In this silent WSB newsfilm clip from August 28, 1963, leaders of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom meet with president John F. Kennedy at the White House following the demonstration at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. As the clip begins, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and Walter P. Reuther of the United Automobile Workers of America (UAWA) walk along a tree-lined path, followed by other event organizers. They and the other men in the clip wear buttons on their jackets. The camera briefly focuses on the White House and then on camera men waiting outside the building. Next, the demonstration leaders walk past a building. First, King and Reuther walk together with John Lewis, head of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC); they are followed by Whitney M. Young, Jr. of the National Urban League and Rabbi Joachim Prinz of the American Jewish Congregation; finally Roy Wilkins of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), Floyd McKissick of the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), and Mathew Ahmann of the National Catholic Conference for Interracial Justice pass the camera.

Inside the White House, photographers stand together and take pictures of the gathering. The camera focuses on several of the men standing together with the president; Young stands on the right of the group and A. Philip Randolph, organizer of the day's demonstrations and representative of the Negro American Labor Council, stands between the president with Dr. Eugene Carson Blake of the United Presbyterian Church. Rabbi Prinz and John Lewis are also seen next to Blake. The camera focuses on Kennedy, Reuther, and Young before panning to the left to also show Randolph and Reuther. At the far left of the group stand Ahmann and Labor Secretary W. Willard Wirtz. The camera pans to the right to also focus on King, Lewis, Prinz, Randolph, and Kennedy. As the camera focuses on Reuther, vice president Lyndon B. Johnson is seen standing behind him. The camera pans left to show Kennedy, and then focuses on King and Lewis, although Lewis is obscured in the shadow. After focusing again on Kennedy and Randolph, the clip ends with another image of the group, this time with Young standing on the right of the men.

The August 28, 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom was organized by civil rights and labor leaders to show support for civil rights legislation under consideration by the United States Congress. During the afternoon program many of the leaders seen in the clip spoke, including King who gave the "I have a dream" speech that day. After the afternoon ceremony ten leaders of the sponsoring organization met for an hour with president John F. Kennedy and some of his cabinet including vice president Johnson, Labor Secretary Wirtz, and Civil Rights Division head Burke Marshall. The proposed civil rights legislation was finally passed the next summer as the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

Title supplied by cataloger.

The Civil Rights Digital Library received support from a National Leadership Grant for Libraries awarded to the University of Georgia by the Institute of Museum and Library Services for digital conversion and description of the WSB-TV Newsfilm Collection.

1 clip (about 1 min.): black-and-white, silent ; 16 mm.

Original found in the WSB-TV newsfilm collection.

WSB-TV newsfilm clip of leaders of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom meeting with president John F. Kennedy at the White House, Washington, D.C., 1963 August 28, WSB-TV newsfilm collection, reel 0767, 32:08/33:11, Walter J. Brown Media Archives and Peabody Awards Collection, The University of Georgia Libraries, Athens, Ga, as presented in the Digital Library of Georgia.

Forms part of: Civil Rights Digital Library.