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Great Wall Institute: The Process of the Great Wall of Los Angeles

March on Washington

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2. 1963 "I have a Dream" - March on Washington Not Released (NR) Full editorial rights UK, US, Ireland, Canada (not Quebec). Restricted editorial rights elsewhere, please call local office. **Agency/Wires: This photo was licensed from an agency and any use must be consistent with the terms of the agreement for that agency. Unless otherwise noted, we have the right to use the photo for one-time use in connection with a particular story. We may not re-use, sublicense or distribute this photo, except via our API/RSS in conjunction with the story for which the photo was licensed, but you may re-license the photo for subsequent use by going back to the agency.**
4. 1963 Marchers with signs at the March on Washington The Voting Rights Act, adopted initially in 1965 and extended in 1970, 1975, and 1982, is generally considered the most successful piece of civil rights legislation ever adopted by the United States Congress. The Act codifies and effectuates the 15th Amendment’s permanent guarantee that, throughout the nation, no person shall be denied the right to vote on account of race or color. In addition, the Act contains several special provisions that impose even more stringent requirements in certain jurisdictions throughout the country.

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1963 - March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom “The March on Washington is not the climax of our struggle, but a new beginning not only for the Negro but for all Americans who thirst for freedom and a better life. When we leave, it will be to carry on the civil rights revolution home with us into every nook and cranny of the land, and we shall return again and again to Washington in ever growing numbers, until total freedom is ours.” —A. Philip Randolph

"The March on Washington was a massive protest march that occurred in August 1963, when some 250,000 people gathered in front of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. Also known as the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, the event aimed to draw attention to continuing challenges and inequalities faced by African Americans a century after emancipation. It was also the occasion of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s now-iconic “I Have A Dream” speech." - https://www.history.com/topics/black-history/march-on-washington

Extracted from The Smithsonian Magazine:
Ken Howard:
You have to back up and think about what was happening at the time. Nationally, in 1962, you have James Meredith, the first black to attend the University of Mississippi, that was national news. In May 1963, Bull Connor with the dogs and the fire hoses, turning them on people, front-page news. And then in June, that summer, you have Medgar Evers shot down in the South, and his body actually on view on 14th Street at a church in D.C. So you had a group of individuals who had been not just oppressed, but discriminated against and killed because of their color. The March on Washington symbolized a rising up, if you will, of people who were saying enough is enough.

John Lewis, Chairman of SNCC (later a 13-term congressman from Georgia)
A. Philip Randolph had this idea in the back of his mind for many years. When he had his chance to make another demand for a March on Washington, he told President Kennedy in a meeting at the White House in June 1963 that we were going to march on Washington. It was the so-called “Big Six,” Randolph, James Farmer, Whitney Young, Roy Wilkins, Martin Luther King Jr. and myself. Out of the blue Mr. Randolph spoke up. He was the dean of black leadership, the spokesperson. He said “Mr. President, the black masses are restless and we are going to march on Washington.” President Kennedy didn’t like the idea, hearing people talk about a march on Washington. He said, “If you bring all these people to Washington, won’t there be violence and chaos and disorder and we will never get a civil rights bill through the Congress?” Mr. Randolph responded, “Mr. President, this will be an orderly, peaceful, nonviolent protest.”

EVENTS PROCEEDING THE MARCH:

1) THE EMANCIPATION PROCLAMATION: Decreed by President Abraham Lincoln on 1 January 1863, the Emancipation Proclamation declared slaves in all confederate states then at war with the Union “forever free” and made them eligible for paid military service in the Union Army.
2) 100 years later: 1961/62 - MLK In 1961 made multiple appeals to President John F. Kennedy to issue a second Emancipation Proclamation to outlaw segregation in commemoration of the centennial of the original document.

3) December 1961 telegram to Kennedy called for “a second Emancipation Proclamation to free all Negroes from second class citizenship” in line with the “defense of democratic principles and practices here” in the United States (King, 18 December 1961).

4) On 17 May 1962, the sixth anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education, King sent Kennedy a 75-page appeal to request a “national rededication to the principles of the Emancipation Proclamation and for an executive order prohibiting segregation” (King, 17 May 1962). Clarence B. Jones, King’s legal advisor, recommended that the Southern Christian Leadership Conference send out copies of this appeal to all the major national organizations before 22 September 1962, the 100th anniversary of the earlier issuance of the Emancipation Proclamation as a military order.
5) At the 28 August 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, as King stood on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial to deliver his “I Have a Dream” speech, he noted that the Emancipation Proclamation gave hope to black slaves. The following year Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964 as a concrete step toward fulfilling the promise of the Emancipation Proclamation.