Martin Luther King III, along with his wife, Arndrea Waters King, and their 15-year-old daughter, Yolanda, have developed a set of traditions for this time of the year.
Each August, they rewatch Martin Luther King Jr’s rapturous address to the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. Even if the civil rights icon’s legacy is closer to the Kings than it is for most other families, they see march anniversaries as a teaching moment.
“We are like any other family, in the sense that we want to teach our daughter about this moment in history,” Arndrea said. “And then we also try to connect it with movements or people that are doing things in the present.”
This year, the Kings will join an expected crowd of tens of thousands of people, who are gathering on Saturday at the Lincoln Memorial in the nation’s capital to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the late reverend’s “I have a dream” speech.
The event is convened by the Kings’ Drum Major Institute and the National Action Network. A host of Black civil rights leaders and a multiracial, interfaith coalition of allies will rally attendees on the same spot where as many as 250,000 gathered in 1963 for what is still considered one of the greatest and most consequential racial justice and equality demonstrations in U.S history.
On Friday, Martin Luther King III, who is the late civil rights icon’s eldest son, and his sister, Bernice King, each visited their father’s monument in Washington.
“I see a man still standing in authority and saying, ‘We’ve still got to get this this right,’” Bernice said as she looked up at the granite statue.
The original march, which featured their father as a centerpiece, helped till the ground for passage of federal civil rights and voting rights legislation in the 1960s.
Organizers of this year’s commemoration hope to recapture the energy of the original March on Washington – especially in the face of eroded voting rights nationwide, after the recent striking down of affirmative action in college admissions and abortion rights by the supreme court, and amid growing threats of political violence and hatred against people of color, Jews and the LGBTQ+ community.
“What we know is when people stand up, the difference can be made,” Martin Luther King III told the Associated Press ahead of Saturday. “This is not a traditional commemoration. This really is a rededication.”
The event kicks off with pre-program speeches and performances at 8.00am ET. The main program begins at 11am ET, followed by a procession that will begin through the streets of Washington toward the Dr Martin Luther King Jr Memorial.
Featured speakers include Andrew Young, the close King adviser who helped organize the original march and who went on to serve as a congressman, UN ambassador and mayor of Atlanta. Leaders from the NAACP and the National Urban League are also expected to give remarks.
Several leaders from groups organizing the march met on Friday with the attorney general, Merrick Garland, and the assistant attorney general of the civil rights division, Kristen Clarke, to discuss a range of issues, including voting rights, policing and redlining.
The gathering on Saturday is a precursor to the actual anniversary of the 28 August 1963 March on Washington. Joe Biden and the vice-president, Kamala Harris, will observe the march anniversary on Monday by meeting with organizers of the 1963 gathering. All of King’s children have been invited to meet with Biden, White House officials said.
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