The revived attention to Rustin is an occasion to remember his career in all its complexity. Although the March for Jobs and Freedom was probably Rustin\u2019s greatest achievement, his work both before and after 1963 is worth remembering. Rustin\u2019s career contains much both to inspire and to sadden Consistent Life Ethic activists.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/consistent-life.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/1-blog-Rustin-movie.jpg\")
<\/a>Rustin Movie<\/p><\/div>\n
The Years before the March: An Advocate for Peace and Justice<\/strong><\/h3>\nRustin\u2019s coordination of the 1963 March was the culmination of decades of peace activism, as the movie mentions but largely does not portray. In fact, the Rustin <\/em>movie implies that the peace movement was some dreary backwater community unworthy of its hero\u2019s abilities. The reality was dramatically different.<\/p>\nRaised a Quaker in West Chester, Pennsylvania, Rustin started working in the 1940s for the peace organization the Fellowship of Reconciliation (FOR). Rustin lectured and conducted workshops for the FOR at schools and churches around the United States. During World War II, he refused to cooperate with US conscription law, writing that \u201cWar is wrong. Conscription is a concomitant of modern war\u2026Its design and purpose is to set men apart\u2014German against American, American against Japanese.\u201d (Rustin, \u201cLetter to the Draft Board,\u201d in Time on Two Crosses: The Collected Writings of Bayard Rustin, <\/em>p. 12) He subsequently served time in federal prison.<\/p>\nRustin combined peace activism with work for racial equality. In prison, he engaged in civil disobedience to integrate the prison cafeteria and chapel. In 1942, he traveled in the south on an interstate bus, sitting in the \u201cwhites\u201d section. This defiance of segregation earned him beating and arrest from police officers, yet his composure apparently so rattled his captors that, as Rustin recounted the incident, an exasperated police captain declared \u201cyou\u2019re supposed to be scared when you come in here!\u201d (Rustin, \u201cNonviolence vs. Jim Crow,\u201d in Time on Two Crosses, <\/em>pp. 2-5)<\/p>\nAlong with other activists, Rustin repeated his defiance of segregated transportation in 1947 as part of the \u201cFreedom Ride\u201d organized by the FOR and the affiliated Congress on Racial Equality. The interracial group rode a bus through southern US states, being arrested six times and being attacked once.<\/p>\n
Working for the FOR and later the War Resisters League, Rustin agitated for peace in the 1940s and 1950s, as the Cold War and nuclear arms race escalated. Determined to challenge US development of the hydrogen bomb, Rustin wrote in 1950 that \u201cWe must find some way to let people know that now <\/em>we are prepared to go to jail or even to give up all\u2014to get shot down if necessary\u2014but to cry out.\u201d (Vincent Intondi, African Americans against the Bomb: Nuclear Weapons, Colonialism, and the Black Freedom Movement<\/em>, p. 42)<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"http:\/\/consistent-life.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/1-blog-Rustin-magazine.jpg\")
<\/a>Rustin in Life Magazine<\/p><\/div>\n
He contemplated civil disobedience at Los Alamos to \u201cobstruct the coming in of materials\u201d and eventually organized an eight-day \u201cFast for Peace\u201d in Washington, DC, to protest nuclear weapons. The fast included a Good Friday vigil, led by Rustin, in front of the Pentagon and inspired similar actions across the United States and in other countries.<\/p>\n
Rustin\u2019s peace activism took him to India, Ghana, Nigeria, the United Kingdom, and the Soviet Union. He also visited Montgomery, Alabama, during the 1955-56 Montgomery Bus Boycott and thus became a key advisor to King.<\/p>\n
Speaking at a 1958 anti-nuclear march in Britain, Rustin linked the peace and civil rights struggles, saying,<\/p>\n
There must be unilateral [disarmament] action by a single nation, come what may. There must be no strings attached. We must be prepared to absorb the danger. We must use our bodies in direct action, non-cooperation, whatever is required to bring our government to its senses. In the United States, the black people of Montgomery said, \u201cWe will not cooperate with discrimination.\u201d And the action of those people achieved tremendous results. They are now riding the buses with dignity, because they were prepared to make a sacrifice of walking for their rights. (Intondi, p. 50)<\/p>\n
The following year, Rustin took part in a campaign to protest French nuclear testing in Africa that brought together the peace and anti-colonial struggles.<\/p>\n
After the March: A Disappointing Record<\/strong><\/h3>\nThe March for Jobs and Freedom was Rustin\u2019s triumph, \u201cthe most exciting project I\u2019ve ever worked on,\u201d as he put it. (Time on Two Crosses, <\/em>p. 31) The March was also a turning point for Rustin.<\/p>\nIn 1964, Rustin wrote \u201cFrom Protest to Politics,\u201d arguing<\/a> that Black Americans should move away from seeking equality through civil disobedience and similar protests to working within the political system, in alliance with labor unions and the Democratic Party. He subsequently became head of the A. Philip Randolph Institute, an AFL-CIO affiliated group focused on anti-poverty efforts. Economic issues dominated Rustin\u2019s work for the rest of his life.<\/p>\nDuring his later years, Rustin adopted many stances that dismayed his admirers and should dismay Consistent Life Ethic activists.<\/p>\n
Like so many social justice advocates, Rustin sadly had a blind spot toward children in the womb. In 1970, he stated \u201cI am entirely for free abortions on demand, since I think women should be able to choose whether they want to have children.\u201d (\u201cFeminism and Equality,\u201d in Time on Two Crosses, <\/em>p. 238) That Rustin should be indifferent to some of the most vulnerable humans is deeply disappointing.<\/p>\nEqually disappointing and more surprising was Rustin\u2019s move away from peace activism. Although an early<\/a> Vietnam War critic<\/a> who never exactly abandoned this position, Rustin became cautious as the war progressed. He was equivocal<\/a> about linking opposition to the war to the anti-poverty cause. While supportive of King\u2019s opposition to the war, he criticized his colleague for linking the civil rights and anti-war causes, calling such an approach \u201cdistinctly unprofitable and perhaps even suicidal.\u201d (Intondi, pp. 77-78)<\/p>\nRustin\u2019s attitude frustrated his allies. Fellow activist Eleanor Holmes Norton commented, \u201cThe Vietnam War seemed to me to be so wrong that on that one I really did expect to be led by Bayard\u2026That was a very disillusioning notion.\u201d (Interview in documentary Brother Outsider: The Life of Bayard Rustin <\/em>[2003]) Years after the war\u2019s bitter and bloody end, Rustin remained ambivalent<\/a> about whether the US involvement in Southeast Asia was wise or just and was still critical of King\u2019s approach. In the 1980s (amid the depths of the nuclear arms race), Rustin similarly opposed linking civil rights and peace work.<\/p>\nYet Rustin was willing to link civil rights to a different foreign policy issue: he strongly supported Israel<\/a>, founding the Black Americans to Support Israel Committee<\/a>. This stance included advocating in 1970 for the United States to send military jets to Israel for defense against Arab nations. Rustin commented, \u201cI believe that sending jets to Israel when it was requested would have been best for the world situation and would have upheld democracy.\u201d (I Must Resist: Bayard Rustin\u2019s Life in Letters <\/em>[2012, ebook edition], p. 204) Rustin wrote President Gerald Ford urging him \u201cto provide Israel with whatever supplies she needs in order to maintain safe, secure borders.\u201d (I Must Resist<\/em>, p. 215) He later expressed sympathy for Israel\u2019s 1982 invasion of Lebanon.<\/p>\nA possible reason, identified by friendly and unfriendly critics alike, for Rustin\u2019s shifting views is that he became wary of positions that might jeopardize his vision, expressed in \u201cFrom Protest to Politics,\u201d of working within the political system.<\/p>\n
For example, Democratic President Lyndon Johnson\u2019s ability to deliver pro-Black and pro-poor economic policies may have made Rustin wary of too vocally opposing the war Johnson was prosecuting in Southeast Asia. Rustin reportedly warned civil rights leaders about the dangers of alienating Johnson and told peace groups \u201cYou guys can\u2019t deliver a single pint of milk to the kids in Harlem and Lyndon Johnson can.\u201d (Time on Two Crosses, <\/em>p. xxxiv) Mainstream political commitments may have carried a price.<\/p>\nConclusion<\/strong><\/h3>\nBy highlighting Rustin\u2019s questionable positions, I am not seeking to tear him down or argue he is unworthy of celebration. Bayard Rustin was a man of extraordinary intelligence and courage whose accomplishments are worthy of cinematic and other celebration.<\/p>\n
Rather, Rustin\u2019s failures in advocating against violence and for the lives of all humans teach the very humbling lesson that even the most admirable people can have their moral and political blind spots. These failures perhaps also teach that efforts to be politically effective can come at the expense of moral clarity.<\/p>\n
=================================<\/p>\n
For more posts covering about the same historical period, see:\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n\u201cAn Inferno That Even the Mind of Dante Could Not Envision\u201d: Martin Luther King on Nuclear Weapons<\/a><\/p>\nWhere Does Martin Luther King Jr. Fit Into the Consistent Life Ethic?\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\nIs it Too Late? 1971 Speech of Fannie Lou Hamer<\/a><\/p>\nThe Poor Cry Out for Justice, and We Respond with Legalized Abortion<\/a><\/p>\n
Raised a Quaker in West Chester, Pennsylvania, Rustin started working in the 1940s for the peace organization the Fellowship of Reconciliation (FOR). Rustin lectured and conducted workshops for the FOR at schools and churches around the United States. During World War II, he refused to cooperate with US conscription law, writing that \u201cWar is wrong. Conscription is a concomitant of modern war\u2026Its design and purpose is to set men apart\u2014German against American, American against Japanese.\u201d (Rustin, \u201cLetter to the Draft Board,\u201d in Time on Two Crosses: The Collected Writings of Bayard Rustin, <\/em>p. 12) He subsequently served time in federal prison.<\/p>\n Rustin combined peace activism with work for racial equality. In prison, he engaged in civil disobedience to integrate the prison cafeteria and chapel. In 1942, he traveled in the south on an interstate bus, sitting in the \u201cwhites\u201d section. This defiance of segregation earned him beating and arrest from police officers, yet his composure apparently so rattled his captors that, as Rustin recounted the incident, an exasperated police captain declared \u201cyou\u2019re supposed to be scared when you come in here!\u201d (Rustin, \u201cNonviolence vs. Jim Crow,\u201d in Time on Two Crosses, <\/em>pp. 2-5)<\/p>\n Along with other activists, Rustin repeated his defiance of segregated transportation in 1947 as part of the \u201cFreedom Ride\u201d organized by the FOR and the affiliated Congress on Racial Equality. The interracial group rode a bus through southern US states, being arrested six times and being attacked once.<\/p>\n Working for the FOR and later the War Resisters League, Rustin agitated for peace in the 1940s and 1950s, as the Cold War and nuclear arms race escalated. Determined to challenge US development of the hydrogen bomb, Rustin wrote in 1950 that \u201cWe must find some way to let people know that now <\/em>we are prepared to go to jail or even to give up all\u2014to get shot down if necessary\u2014but to cry out.\u201d (Vincent Intondi, African Americans against the Bomb: Nuclear Weapons, Colonialism, and the Black Freedom Movement<\/em>, p. 42)<\/p>\n Rustin in Life Magazine<\/p><\/div>\n He contemplated civil disobedience at Los Alamos to \u201cobstruct the coming in of materials\u201d and eventually organized an eight-day \u201cFast for Peace\u201d in Washington, DC, to protest nuclear weapons. The fast included a Good Friday vigil, led by Rustin, in front of the Pentagon and inspired similar actions across the United States and in other countries.<\/p>\n Rustin\u2019s peace activism took him to India, Ghana, Nigeria, the United Kingdom, and the Soviet Union. He also visited Montgomery, Alabama, during the 1955-56 Montgomery Bus Boycott and thus became a key advisor to King.<\/p>\n Speaking at a 1958 anti-nuclear march in Britain, Rustin linked the peace and civil rights struggles, saying,<\/p>\n There must be unilateral [disarmament] action by a single nation, come what may. There must be no strings attached. We must be prepared to absorb the danger. We must use our bodies in direct action, non-cooperation, whatever is required to bring our government to its senses. In the United States, the black people of Montgomery said, \u201cWe will not cooperate with discrimination.\u201d And the action of those people achieved tremendous results. They are now riding the buses with dignity, because they were prepared to make a sacrifice of walking for their rights. (Intondi, p. 50)<\/p>\n The following year, Rustin took part in a campaign to protest French nuclear testing in Africa that brought together the peace and anti-colonial struggles.<\/p>\n The March for Jobs and Freedom was Rustin\u2019s triumph, \u201cthe most exciting project I\u2019ve ever worked on,\u201d as he put it. (Time on Two Crosses, <\/em>p. 31) The March was also a turning point for Rustin.<\/p>\n In 1964, Rustin wrote \u201cFrom Protest to Politics,\u201d arguing<\/a> that Black Americans should move away from seeking equality through civil disobedience and similar protests to working within the political system, in alliance with labor unions and the Democratic Party. He subsequently became head of the A. Philip Randolph Institute, an AFL-CIO affiliated group focused on anti-poverty efforts. Economic issues dominated Rustin\u2019s work for the rest of his life.<\/p>\n During his later years, Rustin adopted many stances that dismayed his admirers and should dismay Consistent Life Ethic activists.<\/p>\n Like so many social justice advocates, Rustin sadly had a blind spot toward children in the womb. In 1970, he stated \u201cI am entirely for free abortions on demand, since I think women should be able to choose whether they want to have children.\u201d (\u201cFeminism and Equality,\u201d in Time on Two Crosses, <\/em>p. 238) That Rustin should be indifferent to some of the most vulnerable humans is deeply disappointing.<\/p>\n Equally disappointing and more surprising was Rustin\u2019s move away from peace activism. Although an early<\/a> Vietnam War critic<\/a> who never exactly abandoned this position, Rustin became cautious as the war progressed. He was equivocal<\/a> about linking opposition to the war to the anti-poverty cause. While supportive of King\u2019s opposition to the war, he criticized his colleague for linking the civil rights and anti-war causes, calling such an approach \u201cdistinctly unprofitable and perhaps even suicidal.\u201d (Intondi, pp. 77-78)<\/p>\n Rustin\u2019s attitude frustrated his allies. Fellow activist Eleanor Holmes Norton commented, \u201cThe Vietnam War seemed to me to be so wrong that on that one I really did expect to be led by Bayard\u2026That was a very disillusioning notion.\u201d (Interview in documentary Brother Outsider: The Life of Bayard Rustin <\/em>[2003]) Years after the war\u2019s bitter and bloody end, Rustin remained ambivalent<\/a> about whether the US involvement in Southeast Asia was wise or just and was still critical of King\u2019s approach. In the 1980s (amid the depths of the nuclear arms race), Rustin similarly opposed linking civil rights and peace work.<\/p>\n Yet Rustin was willing to link civil rights to a different foreign policy issue: he strongly supported Israel<\/a>, founding the Black Americans to Support Israel Committee<\/a>. This stance included advocating in 1970 for the United States to send military jets to Israel for defense against Arab nations. Rustin commented, \u201cI believe that sending jets to Israel when it was requested would have been best for the world situation and would have upheld democracy.\u201d (I Must Resist: Bayard Rustin\u2019s Life in Letters <\/em>[2012, ebook edition], p. 204) Rustin wrote President Gerald Ford urging him \u201cto provide Israel with whatever supplies she needs in order to maintain safe, secure borders.\u201d (I Must Resist<\/em>, p. 215) He later expressed sympathy for Israel\u2019s 1982 invasion of Lebanon.<\/p>\n A possible reason, identified by friendly and unfriendly critics alike, for Rustin\u2019s shifting views is that he became wary of positions that might jeopardize his vision, expressed in \u201cFrom Protest to Politics,\u201d of working within the political system.<\/p>\n For example, Democratic President Lyndon Johnson\u2019s ability to deliver pro-Black and pro-poor economic policies may have made Rustin wary of too vocally opposing the war Johnson was prosecuting in Southeast Asia. Rustin reportedly warned civil rights leaders about the dangers of alienating Johnson and told peace groups \u201cYou guys can\u2019t deliver a single pint of milk to the kids in Harlem and Lyndon Johnson can.\u201d (Time on Two Crosses, <\/em>p. xxxiv) Mainstream political commitments may have carried a price.<\/p>\n By highlighting Rustin\u2019s questionable positions, I am not seeking to tear him down or argue he is unworthy of celebration. Bayard Rustin was a man of extraordinary intelligence and courage whose accomplishments are worthy of cinematic and other celebration.<\/p>\n Rather, Rustin\u2019s failures in advocating against violence and for the lives of all humans teach the very humbling lesson that even the most admirable people can have their moral and political blind spots. These failures perhaps also teach that efforts to be politically effective can come at the expense of moral clarity.<\/p>\n =================================<\/p>\n For more posts covering about the same historical period, see:\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cAn Inferno That Even the Mind of Dante Could Not Envision\u201d: Martin Luther King on Nuclear Weapons<\/a><\/p>\n Where Does Martin Luther King Jr. Fit Into the Consistent Life Ethic?\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n Is it Too Late? 1971 Speech of Fannie Lou Hamer<\/a><\/p>\n The Poor Cry Out for Justice, and We Respond with Legalized Abortion<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a>After the March: A Disappointing Record<\/strong><\/h3>\n
Conclusion<\/strong><\/h3>\n