upporter. Black unity and white support continued to grow. in 1962, with the first large-scale public protest against racial discrimination, rev. Martin Luther King Jr. Gave a dramatic and inspirational speech in washington, d.c. After a long march of thousands to the capital. the possibility of riot and bloodshed was always there, but the marchers took that chance so that they could accept the responsibilities of first class citizens. "the negro," King said in this speech, "lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity and finds himself an exile in his own land." King continued stolidly: "it would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment and to underestimate the determination of the negro. this sweltering summer of the negro's legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality." when King came to the end of his prepared text, he swept right on into an exhibition of impromptu oratory that was catching, dramatic, and inspirational. Everyone agreed the march was a success and they wanted action now! but, now! remained a long way off. president kennedy was never able to mobilize sufficient support to pass a civil rights bill with teeth over the opposition of segregationist southern members of congress. but after his assassination, president johnson, drawing on the kennedy legacy and on the press coverage of civil rights marches and protests, succeeded where kennedy had failed. However, by the summer of 1964, the black revolution had created its own crisis of disappointed expectations. rioting by urban blacks was to be a feature of every "long, hot, summer" of the mid-1960s. In 1965, King and other black leaders wanted to push beyond social integration, now guaranteed under the previous year's civil rights law, to political rights, mainly southern blacks' rights to register and vote. king picked a tough alabama town to tackle: selma...
