The March on Washington, fifty years later

It’s the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington. If you want to read something excellent about, read Harold Meyerson’s fantastic article on the contributions of Bayard Rustin and other democratic socialists to that day-and many others-in the civil rights struggle. Rustin’s career was a quiet tragedy. Had he been born ten or twenty years later, he would have been rightly recognized as one of the greatest political and strategic minds of his generation.

If you simply want to be moved by the grace of that moment of fifty years ago, this is pretty great, too.

Author: Harold Pollack

Harold Pollack is Helen Ross Professor of Social Service Administration at the University of Chicago. He has served on three expert committees of the National Academies of Science. His recent research appears in such journals as Addiction, Journal of the American Medical Association, and American Journal of Public Health. He writes regularly on HIV prevention, crime and drug policy, health reform, and disability policy for American Prospect, tnr.com, and other news outlets. His essay, "Lessons from an Emergency Room Nightmare" was selected for the collection The Best American Medical Writing, 2009. He recently participated, with zero critical acclaim, in the University of Chicago's annual Latke-Hamentaschen debate.