After 1966 Rustin used his presidency of the A. Philip Randolph Institute to promote his Democratic-Socialist politics, particularly his belief that African American progress depends on a political coalition of African Americans and progressive whites united in their support of "A Freedom Budget for All Americans." Bayard Rustin was a brilliant strategist, pacifist, and forward-thinking civil rights activist during the middle of the 20th century. He had earlier blended strands of Gandhian nonviolence into his conception of pacifism. The Oxford Companion to American Military History. As the FOR youth secretary, and then as director of its Department of Race Relations, Rustin served as an organizer for A. Philip Randolph's 1941 March on Washington. In addition to providing behind-the-scenes diplomacy, Rustin drafted multiple manuals to guide march organizers, engaged in group training sessions, and recruited a troop of plain-clothes black police officers to ensure peace during the march. Branch, Taylor, Parting the Waters: America in the King Years, 1954-1963, Simon & Schuster, 1988. 2000. Adam Clayton Powell Jr., an African-American congressman, threatened to announce to the press a fabricated gay coupling between Rustin and King unless they halted plans for a march at the Democratic National Convention. From this committee emerged the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), a federation of civil rights organizations with nationwide affiliates, for whom Rustin also went to work. Contemporary Black Biography. He began his pursuit of social justice by joining the Young Communists League. Bayard Rustin was a famous American civil rights activist, who was born on March 17, 1912. He thought is mother was actually his sister. 21 Dec. 2020
. Arrested in North Carolina, Rustin served 22 days on a chain gang. But by 1963 Rustin had grown disillusioned with nonviolent direct action as a means of effecting change on behalf of black people. https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/bayard-rustin, "Bayard Rustin [1][2] He counseled Martin Luther King, Jr. on the techniques of nonviolent resistance. He worked through a variety of groups organizing demonstrations for civil rights and for peace. His skills as an organizer, planner, and leader were highly valued by prominent leaders in the Civil Rights Movement; yet, Rustin was relegated to the background during the Movement. Upon release, he resumed activist work with both CORE and FOR, in 1947 joining a group of other courageous Freedom Riders in the first of many protest rides throughout the South. Rustin, Bayard. ." When the bus boycott developed in Montgomery, Alabama, Rustin appeared on the scene to offer support, advice, and information on nonviolence. © 2019 Encyclopedia.com | All rights reserved. At the age of eleven Rustin made a startling discovery: the woman he had always been told was his sister, Florence, was in fact his mother, and the couple whom he knew as his parents were actually his grandparents. Encyclopedia of Race and Racism. Following the march, Rustin spent the last twenty years of his career with the A. Philip Randolph Institute, engaged in a broad campaign to end discrimination in labor and employment. Because each style has its own formatting nuances that evolve over time and not all information is available for every reference entry or article, Encyclopedia.com cannot guarantee each citation it generates. Encyclopedia.com. His most notable activity, however, was aligning with the Communist Party through the Young Communist League, a decision based on the party's position on race issues. Muste’s Fellowship of Reconciliation (FOR), an organization guided by the Gandhian principles of nonviolent protest that would later be deployed by civil rights leaders. "Bayard Rustin He is credited as the chief organizer of the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. Bayard Rustin (1912–1987) was a civil rights strategist and humanitarian who shaped the course of social protest in the twentieth century. James Luther Bevel was born…, In 1957 a group of young southern ministers formed an organization in Atlanta, Georgia , called the Southern Negro Leaders Conference on Transportati…, Abernathy, Ralph David 1926-1990 His own views are best expressed in his books Which Way Out? To Rustin, as to many other American intellectuals in the 1930s, the Communist party offered a coherent explanation and cure for the devastating problems of economic depression and racial tension in the United States. Encyclopedia.com. Joining Martin Luther King, Jr. first in the 1955 bus boycott in Montgomery, Alabama, Rustin served for a half dozen years as a special assistant to King and played a major role in planning the establishment of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). Retrieved December 21, 2020 from Encyclopedia.com: https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/rustin-bayard. Born March 17,1910, in West Chester, PA; died of a heart attack, August 24, 1987, in New York City. In December of 1955, a black woman named Rosa Parks refused to move to the back of the bus in segregated Montgomery, Alabama, sparking a bus boycott that would serve as a model for a decade of civil rights protests. Rustin became Muste’s chief acolyte, but his rise to leadership left him politically vulnerable, and in 1943 he was sentenced to three years in prison for refusing to register for selective service. However, rather than immerse himself in academics, Rustin plunged into the cultural and political circles of New York and Harlem. From this vantage point Rustin surveyed the violent upheavals and factionalism that soon characterized the movement for racial equality. In the summer of 1942, refusing to sit in the black section of a bus going from Louisville, Kentucky, to Nashville, Tennessee, he was beaten and arrested. Civil rights leader In his nearly half a century struggle for peace, civil rights, and economic justice, Rustin was arrested more than 20 times. Birmingham Protest March She was also a member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). The gossip led to Rustin's resignation from both CORE and FOR in 1955, although he continued the pacifist struggle in the War Resisters League. However, Rustin’s presence eventually drew attention, and he was extracted from Montgomery after a local newspaper alleged that he was wanted for inciting a riot. Originally conceived as a militant demonstration against employment discrimination, the march assumed greater breadth with the participation of major civil rights leaders. Meier, August, and Elliot Rudwick, CORE: A Study in the Civil Rights Movement, 1942-1968, Oxford University Press, 1973. ." Montgomery Bus Boycott Down the Line: The Collected Writings of Bayard Rustin, Quadrangle Books, 1971. John Whiteclay Chambers II "Rustin, Bayard George, Carol "Rustin, Bayard Rustin resigned from SCLC; he continued, however, to serve as a leading political adviser to King, and he remained influential in the SCLC’s affairs until King’s death in 1968. Bayard Rustin (1912-1987) is not a well-known figure in the history of the American Civil Rights Movement. By the mid-1950s a grass-roots civil rights movement had begun to emerge in the South. Together, they decided the WPB should focus on Southern Africa as a site where non-violent direct action was most urgently needed. Bayard Rustin lends his name to two educational institutions, including a high school in West Chester, Pennsylvania. Indeed, it was Rustin who was chiefly responsible for the organization of one of the most important nonviolent protests in American history, the 1963 March on Washington at which King delivered his electrifying “I Have a Dream” speech. With the outbreak of the Second World War in 1939, however, the American Communist party shifted its emphasis from the domestic to the international front and essentially halted its agitation for racial reform in the United States. University of Bristol, School of Education, Barbican / Guildhall School of Music & Drama, Royal Academy of Engineering Engineering Engagement Programme. He never softened his principles. When Rustin began to run into trouble with laws against homosexual activity, FOR chairman Muste warned him that any further such violations would cause his dismissal from the organization. A 1952 visit to countries in North and West Africa convinced him of the need to assist Africans in their independence struggle. ." Under Rustin’s direction, the March on Washington proved to be a turning point in American history. True to its grassroots origins, the SCLC was organized at the regional level and allotted membership status only to groups, not individuals. Disillusioned but undaunted, Rustin appealed to the venerated black labor leader A. Philip Randolph, president of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters. Bayard Rustin (right) talks to a reporter during the Harlem Riots in Manhattan in July 1964. “I Have a Dream” Despite his international success, aspects of Rustin’s personal life threatened to cripple his effectiveness in the United States by isolating him from his political colleagues. Votin…, Nonviolence is a principle that rejects violence as un-conscionable and may reject all forms of coercion. San Francisco: Cleis Press. Randolph’s support was well founded. It was initiated by a generous gift from Friends for … Rustin felt that the organizational principles of CORE had been flawed, in that its interracial composition had opened the door to domination by well-meaning white members. The boycott soon attracted the attention of the national press and of northern civil rights activists; to Bayard Rustin, the Montgomery bus boycott represented a chance to regain his former influence by joining what appeared certain to become a national movement. After the passage of the civil-rights legislation of 1964–65, Rustin focused attention on the economic problems of working-class and unemployed African Americans, suggesting that the civil-rights movement had left its period of “protest” and had entered an era of “politics”, in which the Black community had to ally with the labour movement. One of 12 children, Bayard Rustin was born on March 17, 1910, in West Chester, Pennsylvania, a small town near Philadelphia where the Quakers had established a colony of Black freedmen before the Civil War. "Rustin, Bayard Encyclopedia of African-American Culture and History. Encyclopedia.com. Rustin became a leading strategist of the civil rights movement from 1955 to 1968. In the mid-1930s, seeking an organization that shared his opposition to war and racism, he joined the Young Communist League (YCL). Retrieved December 21, 2020 from Encyclopedia.com: https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/rustin-bayard. . . Bayard Taylor Rustin was born March 17, 1912 in West Chester, PA to Florence Rustin and Archie Hopkins, but he was raised by his maternal grandparents, Janifer and Julia Rustin. Rustin joined the Young Communist League, whose leaders recognized him as a good organizer who could appeal to other young blacks; they appointed him a youth recruiter for the party. Leaders of Jewish organizations joined in mourning the passing of Bayard Rustin, chairman of the A. Philip Randolph Institute and one of the foremost civil rights and leaders in this country. Organizer, Young Communist League, 1936-41 (resigned from party, 1941); Fellowship of Reconciliation, Chicago, IL, youth secretary, 1941, race relations director, 1942-53; Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), field secretary and co-founder, 1942; jailed as a conscienti… Therefore, be sure to refer to those guidelines when editing your bibliography or works cited list. Chicago: Quadrangle Books, 1971. The only integrated social clubs in New York were operated by Communist organizers who hoped to enlist the support of blacks, and during this period Rustin became affiliated with the Communist party. Encyclopedia of African-American Culture and History. ." John Whiteclay Chambers II "Rustin, Bayard Toward the end of his life, he also became increasingly open about his homosexuality and spoke out in favor of equal rights for gays and lesbians. Encyclopedia of World Biography. Rustin was raised in Pennsylvania by his grandparents. Fairclough, Adam, To Redeem the Soul of America: The Southern Christian Leadership Conference and Martin Luther King, Jr., University of Georgia Press, 1987. His continuing visible role in racial policies brought him additional arrests and beatings. His father was a West Indian man with whom Florence had a stable relationship but never married. Rustin was also instrumental in organizing two Youth Marches for Integrated Schools in 1958 and 1959. Although it was King who was catapulted into a position of national leadership by the boycott, it was Rustin, a man twenty years King’s senior, who provided much of the organizational know-how, political savvy, and theoretical underpinning for King’s civil rights victories. However, the date of retrieval is often important. After the end of World War II Rustin became chairman of the Free India Committee and later went to India to study the Gandhi movement's nonviolent civil disobedience. Bayard Rustin was a black Civil Rights activist, a close associate of Martin Luther King, and an advocate of gay and lesbian rights, and a Quaker. Retrieved December 21, 2020 from Encyclopedia.com: https://www.encyclopedia.com/education/news-wires-white-papers-and-books/rustin-bayard-1910-1987. His public personality and organizing skills subsequently brought him to the attention of A. Philip Randolph, who recruited him to help develop his plans for a massive March on Washington to secure equal access to defense jobs. 21 Dec. 2020 . Rustin was particularly instrumental in the development of the nonviolent protest movement that evolved from the Montgomery bus boycott associated with Martin Luther King, Jr. After his release from the chain gang, Rustin traveled to India, where he was received by Mohandas K. Gandhi's sons. Conservative members, however, eventually sought his ouster, and from 1960 until 1963 Rustin had little contact with King. Outraged by actions that he believed jeopardized FOR’s mission, Muste asked Rustin to leave the organization. We innovate with outstanding artists and…, Community is a union for everyone. The Reverend Ralph David Abernathy, closest friend and adviser of civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr., was a…, Bayamon Central University: Narrative Description, Bayard v. Singleton 1 Martin (N. Martin, Jonathan "Rustin, Bayard 1910–1987 Bayard Rustin, a gay civil rights leader, was kept in the shadows by the Civil Rights movement establishment, but organized the March on Washington. (December 21, 2020). Here he parted with King, who still believed in the power of mass demonstrations. Jervis Anderson , Bayard Rustin: Troubles I’ve Seen, 1997. Rustin the Presidential Medal of Freedom to lead protests against militarism and segregation arrested in North and West Africa him... Rustin began the most productive period of his sexuality organizers, but also with federal and municipal.! 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