Rustin: Commitment Was Firm

Bayard Rustin orchestrated some of the great moments of this country’s civil-rights movement. The chief strategist for the mammoth March on Washington in 1963--one of the largest single civil-rights demonstrations and the most disciplined mass protest in U.S. history--he made it run smoothly, with no hint of the race riots that had been feared.

Coordinating the march was perhaps his most memorable feat, but it was neither the first nor the last. An organizer of the first Freedom Ride, a protest to challenge racial discrimination in interstate travel, Rustin was arrested and served on a North Carolina chain gang in 1947. His written descriptions of that cruel form of punishment helped put an end to such chain gangs. He was active in the Montgomery bus boycott with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in 1955-57, and helped King organize the Southern Christian Leadership Conference.

A prolific writer and intense analyst, Rustin practiced rainbow politics long before multiracial coalitions became common. He served a critical liaison role between the Northern liberal Establishment, King and the SCLC. Shunning separatism of any sort, Rustin reached out to include all voices in a broad coalition calling for equality for all Americans, excluding none.

A disciplined thinker, a perfectionist who paid absolute attention to detail, Rustin was essential to the intellectual base of the civil-rights movement. But he served in the shadow of more famous leaders--including his first mentor, A. Philip Randolph of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters; Roy Wilkins of the NAACP; Whitney Young of the Urban League, and King.

Rustin shared with King a fierce allegiance to the philosophy of nonviolence. Both had studied with Mohandas K. Gandhi. In addition, Rustin was raised a Quaker, and lived the convictions of a pacifist. He spent two years in prison as a conscientious objector during World War II.

As the challenges changed, Rustin’s focus shifted, but not his commitment to human rights. During the 1980s he worked on behalf of Cambodian refugees in Thailand. He helped South African groups that were pursuing peaceful change. He worked for freedom for Soviet and Ethiopian Jews, and never wavered in his staunch support of Israel. In his strong and uncompromising voice, up until his death on Monday, Bayard Rustin continued the fight for equality.