Marching on Montgomery

The twenty-five thousand Americans who converged upon Montgomery on March 25 surely did not represent the “best” of America in terms of wealth, status or power, but —in the words of Bayard Rustin—”all the best in America” was there. No one who went through that exhilarating day will ever forget it. It was the most powerful, confident, and dramatic civil rights confrontation ever held in America. If the March on Washington may be likened to a declaration of purpose on the part of the American Negro, the March on Montgomery was his declaration that henceforth he will walk without fear. That this confrontation took place in the heart of the unreconstructed South only underscored its drama.

Coming from New ...