Civil Rights Activists Question Relevance of New Mass Marches

To march or not to march?

That is the question swirling around the furrowed brow of the Rev. Hosea Williams, associate of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and long enduring civil rights mischief-maker, as Monday’s Million Family March looms.

No, Williams, the self-proclaimed “mastermind” behind some of King’s most successful marches, hasn’t taken leave of his senses--or his 50-year-old commitment to civil rights advocacy.

And no, neither the loss of his wife, Juanita, in August nor his own battle with cancer have dulled Williams’ appetite for a good old-fashioned civil rights fracas like the bloody Montgomery-to-Selma march where Alabama state troopers cracked his skull in 1965 or his Georgia anti-Ku Klux Klan marches almost 30 years later.

Williams’ doubts are rooted in his fear that civil rights marches really don’t accomplish much nowadays. If grass-roots organizing after the march is neglected--as it always seems to be, Williams says--civil rights marches ought be relegated to history books.

Marches, he fears, are “going out of style.”

Message Worthwhile

So, what about Monday’s planned Million Family March in Washington, to be led by Minister Louis Farrakhan of the Nation of Islam? Will Williams join in?

Farrakhan’s 1995 Million Man March called black men to atone for their transgressions, and this time around Farrakhan is calling for men to bring their families and rededicate themselves to spiritual and moral renewal.

It’s a message Williams deems worthwhile.

“I’m still making up my mind. But I’ll tell you this. If all we’re going to do is hear a lot of preaching and such--man, it won’t be worth a damn.”

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Is black America marched out?

Shoe leather has gotten a stern test in the black community since the 1950s, when King and others first marched to demand equal rights, setting the stage for civil rights gains.

And marching hasn’t stopped since.

Marching for voting rights in the ‘60s.

Marching to retain affirmative action set-asides in federal hiring and school admissions in the ‘70s.

Marching against Reagan administration efforts to rewrite civil rights laws in the ‘80s.

Marching to commemorate past marches in the ‘90s.

Marching against racial profiling and police brutality a few weeks ago.

But amid the footsteps, a growing chorus inside the black progressive community is calling into question the effectiveness of this revered mainstay of the modern civil rights movement.

Some, like Leonard Tate, an Atlanta activist organizing a caravan to the Million Family March, question exactly how much practical good comes out of civil rights marches these days.

“I believe in Minister Farrakhan’s message for the redemption of our families, so I’m going. But I’m really against marches, to tell you the truth. I’m almost gritting my teeth to bring people. . . . I hope it’s my last march,” Tate said.

For Tate, the civil rights march once had a noble and useful purpose--to inform the community about injustices and work toward solutions.

But after 40 years, he said, “We all know the issues before we get there. I’m not sure if anything substantive comes out of marches for either African American or white people anymore.”

“For African Americans, we know the most important element is how we organize once the march is over. As far as whites, we are sending this old woe-is-me Negro image and we need to get past that,” Tate said.

Ron Daniels, head of the Center for Constitutional Rights in New York, agreed marches can only be effective when coupled with organization. “People get discouraged when they don’t see sustained follow-up,” he said.

Some liken attending a march today to attending a sporting event with friends, a place to root, root, root for the home team, share a meal while rekindling friendships, and even pick up a snazzy commemorative T-shirt or two.

They say the primary problems facing black people are no longer the big-bellied sheriff blocking a polling booth or the race-baiting governor blocking the schoolhouse door.

Today’s problems, they say, are shaking voter apathy and raising Election Day turnout rates to higher levels or ensuring that public elementary and high school educations adequately prepare black students for college.

In short, ills that black people have the primary power to cure.

“There was a time when overt white racism was such that we needed to march. But now the obstacles to success are different,” said John McWhorter, a UC Berkeley linguistics professor and author of “Losing the Race--Self Sabotage in Black America.”

“Racism isn’t dead in America, but things have gotten much better in the past 50 years. The tacit feeling from most march organizers is that white racism is the primary obstacle to our success, but that’s not true,” McWhorter said.

Results in Doubt

Sunni Khalid, a Baltimore free-lance writer on African-American issues, said modern-day civil rights marches are fine if participants are seeking a little exercise or a sense of camaraderie with fellow demonstrators. But don’t expect much more, he said.

“My problem with the time and effort spent is that marches aren’t designed to achieve real results,” Khalid said. “Racism is institutionalized now. The brothers and sisters better start marching to the courtrooms if they really want change.”

Khalid and others questioning marches are quick to stress that their disagreement with any pro-marching forces isn’t over the aims of protest but the methods in getting there.

“I just think our time could be better spent,” Khalid said. “Take the effort, the money, the time devoted to a march and organize in the community.”

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Stop marching?

The notion might make civil rights icons like King, Medgar Evers and Fannie Lou Hamer turn over in their graves. And for good reason. While sit-down strikes and boycotts helped raise awareness and litigation tore down the underpinnings of racial discrimination, nothing in the civil rights advocate’s arsenal could evoke the passion, hope, and chills-down-your spine sensation of a massive civil rights march.

“I remember feeling like we were going to change the world,” Williams said of the 1963 March on Washington, of which he was a principal organizer.

“The greatest weapon to face down injustice was the march because you could mobilize people and organize at the same time,” he said.

A. Philip Randolph and King had been staging Washington, D.C., civil rights marches since the late 1950s over school desegregation.

But the 1963 March on Washington, where King delivered his “I Have a Dream” speech, helped trigger passage of civil rights legislation starting with the Civil Rights Act and Economic Opportunity Acts of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and the Civil Rights Act of 1968.

The Million Family March does not have legislation as its primary goal.

Farrakhan and Benjamin Muhammad organized this march to help “renew” families.

Organizers are taking full advantage of technology that King and other march pioneers couldn’t have dreamed of.

At www.millionfamilymarch.com, the Web-wise activist can read the 154-page march agenda, register and donate.

Or get your Million Family March merchandise--from buttons ($1) to 14-caret gold rings ($350) or silver medallions ($160).

Marches still have a place, said hip-hop impresario Russell Simmons, who is organizing entertainers like Will Smith and Spike Lee for Monday’s march.

The mass actions can open the doors of power.

Simmons filled the same role during a march against police brutality in Washington organized by Al Sharpton in late August. Afterward, leaders were given an opportunity to discuss their concerns with Atty. Gen. Janet Reno.

“If we don’t get 100,000 people on the Mall that day, we don’t get to meet with Reno,” Simmons said.