There was anxiety in Washington the day before the 1963 March on Washington. They were so worried, they closed the liquor stores. The opening line of the New York Times article spoke rather fearfully of the “vanguard” of tens of thousands of people, who had begun arriving on the roads and filling the bus and train stations. The largest marches up until that time had been only around 30-40,000 people, and it was pretty clear this would be bigger. Organizers hoped for 100,000. Martin Luther King was last on a long list of speakers.
The concern was unfounded. There was no violence, no major counter-protest (a small group of Nazis was quickly dispatched), little untoward behavior by police or protesters. People showed up en masse but marched as planned, gathered as planned, and patiently listened to speakers as planned. Their patience was rewarded: it was the largest protest march on Washington in history at the time, estimated at 250-300,000. And they heard one of the greatest orations ever delivered.
The Gathering
There had been marches to Washington before, protesting wages, unemployment, and civil rights. Five thousand walked in D.C. at the 1922 “Silent March” on Washington to urge passage of the Dyer anti-lynching bill. But few years later in 1925, the KKK brought 30,000 racists into Washington, one of the largest marches of its time. People came to Washington to protest multiple times during the Great Depression, looking for help and answers.
During the FDR administration, the idea of a march by Blacks to protest discrimination in jobs and the military was advanced repeatedly among leaders of civil rights organization. At the time, marches often helped to pressure Congress, but leaders weren’t sure that the “Court and Congress” strategy was all that effective for Blacks. Plessy vs. Ferguson, the Supreme Court decreeing “separate but equal” facilities were acceptable was only a few decades old in 1933.
The organizers of the 1963 march began planning in December 1961, after Kennedy was elected but in no hurry to champion civil rights. The courts had outlawed some types of segregation in the 1950s, but armed guards still had to accompany children to school. Mass marches and nonviolent demonstrations across many places had been effective, but organizers sensed it was a time to push for more. Kennedy and many in his party supported civil rights in concept, but he urged the organizers not to march. Civil rights was on the list, but low priority. He was working on a bill, people should be patient. Civil rights always are a “distraction” to those who don’t need it.
Continue reading “Vision”
