And this officially concludes this two and a half hour Lincoln Memorial program. A part of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. The some 175,000 Americans are now beginning to leave the Lincoln Memorial. Placards are once again being held up. On the podium now, directions are being given the demonstrators as they’ve been called officially as they return to their buses and from buses to trains and to homes all over the country. For a little bit of poetic symbolism here, a cloud has just darkened this area in front of the Lincoln Memorial but the Reflecting Pool is in the sunlight. The Washington Memorial, Congress is brilliantly silhouetted against the sky and flags are waving. This will apparently be a very difficult problem to get this estimated crowd of 175,000 back to the Washington Monument and then on back home. Some of the people that have been on this march are remaining at the Lincoln Memorial, attempting to meet personally some of the many movie personalities and civil rights leaders that are now on the stage. Earlier we heard from Marlon Brando.

The other personnel here from the movie world are Charlton Heston, Sydney Poitier, Harry Belafonte, Burt Lancaster, many folk singers including Josh White and Joan Baez. We’ll be hearing later from ERN reporter Dave Edwards who has made some exclusive educational radio network interviews with Senator Hubert Humphrey concerning the civil rights demonstration today and also Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, G. Mennen Williams. Here at the Lincoln Memorial, the organist is now beginning to play the freedom song “We Shall Overcome.” Suppose we depart here shortly and go back to George Geesey.

Of course the big problem now for metropolitan police is to get these people back to the monument ground, down by Massachusetts or rather Constitution Avenue, and as you heard them say, most of the crowd should walk down along the Reflecting Pool, over to the monument grounds and on to their buses. One of the big problems now had just turned out and our reporter, it was Mike Rice down at the police headquarters, he has confirmed now a report that over 1,300 people have been treated by the Red Cross for food poisoning from these boxed lunches which have been served all day and they’re now condemning further use of the food in the remaining boxes.

The Red Cross treated 1,335 people. Washington Hospital Center reports that they’ve treated 56 people with food poisoning. Georgetown University Hospital, one person. George Washington University Hospital twenty-two persons and DC General Hospital had thirty-three persons reporting because of the food poisoning from the suspected chicken boxes of food and some of the other people that were treated today for injuries were for people who fell over tent pegs and fell down the steps and over the snow fences which are surrounding some of the bushes at the memorial site.

The feeling though, by the police department is that for the large number gathered here in Washington today, this is relatively small. Dr. Murray Grant of the Public Health Service has condemned the further use of these chicken boxes of food which were supplied for the marchers and for police officers who have been on duty now since about 7:30 this morning. We’ll have further reports on all these things.

Another note just in, the director of the department of prisons, Donald Clemner said that about 70 percent of the inmates in the prisons in the Virginia and Washington, DC area are Negro prisoners. However, most of them were allowed today to watch the demonstration over television and officials expressed the view that the conduct during the viewing was gentlemanly. Summer of discontent is some of the messages being given here today by these speakers.

1963 they say is not an end but really a beginning and of course, through the evening we’ll be reporting and commenting further on some of the speeches you’ve heard live this afternoon from the Lincoln Memorial. We have all sorts of reports now. The person that we haven’t heard from is EN reporter Malcolm Davis who is down at the monument grounds where these people are now addressing themselves and trying to get to. Let’s call in Malcolm Davis from the Washington Monument grounds.

Thank you, George. Down here at the Washington Monument, the people, I guess like at the Lincoln Memorial are dispersing very, very slowly. An observation that I just made when you reported that the boxed lunches were a means of spreading food poisoning, through my field glasses, looking right across, I can see that one of these box lunch counters is still selling those lunches and apparently they have not been informed by the officials to cease selling these. This is an observation that I made when I heard you talking about that.

One of the things that impressed me most here, a little while ago was that the crowds here were comparatively thin and have been for some considerable time since everybody went down to the Lincoln Memorial but for the last hour or hour and a half, we have had a steady stream of people who have been returning from the Lincoln Monument back here towards the Washington Monument and very slowly but gradually, walking away from the scene.

The impressions that Kurt Winneg and I were able to obtain from this that they have been unable to get very close and that there was no point in remaining there, that they were better off back here and so they have been coming back. The crowds now are very slowly dispersing after listening very carefully. This was a very interesting point. Many people were sitting around on the grass here, relaxing and resting.

Some of them eating, some of them sleeping, most of them just idly killing time but when Martin Luther King addressed the people here, there was a considerable amount of attention. People rose and came right over to the loud speakers and applauded from this end, every sentence that he said, much as they did, at the Lincoln Memorial and the obvious reverence just now when we heard the closing prayers was extremely impressive. Everybody did in this area, rise to their feet and were extremely devout at the time the prayers were being offered. Can you comment further on this Kurt, what did you think?

Well, my impressions were very similar to yours. Of course we’re viewing from the same vantage point, Malcolm, but things are very orderly. The crowds are moving rather fast down Constitution Avenue and they’re not in the heavy crowds that they were in earlier in the afternoon.

The steady stream that we were seeing earlier does seem to have thinned out but I imagine very shortly, the people down at the Lincoln Monument will have had time to come down here to the Washington Monument and we will probably see a much thicker column coming through. From where I can see the buses, there is no attempt at this point of people loading on buses but I imagine most of those people are still down at the Lincoln Memorial.

Malcolm? Al Hulsen down there.

Yes...

Reports that they’re holding hands and singing. Let’s go back to Al and have him describe the scene there.

Actually George, it seems here that people are streaming out very rapidly. We can see here that there’s going to be a tremendous job for the Sanitation Department of the District of Columbia. All over where there used to be grass, there’s now paper. It’s beginning to blow even into the Reflecting Pool. Those people that are not going back to the buses and as I said, they’re moving out very rapidly, some of them are moving up toward the stage.

They’re waving their placards, the same ones that we saw before. We demand voting rights now. We march for effective civil rights laws now. Most of them either all blue and white or all red and white. We understand that most of the dignitaries here, certainly the ten leading personalities will be attempting to get over to the White House, is that correct George, to meet with the President at five?

Sometime between five and six, yes about ten leaders of this group are expected to talk to the President and we’ll be carrying it live. We’re standing by for the first report on whether there will be a public statement from over there. I would imagine that some of these people are going to cut across the ellipse and go up, 17th Street, aiming for the White House, just a chance that perhaps the President will make an appearance on the steps of the White House.

But we don't know this is true yet and as they go over toward Union Station, of course, that whole area, the ellipse, the monument grounds where Malcolm is standing by, Jeff Guylick is along Constitution Avenue at 19th Street where he reported the flow of people in the other direction when they were heading for the Lincoln Memorial. I might bring some plaques [incomprehensible] from the police department. Already 50 to 70 buses are leaving the city. These are the people who came on buses.

About 150 of the shuttle buses which dropped the people off at the assembly area of the monument grounds, have now picked up their people and are returning to Union Station where 4,800 people are waiting for trains and the first train does not leave Washington or pull out of the four tracks which are open until about 5:10. That’s roughly a half an hour from now, daylight savings time, here in the nation’s capital.

So the people are in transit. Let’s see if we can call in Jeff Guylick who is down along Constitution Avenue at 19th Street and perhaps he can give us an idea of the traffic pattern of that point. Jeff, are you at your station? Evidently he’s not or he’s swamped or moving along with the tide of people. Malcolm are you still standing by at your site?

George, I can hear you right now. I can hear the singing from here and the crowds are starting to return. The singing that I can hear is not coming from the microphones at Lincoln Memorial being left open but the fact that we can actually hear it now and I can actually see the crowds coming through.

Are they still carrying the signs?

I beg your pardon.

Are they still carrying signs?

Yes that’s something I meant to tell you about a little while ago. Some of them are carrying the signs, quite high as they were when they walked down but many of the others have lowered their signs and just sort of dragging them along the streets but this is not, I feel that this is not a feeling of despair but one that most of these people tend to be terribly tired but many of them, yes they are carrying the signs quite high.

Well Malcolm, some of the singing that you hear on your receiver, along with my conversation is from the microphones of Al Hulsen. The two of you can talk back and forth if you care to. We’re all in together now.

George and Malcolm, you mentioned that some of the people look tired. Directly in front of me, about a hundred feet away of that fence that I continue to talk about are some of the same people that have been here since about 11:30 this morning. They look as though they can barely move and I’m sure that a great deal of them, a great many of them haven’t had sleep for one or two days and can’t expect any tonight. This is really a very difficult job that these people have done.

...report that two of the deputy policemen have now shifted and diverted their police forces over to Union Station with this crowd of 4,800 have already arrived and where these other 150 shuttle buses are about to let people off so that’s going to be quite the next area to watch.

There are very, very few policemen here now. I seem to see many more military policemen but the crowd has dispersed. There is just a fraction of the number of that 175,000 predicted. The most people are now on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, listening to some of the singing now going on and listening to the directions being provided to the marchers as they return home. I also understand that the ten dignitaries have left through a special entrance at the rear of the Lincoln and are now on their way to the White House.

From this end Al, the march of the exit out here is extremely orderly. Everybody is very casually leaving the scene. They are walking, not a particularly brisk pace but just the same sort of speed as they walked down this morning and they are leaving in much the same way. The crowd, I can see a column going out on Constitution Avenue as far as my eyes can actually take me from here from this viewpoint and from my binoculars, looking right across the field. I can see also that they are likewise leaving from the Washington Monument over towards the theater where our other remote location is. It appears that they are leaving actually all directions but the bulk of people are going out through Constitution Avenue. I don’t know what it’s like with Jeff or if he’s with us at all. George, is he?

Malcolm, Jeff has joined us here at the Lincoln Memorial. Maybe we’ll call him in to see what he’s been doing this afternoon. Jeff?

Well I’ve been walking around the memorial while these speeches are going on, talking to some of the dignitaries around. I spoke to Senator Humphrey and Senator Scott from Pennsylvania. They all seem to be sincerely impressed by the orderliness and the discipline of the crowd, the lack of what you might call mob action even though there was a fantastic mob here, it seemed as if there was excellent control over it. They seemed very much relieved if nothing else. None of them would make any sort of commitment on what they thought about legislation but they certainly seemed relieved and encouraged about it.

We noticed here at the Lincoln Memorial that many, many people were having difficulty with the heat and with the close quarters. Jeff, did you notice anything like that along the way?

Not too much. Most of them came well prepared with thermos jugs and that sort of thing. Occasionally there was, you’d see an elderly person who seemed to be overcome by the heat.

When we started this morning at about 6:30 over at the ellipse, the comfort stations and the refreshment stands were very busy. The telephones and the first aid stations had no business. Did you notice whether the first aid stations were in action?

There didn’t seem to be anything serious, no. It was pretty much routine things. People would fall and get a minor cut or something like that. Pretty much routine, now.

Al I had the figures a while ago, about 570 casualties in the area of the Lincoln Memorial; people who required help at the Red Cross tents.

Suppose we go back to the stage for the moment. A group is performing Freedom Songs. This particular group is the stage and screening committee for the March on Washington. Actually they’re beginning to rock back and forth. They’re right on the ledge, the last step before going into the Lincoln Memorial to the statue of Abraham Lincoln.

I would imagine a lot of these people are interested in getting up there to see Lincoln first hand. This is the first time they’ve been in Washington or they haven’t been here in some time.

Actually, it seems just the opposite, George. Everyone is going up to the top, and then looking across toward the Washington Monument and the Capitol. It’s really a very beautiful picture at this time. The Reflecting Pool shows the monument very well. The flags are unfurled, a slight breeze is blowing, and in the distance, we see the Capitol, and it seems to have a greenish tinge which I have never noticed before.

Well, speaking of the Reflecting Pool, Arnold Shaw is at that site over there by the corner of the Reflecting Pool. He’s right down along the area where these people are marching to go back. Let’s try to call him in. Arnold Shaw?

Well, they aren’t marching back actually at this point. They almost all have marched back. We are here at the Reflecting Pool and as Al commented, the green sloping grass between here and the Constitution Avenue is nothing but a mass of paper at this time. I heard Malcolm comment earlier on the lowering of posters. Some people are still carrying them. I find the most fascinating thing of all the fact that most of the people have ripped off the placards on the sticks and are now using the sticks to struggle back to where they came from.

The other reflections that I had here are that there are quite a few people from a Georgia delegation who enjoy tremendously dipping their feet into the waters of the Reflecting Pool. Another observation too is that in walking over here earlier this afternoon from news headquarters which is located just about diagonal from where I am now, on the other side of the Lincoln Memorial, it took twenty-five minutes and in that time five people were helped.

You commented that the DC Police, George you commented that the DC Police have reported about 500 people needing help in this area. I would say that most of them were just casualties of the heat more than anything else. Another fascinating thing was the fact that of all the thousands of people that have gone by this sight this afternoon, I saw only one grasped by the arms of two MP men and actually looking rather huffy and I think one out of the amount of people that were here is a rather good average, don’t you?

Very good, very good figures.

We are also in a spot that has been extremely popular up to this point and continues to be popular. The water fountain is located about 50 feet away. At this point the Reflecting Pool is not only within the confines of the cement poured in the Mall, so rather floating out of the fountain but is also rather floating out of the fountain so we may be inundated any moment now. The crowds have generally left this area. There are very few people going by but I can get comments if you would care to hear some of the departing thoughts of these people.

We’ll be coming back to you. Let’s go back up to the steps again and see what Al Hulsen has. Al Hulsen?

Well it is going out very rapidly George. Things have not changed very much since our last report from here, except that more and more people are gone and I would say within a very short period of time, this crowd will be back to the bus, back to the trains. Another thing is that the radio and television people here are dismantling their cameras and other equipment.

Around me I can see some of the newspaper people finishing their stories, phoning them in, the stories that will appear in tomorrow morning’s paper, possibly some late editions tonight. Some of the television commentators and radio commentators likewise are finishing their brief reports for the newscasts later this evening.

Well Al, make sure they don’t disconnect your materials because the ERN is going to continue to bring live coverage from these scenes in the Washington area throughout the evening. Right now by means of tape recording, our studios in Boston have been able to re-supply us with the demands that were made by Bayard Rustin, the march’s deputy director, just a few moments ago. So by delayed recording, let’s bring in Boston and again hear these demands made by Mr. Rustin.

The first demand is that we have effective civil rights legislation, no compromise, no filibuster and that it include public accommodations, decent housing, integrated education, FEPC and the right to vote. What do you say? Number two, number two, they want that we demand the withholding of federal funds from all programs in which discrimination exists. What do you say? We demand that segregation be ended in every school district in the year 1963.

We demand the enforcement of the 14th Amendment, the reducing of Congressional representation of states where citizens are disenfranchised. We demand an executive order banning discrimination in all housing, supported by federal funds. We demand that every person in this nation, black or white, be given training and work with dignity to defeat unemployment and automation. We demand that there be an increase in the national minimum wage so that men may live in dignity.

We finally demand that all of the rights that are given to any citizen be given to black men and men of every minority group, including a strong FEPC. We demand. And now ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Randolph will read The Pledge. This is a pledge which says our job has just begun. You pledge to return home to carry on the revolution. After Mr. Randolph has read the pledge, I will say do you so pledge and you will say I do pledge.

The Pledge. Will you stand? Standing before the Lincoln Memorial on the 28th of August, in the centennial year of emancipation, I affirm my complete personal commitment to the struggle for jobs and freedom for Americans. To fulfill that commitment, I pledge that I will not relax until victory is won. I pledge that I will join and support all actions undertaken in good faith, in accord with the time honored democratic tradition of non-violent protest, of peaceful assembly and petition and of redress through the courts and the legislative process.

I pledge to cover the message of the marks to my friends and neighbors, back home and arouse them to an equal commitment and equal effort. I will march and I will write letters. I will demonstrate and I will vote. I will work to make sure that my voice and those of my brothers ring clear and determine, from every corner of our land. I pledge my heart and my mind and my body unequivocally and without regard to personal sacrifice, to the achievement of social peace, through social justice.

How do you pledge? Aye.

You heard by tape recording a repeat of the demands and the pledge taken by the Negro marchers on Washington. This is Rick Lee for the ERN returning you to George Geesey at ERN Master Control.

And of course charging the group with the pledge was A. Philip Randolph. One of the members who was supposed to be here from the committee planning for this march today was James Farmer but as you’ve heard mention several times in this broadcast, James Farmer, the Director of the Congress of Racial Equality, is now in jail and wasn’t able to be here. We do have an exclusive tape recording, however, made by Mr. Farmer for the Educational Radio Network before he was sent to jail. We’d like to present that at this time.

This is the 100th anniversary of the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation. One hundred years ago when the American Negro was theoretically freed from slavery, his freedom was not a complete thing in any sense of the word. Most Negroes were then shuttled into a second class citizenship and instead of slavery, there came into being a servant class and this class was more or less reserved for the Negro. Negroes never liked the second class citizenship. Never liked segregation, the institution which was devised to maintain that second class citizenship.

They never liked it but they put up with it and accepted it. Accepted it, because they knew of no method, no means by which they could overcome it. Within the past hundred years, much has taken place to change that situation. One significant factor was the development of non-violent, direct action techniques. CORE, an organization which is interracial in nature, was founded in 1942.

To use such Gandhi-like techniques, to seek to involve individuals directly and immediately in an attempt to change the pattern of segregation, to remove that light from the American scene. CORE in that time was very small, involving only a few individuals, both Negro and white, most of them young people. At the same time, this was during World War II. The masses of Negroes were considerably bitter. Bitter because their young men were involved in the war, they were in uniform and were told that they were fighting against the master race theory of Nazism and of Adolph Hitler.

It was inevitable that at some point they should begin to ask what about the master race theory back home? This bitterness was widespread throughout the Negro community. Later the masses of Negroes saw a non-violent direct action, a technique which could be used to channel this resentment, the resentment against segregation. They saw in 1956 the use of non-violent direct action on a mass scale in Montgomery, Alabama, as 50,000 Negroes stayed off the buses, refusing to hate their oppressors but at the same time, refusing to accept any longer the pattern of segregation which they had grown to acknowledge in the past.

What has happened in the past few years has been a merger, sort of a fusion between the young militants, the angry young men in the Negro community and those forces which believed in non-violent, direct action. Thus we have seen large numbers of persons, no longer a handful of individuals and a very few scattered cities, but literally hundreds of thousands of people marching, sitting in, demonstrating, demanding freedom now, no longer willing to wait. They feel that they have waited a hundred years and that’s far too long. Now the ultimate objective, of course, is to put itself out of business.

What we hope to do is to achieve an open society in the United States, a society in which there would be no more need for an organization called the Congress of Racial Equality because racial equality will be an established fact. We are searching for a society in which the stature and status and worth of an individual will be determined not by the color of his skin, but by his own individual merit. That is the objective of CORE. That is the objective of the current civil rights revolution.

That in a real sense is the objective of the March on Washington. In more specific terms, the March on Washington is being held to spotlight two issues. First, jobs. Unemployment. The unemployment rate among Negroes is two and a half times as great as it is among white persons and it is increasing at the same rate which means that unless something is done to reverse the trend, it will continue to be two and a half times as high as among other American citizens.

So the March is taking place to spotlight that issue and to demand jobs. To demand an end to discrimination in employment and to demand that the federal government take strong action to create new jobs, perhaps through a massive public works program to create new and constructive work for all citizens, white and colored. The second objective of the March is to urge the passage of strong civil rights legislation.

Such legislation is now before Congress. It is being considered but it must not be watered down and that is what the marching feet in Washington, DC are saying to the Congress and saying to the people of the nation, indeed saying to the world. Now is the time to put an end to racial discrimination in places of public accommodation which is a key problem in the South, to discrimination in employment which is a major problem throughout the nation, to residential segregation which is a major problem particularly in northern cities, to segregated schools, the de jour segregated schools of the South and the de facto segregated schools of the North and to put an end to police brutality.

We expect that the outcome of the March will be extremely positive. Aside from what the marching feet are saying to the nation, we believe that the people who are participating in the march themselves, many of them for the first time, would have been involved directly in this sort of action. When they go back to their communities, they cannot be the same. They then we expect will participate in our picket lines, in our marches locally, in lobbying for powerful legislation.

We expect too, that America will change as a result of the March on Washington. Now the March is not for Negroes alone. It is in a real sense for all minorities and what American is not a member of some minority. If one is not a Negro then he may be a Jew. If he is not a Jew, he may be a Catholic. If he is not a Catholic, then he may be German American. He may be British American. He may be a member of any number of nationality, religious, cultural or racial minorities.

As long as there is discrimination against any one minority, that discrimination can very easily spread and take in others. So what is the fight for America? It’s a fight for all American citizens. Beyond that, it is a battle for freedom which has spread throughout the world. It is a battle against the repressions and oppressions of totalitarianism. Whether it be in the southern part of the United States or in Asia or in Africa, or in anyplace else in the world, it is a battle too to find a new method for resolving conflict.

We’re living in an age when war is outmoded. We’re living in an age where non-violence is the only possible solution to the problems which beset mankind. If our revolution, non-violent in essence, can be successful, then that is a message that must be heard throughout the world. In the thermonuclear age, who in his right mind can talk about violence as a solution to this or any other social problem?

James Farmer, Director of the Congress of Racial Equality. A person supposed to be here today to participate in the activities at the Lincoln Memorial steps. However, because he is in jail, he was not able to be here and the recording you’ve just heard was a statement he made for the Educational Radio Network about a week ago. We’re standing by now to pick up some reports made by reporter David Edwards, who was able to interview us under Hubert Humphries and the Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, G. Mennen Williams.

We’ll have that for you in just a moment or two. We’re also standing by for a report from the White House as to whether President Kennedy has an official statement to make in the presence of the ten leaders who have now left the Lincoln Memorial and have arrived at the White House. Walter Reuther is among the many there. We’ll be waiting to see if there is an official statement and perhaps there will be.

We’re prepared to bring it to you if it does happen. We’ll pause now for station identification. In a moment we’ll continue with this live pick up from Washington, DC and again a reminder that the ERN will bring you highlights of some of the activity we’ve heard the past two hours from the Lincoln Memorial in a program as part of our coverage at seven p.m. tonight. This is the Educational Radio Network.

Haywood Burns, author of a soon to be published book on the Negro protest movement and the only Negro John Harvard scholar at Emanuel College, Cambridge, England, just one of the panelists tonight at nine on a special program, The Implications of the Freedom March. This is WGBH FM, 89.7 megacycles in Boston.

This is George Geesey again back in Washington as the Educational Radio Network brings you this expanded coverage, uninterrupted from nine this morning until midnight this evening, for the special repeat as we said, of some of these highlights in our program about seven p.m. tonight. We mentioned an interview with Senator Hubert Humphrey but David Edwards, a reporter, a graduate student at Harvard University and serving on the staff of Educational Radio Network was able to obtain, while the senator was listening to some of the remarks made from the Lincoln Memorial. Let’s switch now to our Reflecting Pool site for this recorded report.

...worked at the base of the Lincoln Memorial. I have with me Senator Hubert Humphrey. Senator Humphrey, can you tell me what your impression of this demonstration is?

People here are good citizens. I want to emphasize that. They’re really making a tremendous impression.

I notice that you’re wearing a badge from the student non-violent coordinating committee. Does this mean that you support the sit-ins and the freedom rides and the other direct action projects...

Well some of these young folks gave me this badge and I think they’ve done a wonderful job. They’ve shown great courage and they’ve also demonstrated genuine faith in the institutions of free government, law and order, non-violence. This is the way we want it.

Do you think that their activities will have a measurable effect upon the attitudes of congressmen toward civil rights?

I think they have. I believe that all of these many organizations are having their effect. The truth is that there’s a time in history when great things to happen. It’s hard to explain it but there is a timeliness to things and I think that a hundred years after the Emancipation Proclamation, we’ve arrived at the time for the fulfillment of that promise and I really and truly believe that the year 1963 will go down in history as the year of the greatest advance in human rights in the history of the United States.

This means we will have a civil rights bill out of Congress this year?

Yes, of course.

What do you think that bill will look like?

Look like the President’s program.

Including the public accommodations provision?

Yes, indeed.

Will it be at all stronger than the President’s program...

I doubt that. I think it will be about what the President sent to us with maybe some slight modifications.

Do you expect a filibuster?

Hope not but we most likely will have something that looks like one.

Something that looks like one. Some people have suggested that the Southerners might decide not to filibuster or to make it only look like one and not be one if the public accommodations provisions were dropped from the bill. Do you think this is a possibility?

Yes, I think that’s a possibility but all of this is guesswork. I’ve learned in the halls of Congress that you’re better off to live each day and not try to predict too far ahead. Details.

When do you expect the bill to come to the floor of the Senate?

Well as soon as the House completes action on it, which I imagine will be the latter part of September.

Does this mean that there will be months of discussion probably on the floor of the Senate?

Have to be several weeks.

Only several weeks?

Hm hm, I hope.

What would be a next step beyond the President’s bill, Senator?

Why don’t we just get the President’s bill so far? I think that’ll be enough.

Thank you very much.

What effect do you think this will have overseas in such countries as Vietnam for example?

I think this has a good effect everywhere.

Senator Hubert Humphrey, talking with reporter, David Edwards. Once again, we’d like to clear up a report now from police department headquarters and our reporter, ERN newsman, Mike Rice. We earlier had a message and a report on food poisoning from the boxed lunches being served. It turns out now and this is again a fast report out of Police Headquarters, that deputy police chief Cavelle says as of 4:25, no police officer or demonstrator has come down with food poisoning yet.

However, there’s a standing order now by Dr. Murray Grant of the Public Health Service for no more policemen to take any of the food that was supplied in these boxed lunches. So we’re still trying to confirm this and find out what the story is. Earlier we reported some officers had been struck down but now, as of 4:25, Deputy Police Chief Cavelle says no officer or not a single demonstrator has come down yet with food poisoning but they do suspect the boxed lunches and reporters and the police chiefs are now telling the policemen not to eat any more food from these boxed lunches.

No report yet as to how the officers are to get meals throughout the evening on duty in their various posts around town, but we’ll try to get these developments from reporter Mike Rice at police headquarters, standing by where all of the police action for today is being correlated and conducted. As we said earlier, two of the areas that were zoned off in Washington have now released their policemen to go over to Union Station because this is the scene now of activity. As we already said, almost 5,000 people are already in the concourse.

They’re waiting for trains to take them out of Washington. The first train is to leave just at this hour, five minutes past five, daylight saving time. Al Hulsen is standing by we hope still at the Lincoln Memorial where police officers estimate the crowd as being now 2,000 people from the original 175,000 people. Al Hulsen can you hear us and what is your report?

I hardly think that there are 2,000 people here, particularly around the Lincoln Memorial. If we take in all the people back to the Washington Monument, maybe that’s the case. The aim here seems to be to remove everything, remove the people, remove all the equipment. Just a short time ago, the marshals in the parade went through the steps here and have taken away just about all of the chairs. There were several hundred chairs set up for the dignitaries. There are a few people now beginning to pick up the waste paper.

It’s proverbially a sea of waste paper. We’re beginning to see some vehicles coming this way, what appear to be private cars. Several Army trucks have gone through. Some sanitation trucks. The military people paraded off not too long ago but we still see many, many policemen. I would say at the moment there are twenty-five or thirty on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. They don’t seem to be preventing anybody from getting in the memorial.

I’m not exactly sure what they are doing, except possibly to protect those marchers that are still here on the stage. There is also a very large contingent of policemen to my left looking toward the State Department building. They seem to be getting some kind of instructions. George, I would say from the Lincoln Memorial, the March on Washington is complete.

Right, Al, and thank you for standing by all these hours in the sun and giving us a fine report. You’ll be joining us tonight of course in a wrap up to the get the sensing of how you reporters out in the field today, actually felt and what your reflections are on what took place. This will be a little later this evening on the ERN. Right now we are still waiting for word as to whether President Kennedy, who is now meeting with some of the leaders of this march at the White House, whether he’ll have a public statement or not.

Meanwhile from Capitol Hill, we have received word that the House has authorized the Railroad Bill. It’s being sent to President Kennedy for his signature and this means that the threatened strike will be delayed past 12:01 tonight which was the deadline set earlier. We mentioned just a moment ago that David Edwards was also able to talk to the Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, G. Mennen Williams. The tape recording that he made while the activities were going on at the Lincoln Memorial is now ready for us. Let’s switch to our site by the Reflecting Pool for this recorded report.

This is David Edwards at the foot of the Lincoln Memorial. With me is G. Mennen Williams. Mr. Williams, what is your impression of the demonstration today thus far?

Well the first impression one gets of course is the tremendous size of the crowd. Over 200,000 people who swallow all of the available space between the Washington Monument practically and the Lincoln Memorial. After that, you’re impressed by the fact that this is a very orderly, dignified meeting of people who have come to demonstrate for their own rights and to try and secure freedom now. The group is a mixed group in every way. It’s not only racially integrated; there are lay and clergy here. They’re rich and poor. They’re people from every part of the country. It seems to be a very representative and dignified turnout to assert their interest in civil rights for all people.

Well you’ve experienced and seen a good many demonstrations of one sort or another in this field and the course of your career in public office. I wonder if you’ve noticed, if you think that the present demonstration is in any significant ways different from the types of demonstrations that have occurred in the past.

Well of course it’s by far the largest. It’s turned out by far the most distinguished list of speakers, entertainers but I think it also has a greater sense of purpose and a feeling of responsibility. I think long before any of them came here, they were made to understand that if they were going to be successful, they would have to demonstrate in such a way that the Congress of the United States would not feel that they were being unduly pressured and as a consequence I think they have handled themselves in a more dignified and even subdued way than the meetings of this kind ordinarily are.

Do you think that this betokens a change in the attitudes of the Negro element in the movement for civil rights?

Well I’m not sure that I can answer that because one rose of course doesn’t make a summer or one icicle winter but I think it does demonstrate a high capacity to understand the requirements of the situation and a great discipline so that they could make their requirements in a favorable fashion.

Your duties in the Kennedy Administration have brought you into close contact with African people and nations and our race problems have undoubtedly had a significant effect upon these people. Do you think that the present demonstration will also have an effect? Will this be recognized by many African leaders as a significant step in our march toward racial equality?

Well I’m quite certain that this meeting will not go unnoticed but I think the people of Africa got their strong impression as to the direction of the company from President Kennedy’s television address and the message that he sent to the Congress. And I think that what they’re really looking for is to see how the Congress of the United States responds to that. This of course, as I said, will be noticed but what they’re waiting to see is the follow-up action and practice.

Do they notice the direct action projects which are undertaken by Negroes and some whites in the South for example or is this an element of a movement which is largely overlooked by these African people ?

No, I am sure they see this but of course, the sensational makes the news and carries to them and it’s the unfortunate incidents in connection with the demonstrations of Negro rights that gets the greater press in Africa as it does in America and in Europe so I would say that they have followed it and they have been impressed by major actions such as the President putting the full power of the government of the United States behind Meredith.

They’ve been impressed of course by the unfavorable treatment of Negroes in the pictures they’ve seen of what happened in Birmingham. Whether they follow each and every nuance, I can’t say. I think they really follow it with a rather broad brush. This I am sure they will recognize but as I say, I think the thing that they’re going to find most significant is the actual legislation to back up the President’s message.

Mennen Williams, thank you very much. This is David Edwards at the foot of the Lincoln Memorial, returning you to the ERN.

And of course we’re still standing by to see if any announcements are made officially from the White House. However, this morning many of these March on Washington leaders made an appearance at Capitol Hill and Robert Radine, VOA reporter was at those meetings this morning and he has a report for the Voice of America listeners and now for us.

The March really started on Capitol Hill this morning as ten of its top men talked things over with Senate and House leaders. First on their agenda was Senator Mike Mansfield, the Democratic majority leader of the Senate. They spent half an hour with him and his office, reporting a very cordial welcome. One of the leaders, Dr. Martin Luther King, referred to the conversation as very fruitful. Mansfield himself said he’d had a good discussion. They expressed their views he said and I gave my reaction.

Senator Mansfield indicated he’d made no promises on passage of racial legislation. He did not discuss what will probably be the biggest obstacle to such passage of filibuster on the Senate floor by its southern members. Majority leader Mansfield repeated what he had already said in the Senate floor speech. That he would much prefer the Senate to wait and to act on a bill first passed by the House of Representatives. Prospects he feels are better for getting a complete bill from the House, rather than from a Senate committee. He thinks such a House bill won’t be ready until October.

The ten leaders called on the Senate minority leader, Republican Senator Everett Dirksen. The House Minority Leader, Charles Halleck was also present. Senator Dirksen in a live television broadcast following the meeting said it was friendly. He believes the March will work neither to the advantage or disadvantage of the civil rights bill. As for the bill itself, Senator Dirksen said he endorses it except for the compulsory public accommodation section.

He said he will introduce a substitute amendment calling for voluntary desegregation of accommodations. The third stop took the ten leaders to the Speaker of the House of Representatives, John McCormack. Fifty minutes of conversation later, they emerged to the front steps of the capitol building, where reporters with microphones and TV cameras were waiting. The march leader, A. Phillip Randolph, acted as spokesman for the group and made these brief remarks.

The committee on the March on Washington just had a conference with the Speaker of the House, Congressman McCormack. And he assured us that if the Fair Employment Practice bill and also part three are put into the package are proposals presented by President Kennedy to the Congress, that these two measures will get through the House of Representatives. This was very encouraging to the committee and I want to stress this aspect of the conference with you because we cannot remain very long. We now must leave in order to go to the Lincoln Monument. Thank you very much.

The part three which Mr. Randolph referred to would permit the Justice Department to start civil rights suits on behalf of Negroes who allege that their constitutional rights have been violated. Each of the 535 members of Congress was spent a special invitation to attend the program at the Washington Monument. One survey made by a Capitol Hill newspaper indicated that forty-three had accepted while 64 said they would go if business permits. This is Robert L. Radine, Voice of America, speaking from Capitol Hill.

That’s a report given earlier this morning on the Voice of America for its overseas audience on how leaders of this March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom met with Capitol Hill representatives. No word yet from the White House on whether a statement is forthcoming so we’ll switch back to our site at the Reflecting Pool where David Edwards is standing by.

David Edwards is standing by, but this is Arnold Shaw from the Reflecting Pool at the Lincoln Memorial and I have the pleasure of first with speaking with Mr. Isaiah Minkoff, Executive Director of the National Community Relations Advisory Council. It’s a pleasure to talk with you.

Thank you.

I’d like to ask first what is your general reflection of this day?

I think it was a day of great historic significance.

And what did your organization actually do up to this day before we carry on in a conversation about the events of today?

Well we are not just newcomers into this field. Our organization is a coordinating body of a number of national and local Jewish organizations interested in community relations. And the whole concept of civil rights and civil liberties was one which we actually have founded our organization and which we have been engaged all the time. And the basis of the concept that civil liberties and civil rights are indivisible and that all citizens of all groups, all persuasions, all races should be interested in civil rights for all. This is an American issue. It’s not just a group issue or a race issue.

Do you feel that the ten sponsoring organizations for today’s demonstration were rather well represented?

Well I believe that, you had ten co-chairmen who sponsored this organization but I think it would be proper to say that you had a multitude of organizations that have sponsored this rally. All those who were involved, in one form or another, in the support of the civil rights program, both before the legislation and as well as community wide, were the supporters of this rally so that in actuality, you can say you had hundreds and hundreds of organizations far beyond the ten that had been mentioned in the official call.

Now actually this day has been set as a pinnacle point up to this point. Everyone has been talking about August 28th as the day for the demonstration in Washington, DC. What is your organization, as an example of one of these organizations that have been combined for this day, doing for the future?

Well first I want to say that all of our national organizations have officially sponsored, member agencies have especially sponsored this rally and asked people to come to the rally. They would have presented here. As a matter of fact, national agencies that are in community relations field, not affiliated with our organization, were also sponsoring this rally, as well as a number of community councils throughout the land have sponsored this rally and also sent a delegation.

Today in my opinion is just a dramatization of the fight for civil rights. It’s not the beginning, nor is it the end, nor is it I would say to be looked upon as the highest point in history. I would say this is the example, anyone who has a sense for history, should look upon this occasion as you said it, as a high point, as the drama but it represents years of activities, years of work, years of devotion and commitment on the part of religious groups, civic minded groups, community groups, to the principle of civil rights and I do not believe that this is going to end because on this day I should be very, very optimistic and I want to be very optimistic but I’m not too sanguine that the entire program that has been presented here will be adopted at this session. And therefore the fight is going to continue and I think it will get a momentum as a result of this demonstration here today.

And your reflection on the people that were gathered here today in such mass volume?

I think it was a splendid group. I think it was one of the best organized, self-disciplined, people who understood the cause for which they came and they behaved beautifully. They knew that there would be some provocations to involve them and think that would discredit this demonstration and they didn’t fall for any of these provocations and if there would have been more provocations, they would have never fallen for it.

Well thank you very much Mr. Minkoff for your reflection.

Thank you.

I’ve been talking with Isaiah Minkoff, executive director of the National Community Relations Advisory Council. This is Arnold Shaw reporting, turning it over now to David Edwards.

Thank you, Arnie. It’s been a hot, humid and parched day. There’s little left to see and say at the site of the Reflecting Pool now except for the rather monstrous quantity of litter, composed of Pepsi Cola cups and old copies of the Afro-American shredded in large measure, used as shields for balding heads during the course of the afternoon.

My function during the afternoon has largely been to speak with the notable people who assembled here for the demonstration and I think, one of the most significant things about the demonstration has been, as Mennen Williams indicated in an interview we played for you shortly ago, that the participation of the notable people has been much greater than in most cases. It’s not surprising that the, almost every significant Negro leader in the United States with the exception of the few who are presently in jail, was here.

But it is surprising that aside from the labor leaders like Walter Ruther who’s generally present at such demonstrations, there were a good many public officials. Senator Humphrey suggested that about twenty of his colleagues were sitting on the steps in the hot blazing sun during the course of the afternoon, about two-thirds of them Democrats he said and there were other public officials like Mennen Williams wandering around. The senators, a good many of the senators left after about forty-five minutes of the program and a series of “pass the bill” chants from the audience but after that group left, there were perhaps seven or eight senators still remaining, most of whom sat through almost the entire program.

These included Senator Humphrey who gave very graciously of his time to a good many pestering reporters and radio and television people, among them the educational radio network. In fact, after the senator had spoken at length with some reporters on the steps, the Educational Radio Network asked him if he would consent to speak for several minutes to our tape recorder and he agreed to do so on condition that we get him a Coke, something which we eventually managed to do.

After speaking with us for perhaps five minutes, the Senator was besieged by tens of other radio reporters from various networks as well as local stations and spent the next forty-five minutes answering questions for one or another radio stations. Mennen Williams was wandering through the crowds when we spotted him and asked him to come to our mikes. He’d been talking with relatively common individuals who had been standing around on the steps and his willingness to come to the microphones of the ERN was very pleasant.

He spoke at considerable length with us and then spent the next half hour talking with once again various other radio interviewers and this attitude I think was characteristic of a good many of the public officials and this is something which is worthy of noting if only because the Congress has, this is indicative I think of the new emphasis which Congress places upon the necessity of recognizing the urgency of the demands for civil rights on the part of a good many of our nation’s people. Now this is Dave Edwards by the Reflecting Pool, littered with the rubbish of some two hundred thousand people at best estimates, returning you to George Geesey at the Educational Radio Network studios.

Yes, the mopping up operation has taken place on both the monument grounds and over by the Lincoln Memorial. A lot of paper is littered on the grounds and men with the usual sharp sticks and little bags are going around trying to get most of it up so that the site is back to normal by tomorrow morning. Traffic reports from police headquarters say that most of the traffic of buses is moving very well and steady. The troubled area of course is around Union Station where everybody’s heading for their special trains to go home.

Buses are being loaded by many are still in their parking places and have not yet moved and perhaps won’t be moving for another half hour or so. Of course one of the big problems now will be cases of missing persons who have been separated from their groups and perhaps can’t remember where their buses are parked. We’ll be reporting on that from police headquarters with ERN reporter, Mike Rice. He also tells us that the public health situation has developed this way now. Dr. Murray Grant, the Director of Public Health, has announced that nothing definitive has been found about the rumored food poisoning in the policemen’s boxed lunches.

However, as a safety precaution, it has been announced that these food items are not to be consumed by the policemen until something more is learned. So where we reported earlier that there was a case of food poisoning, it now turns out nothing definitive has been found and just as a safety precaution, the policemen are being instructed not to eat any more of this food. Well, the ERN is bringing you live coverage from Washington, DC of the activities. Again, we remind you that at seven p.m., we’ll be repeating some of the more important speeches made this afternoon at the Lincoln Memorial. Right now we have some criticism and some reflective thought on how this has been transpired.