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THE MICHIGAN CHRONICLE


September 1-7, 2010


Page A-3


Second Front


‘Reclaiming the Dream’ march protects King’s legacy


“They may have the Mall, but we have the message. They may have the platform, but we have the dream.” — Rev. Al Sharpton


By Michael Cottman and Jackie Jones Brenda Galloway traveled with her family


from North Carolina in 1963 to attend the first March on Washington, and she’s proudly paid tribute to the historic occasion since.


Galloway, now a DC resident, said she makes


a private pilgrimage to the Lincoln Memorial, where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his legendary “I Have a Dream” speech. But on Sat- urday, Galloway decided to join the “Reclaim the Dream” march led by Rev. Al Sharpton, radio personality Tom Joyner and a host of other Black activists to commemorate the 47th anniversary of King’s historic appearance.


“I just think it’s important to keep the dream


that so many of our civil rights activists fought for for years — Martin Luther King, Dorothy Height, Benjamin Hooks and all the others,” Galloway said in an interview with BlackAmeri- caWeb.com.


Between 10,000 and 15,000 people — most


of them African American — gathered under the sweltering sun at Dunbar High School in Wash- ington, DC, Saturday for the march. For nearly three hours, the crowd listened to more than a dozen speakers who advocated for racial equal- ity in education, housing and criminal justice. They also criticized conservative commentator Glenn Beck for holding his “Restoring Honor” rally at the Lincoln Memorial on the same day.


Beck claimed his event drew 350,000 to


600,000 people, but CBS reported the rally ac- tually attracted a much smaller turnout, esti- mating that 87,000 showed up. And on Sunday, appearing on Fox News, Beck tried to explain that his rally was intended to reclaim the Civil Rights Movement from “politics” for “people of faith.”


Beck’s twisted explanations for his march


are often rambling, unclear and misleading, and he raises more questions each time he opens his mouth. So who exactly is reclaim- ing the Civil Rights Movement? The throngs of Whites on the Mall Saturday? And is Beck not- so-subtlely implying that Black people don’t have faith?


“We’re not going to let Beck miscast Martin


Luther King’s dream of what was and what is,” Sharpton said in an interview with BlackAmeri- caWeb.com. “We mobilized 10,000 people who are energized and ready.”


Beck has also backed off his initial claim


that President Barack Obama is “racist.” On a Sunday morning news show, Beck now says he misspoke when he said Obama had a “deep- seated hatred for White people or the White culture.”


“It shouldn’t have been said,” Beck said.


“I have a big fat mouth sometimes and I say things, and that’s not the way people should behave. And it was not accurate.”


Meanwhile, with the bleachers at Dunbar


High School filled to capacity on Saturday, Joyner looked at the enthusiastic gathering of African Americans and said he was pleased to witness such an uplifting moment.


“This makes me hopeful when it comes to


voting in November,” Joyner said in an inter- view with BlackAmericaWeb.com. “If we can get this many people out here on such a hot day — and some of these people don’t even have jobs — then this is an important day.”


“Marching is part of me,” he said. Joyner told the audience that said he’s par-


ticipated in civil rights demonstrations dating


“Don’t drink the tea” to people leaving Beck’s rally.


For Morial, Saturday’s rally and march was


about solidifying a movement. “We’re in a fight between the past and the


future,” Morial said in an interview with Black- AmericaWeb.com. “This is a very important moment for America. It’s about the vision of what America should be moving into the 21st century.”


Morial’s reference to the past was clearly


aimed at Beck and former Alaska governor Sarah Palin, who, as a featured speaker at the Beck event, appealed to a vast audience.


While Beck billed his event as nonpoliti-


cal, conservative activists said their show of strength was a clear sign that they can swing elections because much of the country is angry with what many voters call an out-of-touch Washington.


On Saturday, however, Alveda King, a niece


of the civil rights leader, appealed to Beck rally participants to “focus not on elections or on political causes, but on honor, on character, not the color of our skin.”


Civil rights leaders said Beck and Palin were


trying to hijack a historic date, but Beck main- tains that he didn’t know about King’s anniver- sary before he applied for a rally permit.


“They may have the Mall, but we have the


message,” Sharpton told his crowd. “They may have the platform, but we have the dream.”


Norton said she remembers being at King’s


march on Washington in 1963. “Glenn Beck’s march will change nothing,”


Norton said. “But you can’t blame Glenn Beck for his March-on-Washington envy.”


Before the events started on Saturday, regis-


trants for Beck’s “Restoring Honor” rally were sent a link by a blogger warning the visitors to stay away from certain neighborhoods in Wash- ington where they would purportedly encoun- ter angry and dangerous African Americans.


Al Sharpton


back to 1965, when he joined other politically- active Black Americans for the legendary Selma to Montgomery marche in Alabama.


“I was with Dr. King on the last day of the


Selma-Montgomery march, and I’m marching now just like I marched then, and I’m glad to be here today,” Joyner said. “I love you, Black people!”


Other speakers at Sharpton’s rally in-


cluded labor leaders and union organizers, Marc Morial, president of The National Urban League; Ben Jealous, president of the NAACP; Arne Duncan, U.S. Secretary of Education; and D.C. Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton.


Duncan told the audience that education is


the civil rights issue of this generation. “Parents, turn off the television. Educators,


we have to stop making excuses,” Duncan said. “The dividing line in our country today is less around White and Black and more about edu- cational opportunity. We’ve been too satisfied with second-class schools.”


The rally culminated in a three-mile march


to the construction site of the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial on the National Mall, which is scheduled to be completed by fall of 2011.


Martin Luther King III said at the site of the planned memorial that his father, in 1967 and


1968, “was focused on economic empower- ment. He did not live to see that come to frui- tion.” He added, “We have made great strides, but somehow we’ve got to create a climate so that everybody can do well, not just some.”


(According to a report in The Washington


Post, former DC congressional delegate Walter Fauntroy collapsed at the memorial site after walking from Dunbar High School. The 77- year-old pastor was taken to a local hospital for evaluation.)


As the crowd walked to the planned King


memorial, the marchers were watched closely by participants from Beck’s rally, which ended about 90 minutes before Sharpton’s group ar- rived on the Mall. Sharpton had urged “Reclaim the Dream” attendees to be peaceful, not con- frontational.


“If people start heckling, smile at them,” he


said. “This ismy America,” one White man shout-


ed at the Black crowd. Most people showed restraint and were civilized during the day, al- though some yelled hateful insults at Sharpton as he walked peacefully to the Mall.


One woman from the Beck rally shouted to


the Sharpton marchers: “Go to church. Restore America with peace.” Some marchers chanted


Interestingly, serious crime is down overall


throughout Washington, and some of the neigh- borhoods identified as dangerous have evolved into more diverse communities. “Chocolate City,” which once had a Black population ex- ceeding 70 percent, now wavers between 50 to 54 percent Black.


Missing from Sharpton’s march was Rev.


Jesse Jackson, who decided to skip the DC event to lead a march of 5,000 labor leaders and educators in Detroit.


“Dr. King would have focused on America’s


abandoned zones, from Appalachia to Alabama to urban Detroit,” Jackson said. “He would have cried out against the bank bailout not linked to saving homes or investing in communities. He would cry out for a moratorium on home fore- closures.”


Meanwhile, at Dunbar High School, Maurice


Ratiff III, 9, told BlackAmericaWeb.com that he came with his parents to the Sharpton rally “to hear about Martin Luther King’s march to Washington and all about his life.”


Of course, Ratiff knew about King’s “I Have a


Dream” speech and that the civil rights leader had hoped “that one day White kids and Black kids could hold hands together.”


So far, Ratiff said, he learned that “(King)


taught us how to use non-violence, no guns. He always fought with love.”


Black philanthropists join distinguished group of ‘Detroiters of the Year’


By Minehaha Foreman In Detroit, where finan-


cial solvency is still a projec- tion sketched on economists’ worksheets, there’s another heartbeat that keeps the city rising to new ranks.


The pulse of philanthropy


has swept Detroit through mo- mentous challenges. Without the generosity of its devotees, the famed Motor City would be sorely missing a lot of the cul- tural, educational and historic offerings it has today.


Among the most noted


donors and innovators rec- ognized by Hour magazine as Detroiters of the Year, are key African-American leaders who have blazed the trail for the next generation of altruistic visionaries.


U.S. District Judge Damon


J. Keith, former GM chieftain Roy Roberts and automotive entrepreneur Dr. William F. Pickard share the title of De- troiter of the Year with several high achieving men and women including major developer Al Taubman, Ford Motors’ Edsel Ford II and entrepreneurs Richard and Linda Kughn.


Keith has served as a fed- Bill Pickard


eral judge for 33 years and his lifelong commitment to civil rights activism is key to progress we enjoy today. But through all of his monumen- tal and historic achievements, Keith has not lost his humil- ity.


“This is such a high honor


to be included with such a dis- tinguished group of people,” he said.


For Keith, generosity is not an obligation but a joy.


“ Y o u show me a selfish person and I’ll show you an unhappy person,” Keith told the Michi- gan Chronicle.


Damon Keith The act of giving is also a


measure of investing in the future, something that is often forgotten with today’s “now” mentality. Roy Roberts, the first African American to lead GM’s North American division, is no stranger to hard times.


“My father had ten children and my mother died when I


Al Taubman was two,”


Roberts said. “My father always said, ‘If you have more than you need to eat, you have to share with your neighbors.’ Detroit has to succeed or the surrounding areas will never do well.”


Roberts’ philosophy for


giving is simple: “Do what you can.”


“Some people tend to think


that if you don’t have a lot of money you can’t do much,” he said. “It’s not the amount, it’s


the fact that you’re willing to do it.”


Education is an issue Rob-


erts sees pivotal to success. “People who try to sepa-


rate the well-being of the city and the education system are making a gross mistake,” he said, adding that he plans to do whatever he can to see De- troit schools thrive.


Distinguished entrepreneur


and philanthropist Dr. William F. Pickard says he owes the


community a debt for provid- ing him such great opportuni- ties.


“I will always do whatever I


can to give back the commu- nity, especially young people,” said Pickard, a generous donor to the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History, Grand Valley State University, U-M and several nonprofits.


Raised in Flint, Pickard


has grown to love Detroit as home.


“I love the resilience, the


never-say-no of Detroiters. I love the fact that we always have gotten up off the canvas to fight another day. It was the genius of Ford, Chrysler and GM that made Detroit the arsenal of democracy during WWII.


These philanthropists know


that their work is an important piece to Detroit’s full rebound from economic crisis.


“It’s not a single effort that


will revive us and save us,” Pickard said. “It’s the govern- ment, the private sector, the medical industry and there’s a role for philanthropy. I do my part in that.”


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