Million Man March

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Million Man March, Washington DC, may 1995

The Million Man March was a Black march of protest and unity convened by Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan in Washington, DC on October 16, 1995. The event included efforts to register African Americans to vote in US Elections and increase black involvement in volunteerism and community activism. Speakers also offered a strong criticism of the conservative offensive of Republicans after the 1994 congressional elections (most notably the Contract with America), characterized as an attack on programs like welfare, Medicaid, housing programs, student aid programs and education programs.

Many whites were critical or ambivalent about the march due to some of the more controversial figures associated with it (such as Louis Farrakhan of the Nation of Islam, criticized as racist, sexist and anti-Semitic) and many considered the male-only event sexist. Mumia Abu-Jamal (along with others of the political left) praised the large turnout of blacks but criticized the event's religious overtones and lack of radicalism.

According to voter registration statistics, one and a half million Black men registered to vote in the months following the March, leading David Bositis of the Joint Center for Economic Studies to remark, "In reviewing the sharp increase in the black male vote, I might find it highly implausible that there was another factor that rivaled the Million Man March in bringing about this change."

Following the 1995 Million Man March, The National Association of Black Social Workers (NABSW) reported a flood of 13,000 applications to adopt Black children. Though startlingly impressive, this was not a spontaneous phenonemon. Concurrently to the march, the NABSW launched an initiative, the Fist Full of Families Nationwide Adoption Initiative, as part of its goal to limit transracial adoption and encourage African-American families to adopt African-American children. Their policy echoes the calls from Farrakhan's podium to "save the race."

Phi Beta Sigma Fraternity was the only African-American Fraternity to co-sponsor the March. They provided space and additional resources for March organizers at its Washington, D.C. International Headquarters.

1 Speakers
2 Crowd size controversy
3 See also
- 3.1 Other movements that based their name on the Million Man March
4 External links

[edit] Speakers

Speakers at the rally on the National Mall included:

U.S. Rep. Charlie Rangel - House of Representatives
Donald Payne - Congressional Black Caucus
Rosa Parks - American Civil Rights Movement heroine
Maya Angelou - Author and Poet
Cornel West - Intellectual
Rev. Jesse Jackson - Civil Rights Leader
Benjamin Chavis - Civil Rights Leader
Stevie Wonder - Singer
Isaac Hayes - Singer
Hammer - Rapper
Louis Farrakhan - Nation of Islam leader (transcript of remarks)
Kurt Schmoke - Mayor of Baltimore
Marion Barry - Mayor of Washington, D.C.
Mike Tyson - Boxer
Dorothy I. Height - Civil Rights Leader

[edit] Crowd size controversy

March organizers estimated the crowd size at between 1.5 and 2 million people while the United States Park Police officially estimated the crowd size at 400,000. The Park Police figure was the figure reported widely by U.S. mass media but both figures were discredited by a subsequent Boston University study. Farrakhan threatened to sue the National Park Service due to the controversial low estimate from the Park Police. After the Million Man March, the Park Police decided to discontinue providing official crowd estimates.

Three days after the march, Dr. Farouk El-Baz and a team of ten research associates and graduate students at the Center for Remote Sensing at Boston University released an estimate of 870,000 people in with a margin of error of about 25 percent. They arrived at this figure by enlarging aerial photographs taken by the Park Service and counting crowd density.

They later revised that figure to 837,000 +/- 20%, or from 670,000 to 1,004,000. This revision was made when the Park Service provided original 35mm negatives; the first count was made with scanned printed photographs.

[edit] See also

March on Washington, the historical precedent for the Million Man March, thirty years earlier
Millions More Movement, launched by a broad coalition of Black leaders to mark the commemoration of the 10th Anniversary of the historic Million Man March.
Timeline of the American Civil Rights Movement
List of protest marches on Washington, DC
Get on the Bus, a 1996 Spike Lee movie related to the march.