WASHINGTON – The March on Washington 50 years ago changed America, but more needs to be done to realize the dream of Martin Luther King Jr. for economic opportunities and civil rights for black Americans, President Barack Obama said Wednesday to a crowd of thousands on the National Mall.
“Because they kept marching, America changed,” Obama said. He said educational opportunities have improved and the number of minorities in state legislatures and Congress has grown. “And yes, eventually the White House changed.”
Dismissing the “magnitude of the progress” that civil rights activists have achieved since the initial March on Washington “dishonors the courage and sacrifice of those who led the march in those years,” Obama said, speaking on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial as Martin Luther King Jr. did during his “I Have a Dream” speech.
“But we would dishonor those heroes as well to suggest that the work of this nation is somehow complete.”
Obama alternated praise for progress with the need for more change.
But attendees said they hoped to hear what plans the nation would take in making America more free.
Robert Moffitt, standing in the slight drizzle among the crowd of thousands, said he was there to hear “if there are going to be any plans for the future besides what’s been done so far.” Charles Girard said he was excited that so many in the crowd had made the effort to come from around the country to commemorate the March on Washington.
Obama stressed that a central message of the original March on Washington was economic equality.
“What’s does it profit a man, Dr. King would ask, to sit at a lunch counter if you can’t afford the meal?’’ Obama said.
“For the men and women who gathered 50 years ago were not there in search of some abstract idea,” he said. “They were there seeking jobs as well as justice.”
He said the current black unemployment rate is twice as high as the white unemployment rate, and the Latino unemployment rate is a close second. He addressed the need for providing a gateway to the middle-class through fair wages, better living conditions, healthcare and educational opportunities.
“We should not fool ourselves, the task will not be easy,” he said. “Twin forces of technology and global competition have subtracted those jobs that provided a foothold into the American middle class.”
Obama recognized the struggles not only of black Americans, but of Japanese Americans who survived internment camps and Jewish Americans who survived the holocaust. He also mentioned struggles still going on for gender equality, marriage equality and religious equality.
But he said the fight comes from standing together.
“And that’s the lesson of our past, that’s the promise of tomorrow,” he said, “…that in the face of impossible odds, people who love their country can change it.”