On Aug. 28, millions of Americans will take time to celebrate an event that helped transform the country and bring it closer to its promise of freedom and liberty.
Civil rights leaders, government officials and concerned citizens will gather to reignite the spark left by the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom exactly 50 years ago. During the memorable event, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his famous “I Have a Dream” speech, encouraging America to live up to the statement “all men are created equal” found in the Declaration of Independence.
“The march itself was to get the federal government to, as Dr. King would say often, actually live out what was written on paper,” said Rev. Derek King, the iconic civil rights leader’s nephew and professor of religious studies at Martin University in Indianapolis.
Derek King noted that challenges related to racial discrimination and segregation, as well as the need for jobs and fair hiring and housing practices, compelled leaders to hold the march and call on the government to act.
“It was a cry not only from Black people but also people of conscience to say to America, ‘we have to make some changes. Black folks are here and they’re not going anywhere so we might as well level the playing field,’” the younger King said.
King noted that his famous uncle was just “one of the players on the stage,” and that other major figures were also involved.
Among them were labor leaders A. Phillip Randolph, Walter Reuther and Bayard Rustin, the NAACP’s Roy Wilkins, the National Urban League’s Whitney Young, James Farmer of the Congress of Racial Equality, John Lewis of the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and others.
The March on Washington was one of the largest rallies for human rights in United States history, drawing nearly 300,000 participants, and is often credited with leading to the passage of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, which prohibits discrimination in public accommodations, and the 1965 Voting Rights Act.
Its impact can still be felt 50 years later, especially by those who continue to face some of the same challenges that were around when it took place.
For local resident William Jackson, the March on Washington still has a “profound” impact on the community.
“Among the things they marched for were jobs and fair wages, and that issue is still prevalent today,” Jackson told the Recorder. “The Black unemployment rate is almost double the national average. Blacks are paid less than their white counterparts on average in corporate America. Fifty years later and the dream continues.”
Getting youth in the march
Some activists say that the question of whether or not the goals of the 1963 March on Washington will be fulfilled depends largely on the efforts of today’s young adults and teenagers. Will they carry the fight for equality and justice into the future?
John Lewis, then 23 and chairman of SNCC, was the youngest speaker at the March on Washington. He is now a congressman from Georgia and remembers how activism from youth helped to invigorate not only the march but the civil rights movement overall.
He recently recalled seeing “hundreds of thousands of young people – students and volunteers, Black and white – up in the trees, trying to get a better view.”
Lewis added that such interest is required now to keep the country moving forward.
“I think it is so important for young people – and people not so young – to know there’s a role for them to play,” he said. “I have a feeling that people are just too quiet. And the 50th anniversary of the march on Washington is a good opportunity for them to move their feet.”
Fortunately, some younger activists are taking what they view as a strong stand for justice. Among them are a group known as the Dream Defenders, a multi-racial coalition of young protestors who gained nation attention after holding a 31-day sit-in at Florida’s state capitol building, in protest of the controversial Stand Your Ground highlighted by George Zimmerman in Trayvon Martin’s killing.
“What the March on Washington showed us is that we must look at not only specific instances of injustice, but work together to address the faulty elements in our society that lead to a series of injustices,” said Philip Agnew, director of the Dream Defenders.
King believes that there is more right with America than is wrong, but the wrong cannot go unaddressed, especially as the country becomes more diverse while it deals with economic, education and health disparities.
“We have to call it out, put our hands to the plough and work it out,” King said. “Hopefully, on Aug. 28, people will get motivated enough to get active and make changes.”
For more information on events related to the 50th Anniversary March on Washington, visit 50thanniversarymarchonwashington.com.
March anniversary events to emphasize dreams unfulfilled
By CAROL MORELLO
Donald Cash was just a teenager in 1963 when he finished his shift at a downtown clothing store and joined the throngs marching toward the Mall.
He never got close enough to hear the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. speak but always considered himself a beneficiary of the march as one of the first African-Americans hired to cut meat at a Giant supermarket.
Now 68 and a veteran labor and civil rights activist, Cash will be walking toward the Mall again on Aug. 24, to mark the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington, the landmark protest remembered most for King’s monumental “I Have a Dream” speech.
But the Supreme Court’s recent ruling that struck down part of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and the stark racial divide among Americans after a Florida jury acquitted the man who fatally shot Black teenager Trayvon Martin have spurred debate about how much has changed and what more there is to do.
“I had hoped when I was a young man that we’d see a lot of progress by now,” said Cash, a resident of Washington. “But I think we’re going backwards.”
The Aug. 24 march tracing the historic 1963 route is one of the main events of a full week of activities commemorating the march, which drew 250,000 participants. For the anniversary march, the National Park Service has issued a permit for up to 150,000 people. A second, smaller march will be held on the anniversary itself, Aug. 28.
That day, church bells will peal in communities throughout the country at 3 p.m., the moment when King began addressing the crowd. In an afternoon ceremony jointly sponsored by the Park Service, the King Center and the legacy organizations involved in the 1963 march, President Obama will speak from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, where King stood. The first African-American president will be joined by former presidents Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton.
In many ways, the events are not purely commemorative but about unfinished business. The Aug. 24 march is billed as a National Action to Reclaim the Dream. The march Aug. 28 is called the March for Jobs and Justice.
“The message is that we still have to deal with issues that are alive in the 21st century,” said the Rev. Al Sharpton, the talk-show host whose National Action Network is co-sponsoring the Saturday march with a host of other labor and civil rights groups. “While we celebrate 50 years of progress, we still have not achieved the dream of Dr. King.”
Sharpton said that dream is not narrowly the province of African-Americans.
“We’re going to make sure that representatives of the LGBT community speak at the march,” he said. The organizer of the 1963 march, Bayard Rustin, was openly gay, and some in the movement tried to push him aside.
“Women weren’t major speakers,” Sharpton said. “We’re going to correct that.”
Source: washingtonpost.com
