Amended in Assembly August 26, 2013

Amended in Assembly August 20, 2013

California Legislature—2013–14 Regular Session

House Resolution No. 22

Introduced by Assembly Members John A. Pérez and Weber

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(Coauthors: Assembly Members Achadjian, Alejo, Allen, Ammiano, Atkins, Bigelow, Bloom, Bocanegra, Bonilla, Bonta, Bradford, Brown, Buchanan, Ian Calderon, Campos, Chau, Chávez, Chesbro, Conway, Cooley, Dahle, Daly, Dickinson, Eggman, Fong, Fox, Frazier, Beth Gaines, Garcia, Gatto, Gomez, Gonzalez, Gordon, Gorell, Gray, Grove, Hagman, Hall, Harkey, Roger Hernández, Holden, Jones, Jones-Sawyer, Levine, Linder, Logue, Lowenthal, Maienschein, Medina, Melendez, Mitchell, Morrell, Mullin, Muratsuchi, Nazarian, Nestande, Olsen, Pan, Patterson, Perea, V. Manuel Pérez, Quirk, Quirk-Silva, Rendon, Salas, Skinner, Stone, Ting, Wagner, Waldron, Wieckowski, Wilk, Williams, and Yamada)

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August 5, 2013

House Resolution No. 22—Relative to the March on Washington 50th anniversary.

WHEREAS, The March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom
on August 28, 1963, was one of the largest rallies for human rights
in United States history and called for civil and economic rights
for African Americans; and

WHEREAS, The March on Washington included musical
performances by Marian Anderson, Joan Baez, Bob Dylan, and
Mahalia Jackson, and a series of speeches by various civil rights
leaders, including Catholic, Protestant, and Jewish religious leaders,
as well as now Congressman John Lewis and the only female
speaker, Josephine Baker; and

WHEREAS, At the March on Washington, Reverend Dr. Martin
Luther King, Jr., standing in front of the Lincoln Memorial,
delivered one of the most famous speeches in American history,
his “I Have a Dream” speech, advocating racial harmony and social
justice; and

WHEREAS, The March on Washington was organized by a
group of civil rights, labor, and religious organizations, under the
theme “jobs and freedom,” with an estimated 200,000 to 300,000
people participating; and

WHEREAS, The 1963 March on Washington played an
important part in the rapidly expanding civil rights movement, and
it also marked the 100th anniversary of the signing of the
Emancipation Proclamation by President Abraham Lincoln; and

WHEREAS, The March on Washington was planned and
initiated by A. Philip Randolph, the President of the Brotherhood
of Sleeping Car Porters -- the first predominantly black labor union.
He was also President of the Negro American Labor Council and
Vice President of the AFL-CIO; and

WHEREAS, When schools in the South resisted school
integration following Brown v. Board of Education, Randolph
organized a Prayer Pilgrimage with Martin Luther King, Jr., and
in 1958 and 1959, Randolph organized youth marches for
integrated schools in Washington, D.C.; and

WHEREAS, Randolph inspired the “Freedom Budget,”
sometimes called the “Randolph Freedom Budget,” which aimed
to deal with the economic problems facing the African American
community, particularly workers and the unemployed; and

WHEREAS, Bayard Rustin was the chief organizer of the March
on Washington and instrumental in organizing its logistics. He
drafted off-duty police officers to be marshals and bus captains to
direct traffic, and scheduled the podium speakers; and

WHEREAS, Rustin was an American leader in social
movements for civil rights, nonviolence, and gay rights and became
a leading strategist in the civil rights movement from 1955 to 1968,
helping to organize the Southern Christian Leadership Conference
to strengthen Martin Luther King, Jr.’s leadership and promote
the philosophy and practice of nonviolent resistance; and

WHEREAS, Commemorating the 1963 March on Washington
affirms our nation’s and our state’s commitment to achieving the
social and economic justice sought by the marchers and their vision
of social equality, opportunity, and racial harmony embodied in
the Martin Luther King, Jr.’s captivating “I Have A Dream” speech;
and

WHEREAS, Bayard Rustin proclaimed the demands of the
March on Washington to be “effective civil rights legislation,” an
end to segregation “in every school district in the year 1963,” “the
enforcement of the Fourteenth Amendment” to the United States
Constitution, a ban on “discrimination in all housing supported by
federal funds,” “an increase in the national minimum wage so that
men may live in dignity,” and that “all of the rights that are given
to any citizen be given to black men and men of every minority
group” including a strong Fair Employment Practices Commission;
and

WHEREAS, The March on Washington is widely credited with
helping to pave the way for passage of the Civil Rights Act of
1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965; and

WHEREAS, The Civil Rights Act of 1964 laid the foundation
of civil rights legislation in the United States when it outlawed
major forms of discrimination against racial, ethnic, national, and
religious minorities, and women; and

WHEREAS, In addition, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 became
the landmark federal legislation in the United States to prohibit
discrimination in voting. This act, echoing the language of the
Fifteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, prohibits
states and local governments from imposing any “voting
qualification or prerequisite to voting, or standard, practice, or
procedure ... to deny or abridge the right of any citizen of the
United States to vote on account of race or color”; and

WHEREAS, In recent years, states have enacted voting laws
that could potentially disenfranchise voters; now, therefore, be it

Resolved, By the Assembly of the State of California, That the
Assembly commemorates the 50th anniversary of the 1963 March
on Washington for Jobs and Freedom and how it served as a
catalyst for the passage of landmark legislative reforms, such as
the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and the Civil Rights Act of 1964;
and be it further

Resolved, That the sacrifices made by the leaders and
participants of the March on Washington 50 years ago are
recognized and honored for their role in the advancement of civil
rights and social justice in the United States; and be it further

Resolved, That the Chief Clerk of the Assembly transmit copies
of this resolution to the author for appropriate distribution.