The Civil Rights Movement continues: At the National Mall, in the District of Columbia, A. Philip Randolph, founder of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, and Bayard Rustin, one of the organizers of the Journey of Reconciliation, host the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom.  It is here that President Martin Luther King, Jr. of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, delivers his “I have a Dream Speech”:

       We’ve come to our nation’s capital to cash a cheque.  When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir.  This note was a promise that all men would be guaranteed the inalienable rights of “Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.”

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       There will be neither rest nor tranquility in America until the Negro is granted his citizenship rights.  The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.

       … Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred.  We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline.  We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence.  Again and again we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.

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       There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights: “When will you be satisfied?” We can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is the victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality.

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       …  I say to you today, my friends, that in spite of the difficulties and frustrations of the moment, I still have a dream.  It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.

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       I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a desert state, sweltering with the heat of injustice and oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.

       NOTE: Unfortunately the sentence lifted from the speech, “I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the colour of their skin but by the content of their character,” is all too frequently taken out of context by “conservatives.”

       [restored 10/7/2022]