Presbyterian Mission Agency march on washington Archives

march on washington

Check out the Presbyterian connection in the Netflix film ‘Rustin’

Posted November 21st, 2023

Virtually every adult American knows that Mahalia Jackson sang at the 1963 March on Washington and that the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his “I Have a Dream” speech there on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. But who can name the genius of organizing the massive event, without whom there would not have been a march? A man who had worked with union leader A. Philip Randolph back in 1941 to organize a similar march of 100,000 to go to Washington and demand that African Americans be employed in the defense industries — and who called it off when President Franklin D. Roosevelt issued an executive order commanding that “Negroes” be hired in defense plants. That man was Bayard Rustin, often called “the forgotten hero” of the civil rights movement.

‘She speaks’ seeks to center women’s voices on the 60th anniversary of the March on Washington

Posted August 29th, 2023

Righting a wrong from its celebrated predecessor 60 years ago, when just one woman was invited to speak during the March on Washington, about three dozen women spoke Monday on the 60th anniversary of the original march during “She Speaks,” billed as “a virtual assembly to fight for the same demands that were made 60 years ago, demands that our nation’s leaders have yet to fulfill.”