politically active. Right.

This is phenomenal.

Reconstruction was meant to be an era of great promise for the South, but freedom for black people created intense resentment among white Southerners. It was in this period that the Ku Klux Klan was founded.

The newspaper editors during that time, what hand did those white editors in particular have in trying to manipulate black voters?

These editors, they're racist. The language is very demeaning. It's very patronizing. They're really concerned about how well-organized the black voters are in Morgan County.

In the following decades, persistent and blatantly racist voter suppression tactics continued in Georgia and across the South. This illustrates a practice that didn't end until 1944, Whites Only primary ballots.

All you see is a list of white candidates running for local offices. Black folks were not able to participate in those primaries via running as a candidate or as voters.

Lenise Littleton, a historian at the Atlanta History Center, says despite suppression, the Black community has been fighting for the sacred right to vote generation after generation.

Time changes, but attitudes don't. And so we see a consistent fight on the part of Black citizens to organize, mobilize, strategize, to exercise their right to vote and participate in democracy.

In the face of suppression, voting rights activists in Georgia continue to be a formidable force.

In fact, according to the Georgia State registration files, Georgia saw an increase of almost 1.7.

Million new voters in the lead up to the 2020 elections.

Hey, how are you?

On my final stop, I meet up with young canvassers of the New Georgia Project.

I don't know what these folks did, so you know.

Working to encourage voting in November's election.

We are the boots on the ground.

Kendra Cotton is their CEO. I watched her young and inspired team as they went door to door, reminding fellow citizens that voting is a right, a privilege, and a duty, the opportunity to be counted as equal Americans.

We want our voters showing up and making their voices heard because we fundamentally believe that the best way to get good progressive policy in the state is not to beg for it from folks who don't share your values, but it's to vote in people who already do.

I'm struck by this quote, which says in part, Get in and stay in the streets of every city, every village in Hamlet of this nation until true freedom comes, until the revolution of 1776 is complete. The words of the late congressman John Lewis.

It is a struggle that my great, great, great grandfather participated in from the start and continues to this day.

I didn't actually think I would be emotional about it. But being with this living document that I can only imagine what Tobi had to endure, and I can't help but feel pride.

Tobi's grit and gumption lives on. For more Ancestry stories and information about the 10 Million Names Project, scan the QR code on your screen to visit our newly launched, ABC News 10 Million Names digital landing page. You can learn more about how to personally contribute to the project, access recommended reading lists, and more.