March on Washington
Title
March on Washington
Creator
Jacob Schlitt
Description
"I started writing this on August 28, 2005, the 42nd anniversary of the March on Washington."
Date
2005-08-28
Format
application/pdf
Type
text
Language
en
Coverage
1963
Identifier
1963_March_on_Washington
Text
March on Washington
I started writing this on August 28, 2005. the 42nd anniversary of the March on Washington. Most everyone associates the March with Dr. Martin Luther King’s "I have a dream" speech. I remember it as the remarkable organizing effort of Bayard Rustin, and the culmination of the dream of A. Philip Randolph, President of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters.
In the fall of 1962, I went to work as educational director of the Amalgamated Laundry Workers Union. I had previously worked for the Jewish Labor Committee where I had the good fortune to get to know many of the people in organized labor involved with civil rights. I also served as staff to the NYC AFL-CIO Civil Rights Committee which was chaired by Louis Simon, Laundry Workers Union manager, who asked me to come to work for him as educational director. I thought it would be a good move: I would get back into the labor movement, continue to work on civil rights issues and develop educational programs for laundry workers who were mostly black and Puerto Rican.
In the spring of 1963, I began hearing talk about a proposed March on Washington. Twenty-two years before, Phil Randolph threatened such a march if President Roosevelt did not .establish a Fair Employment Practices Commission to outlaw job discrimination by defense contractors. FDR was reluctant because he was afraid he would lose Southern support, but Eleanor Roosevelt pressed him, he agreed, and the 1941 march was called off. At that time the key organizer planning the march for Phil Randolph was Bayard Rustin, assisted by Arnold Aronson who became one of the earliest staff members of the NCRAC, the National Community Relations Advisory Council, the umbrella agency of Jewish community relations organizations.
Since the end of World War II, there had been growing anger at the racism that existed in our country. In 1948, the armed forces were desegregated, and in 1954, the Supreme Court ruled school segregation illegal. The 1955 Montgomery bus boycott resulted in another Supreme Court ruling that found segregated buses unconstitutional, and in 1957, the first civil rights law in 82 years was passed. Demonstrations, sit-ins and marches were taking place all over the South, and there were violent repercussions: beatings, fire bombings and killings. The traditional civil rights organizations, the NAACP and The National Urban League were joined by new groups: CORE, SCLC and SNCC. The brutality of Bull Connors and other Southern police officials shocked white America.
It was at this critical moment in 1963 that A. Philip Randolph put forward his proposal for a march on Washington to the Civil Rights Leadership Council. And just as in 1941, when President Kennedy was informed, he tried to talk them out of it. But the decision had been made. Randolph wanted it to be a March on Washington for Jobs; King amended it to be a March for Jobs and Freedom. For weeks, the civil rights leadership debated how the march should be organized, what issues should be emphasized, and who should lead it. Finally, in June, the August 28 date was set, and on July 2, Randolph was designated the leader with Bayard Rustin as his assistant.
Bayard was an extraordinary organizer. He reached out to all the civil rights, labor, Jewish community and church groups around New York, and recruited thousands of volunteers. The office of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters on 125th Street was March headquarters and the Friendship Baptist Church let Bayard use their building on 130th Street. From this base the word went out across the country. I was the contact person between the March and my union, and I recruited several union members and staff to join me at the headquarters a couple evenings a week through July and the beginning of August.
We ran off countless letters and stuffed countless envelopes and made countless phone calls and collated countless manuals and instruction guides. My memory of those evenings is vague, but the image of hundreds of young people, black and white, working at desks and improvised tables, folding, stuffing, sealing, labeling and stamping envelopes, stays with me until today. Occasionally, we would see Bayard or Phil Randolph or some of the leaders of the New York local, but they were involved in raising money, and getting commitments for participation in the march.
The AFL-CIO did not endorse the March, but individual unions turned out to be the backbone of this historic event. Foremost was the UAW and Walter Reuther, and in New York there was Cleveland Robinson of District 65, RWDSU. And the Amalgamated Clothing Workers, the ILGWU, IUE, United Steel Workers, Oil Chemical, Teachers, and the State, County and Municipal Workers. They provided the bulk of the funds, prepared the signs and turned out their membership.
In my case, the Executive Board of my union voted to endorse the March and to underwrite the participation of our members. In every one of our shops, Business Agents recruited workers. Joining the march was a big commitment for low-wage workers. It meant giving up a day’s pay, paying $10 toward the cost of the bus and food, leaving early and getting home late. By mid-August we had signed up enough workers to fill five buses. Then came the search for buses. I was told that there wasn’t a bus to be had. After calling every contact, I reached Mildred Kiefer, the wife of Jerry Wurf, Director of DC37 of AFSCME, who miraculously came up with five buses. The devil, they say, is in the details. Now I had to order the lunches, assign people to buses, assign captains to each bus, get caps and signs for everyone, make sure that everyone who was going knew where and when to meet, and as August 28th approached to tell members who wanted to go, that there was no more room.
Despite the fact that I had worked in the March office and was aware of how well organized the planning for the March was, and how widespread the support was across the country, I didn’t have (nor did anyone else have) any idea what the turnout would be. At 7 AM on Wednesday August 28th, my only concern was that the buses would show up, the lunches would be delivered on time, and everyone who signed up would be there. And they were. I had arranged for signs to be put on each of the buses with our name "The Amalgamated Laundry Workers Joint Board." We left from in front of union headquarters, 160 Fifth Avenue, and as we headed for the Lincoln Tunnel, the city was beginning to awaken.
As we headed down the New Jersey Turnpike toward Washington DC, we passed lots of buses, and lots of buses passed us, and we waved to each other. There were other unions, church and synagogue groups, schools, and NAACP and CORE branches, and buses without signs, and cars filled with people going to the March. As we approached the city, we realized that there is going to be a lot of people. From Baltimore to DC, people lined the highway, waving. I remember thinking, "Why are they waving? Why aren’t they joining the March?" We came to an immense parking area, along with hundred of other buses, got out, and marshals directed us to a line of march down Constitution Avenue. We had eaten our lunch on the bus, we put on our union caps and were carrying our signs. I was anxious that we stay together and that everyone know where their buses were if they got separated. It was a very warm day, and when we finally got to the Lincoln Memorial, I looked for a place that had some shade. The musical part of the program was under way, including Joan Baez, Bob Dylan and Mahalia Jackson. There were lots of people.
I started writing this on August 28, 2005. the 42nd anniversary of the March on Washington. Most everyone associates the March with Dr. Martin Luther King’s "I have a dream" speech. I remember it as the remarkable organizing effort of Bayard Rustin, and the culmination of the dream of A. Philip Randolph, President of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters.
In the fall of 1962, I went to work as educational director of the Amalgamated Laundry Workers Union. I had previously worked for the Jewish Labor Committee where I had the good fortune to get to know many of the people in organized labor involved with civil rights. I also served as staff to the NYC AFL-CIO Civil Rights Committee which was chaired by Louis Simon, Laundry Workers Union manager, who asked me to come to work for him as educational director. I thought it would be a good move: I would get back into the labor movement, continue to work on civil rights issues and develop educational programs for laundry workers who were mostly black and Puerto Rican.
In the spring of 1963, I began hearing talk about a proposed March on Washington. Twenty-two years before, Phil Randolph threatened such a march if President Roosevelt did not .establish a Fair Employment Practices Commission to outlaw job discrimination by defense contractors. FDR was reluctant because he was afraid he would lose Southern support, but Eleanor Roosevelt pressed him, he agreed, and the 1941 march was called off. At that time the key organizer planning the march for Phil Randolph was Bayard Rustin, assisted by Arnold Aronson who became one of the earliest staff members of the NCRAC, the National Community Relations Advisory Council, the umbrella agency of Jewish community relations organizations.
Since the end of World War II, there had been growing anger at the racism that existed in our country. In 1948, the armed forces were desegregated, and in 1954, the Supreme Court ruled school segregation illegal. The 1955 Montgomery bus boycott resulted in another Supreme Court ruling that found segregated buses unconstitutional, and in 1957, the first civil rights law in 82 years was passed. Demonstrations, sit-ins and marches were taking place all over the South, and there were violent repercussions: beatings, fire bombings and killings. The traditional civil rights organizations, the NAACP and The National Urban League were joined by new groups: CORE, SCLC and SNCC. The brutality of Bull Connors and other Southern police officials shocked white America.
It was at this critical moment in 1963 that A. Philip Randolph put forward his proposal for a march on Washington to the Civil Rights Leadership Council. And just as in 1941, when President Kennedy was informed, he tried to talk them out of it. But the decision had been made. Randolph wanted it to be a March on Washington for Jobs; King amended it to be a March for Jobs and Freedom. For weeks, the civil rights leadership debated how the march should be organized, what issues should be emphasized, and who should lead it. Finally, in June, the August 28 date was set, and on July 2, Randolph was designated the leader with Bayard Rustin as his assistant.
Bayard was an extraordinary organizer. He reached out to all the civil rights, labor, Jewish community and church groups around New York, and recruited thousands of volunteers. The office of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters on 125th Street was March headquarters and the Friendship Baptist Church let Bayard use their building on 130th Street. From this base the word went out across the country. I was the contact person between the March and my union, and I recruited several union members and staff to join me at the headquarters a couple evenings a week through July and the beginning of August.
We ran off countless letters and stuffed countless envelopes and made countless phone calls and collated countless manuals and instruction guides. My memory of those evenings is vague, but the image of hundreds of young people, black and white, working at desks and improvised tables, folding, stuffing, sealing, labeling and stamping envelopes, stays with me until today. Occasionally, we would see Bayard or Phil Randolph or some of the leaders of the New York local, but they were involved in raising money, and getting commitments for participation in the march.
The AFL-CIO did not endorse the March, but individual unions turned out to be the backbone of this historic event. Foremost was the UAW and Walter Reuther, and in New York there was Cleveland Robinson of District 65, RWDSU. And the Amalgamated Clothing Workers, the ILGWU, IUE, United Steel Workers, Oil Chemical, Teachers, and the State, County and Municipal Workers. They provided the bulk of the funds, prepared the signs and turned out their membership.
In my case, the Executive Board of my union voted to endorse the March and to underwrite the participation of our members. In every one of our shops, Business Agents recruited workers. Joining the march was a big commitment for low-wage workers. It meant giving up a day’s pay, paying $10 toward the cost of the bus and food, leaving early and getting home late. By mid-August we had signed up enough workers to fill five buses. Then came the search for buses. I was told that there wasn’t a bus to be had. After calling every contact, I reached Mildred Kiefer, the wife of Jerry Wurf, Director of DC37 of AFSCME, who miraculously came up with five buses. The devil, they say, is in the details. Now I had to order the lunches, assign people to buses, assign captains to each bus, get caps and signs for everyone, make sure that everyone who was going knew where and when to meet, and as August 28th approached to tell members who wanted to go, that there was no more room.
Despite the fact that I had worked in the March office and was aware of how well organized the planning for the March was, and how widespread the support was across the country, I didn’t have (nor did anyone else have) any idea what the turnout would be. At 7 AM on Wednesday August 28th, my only concern was that the buses would show up, the lunches would be delivered on time, and everyone who signed up would be there. And they were. I had arranged for signs to be put on each of the buses with our name "The Amalgamated Laundry Workers Joint Board." We left from in front of union headquarters, 160 Fifth Avenue, and as we headed for the Lincoln Tunnel, the city was beginning to awaken.
As we headed down the New Jersey Turnpike toward Washington DC, we passed lots of buses, and lots of buses passed us, and we waved to each other. There were other unions, church and synagogue groups, schools, and NAACP and CORE branches, and buses without signs, and cars filled with people going to the March. As we approached the city, we realized that there is going to be a lot of people. From Baltimore to DC, people lined the highway, waving. I remember thinking, "Why are they waving? Why aren’t they joining the March?" We came to an immense parking area, along with hundred of other buses, got out, and marshals directed us to a line of march down Constitution Avenue. We had eaten our lunch on the bus, we put on our union caps and were carrying our signs. I was anxious that we stay together and that everyone know where their buses were if they got separated. It was a very warm day, and when we finally got to the Lincoln Memorial, I looked for a place that had some shade. The musical part of the program was under way, including Joan Baez, Bob Dylan and Mahalia Jackson. There were lots of people.
Original Format
application/msword
Collection
Citation
Jacob Schlitt, “March on Washington,” Autobiographical stories & other writing by Jacob Schlitt, accessed April 24, 2024, https://tsirlson.omeka.net/items/show/18.