President Biden marked the 60th anniversary of the March on Washington on Monday by welcoming family members of Martin Luther King Jr. to the White House and declaring the nation “can’t let hate prevail” after a racist shooting in Florida.
The meeting unfolded exactly 60 years after King met with President John F. Kennedy in the Oval Office around the original march in 1963, when King delivered his “I Have a Dream” speech at the Lincoln Memorial.
Speaking in the Roosevelt Room, Mr. Biden leaned into a simmering debate over American history curricula and acknowledged they are marking the anniversary of a watershed moment for Black Americans just days after a racist gunman killed three Black people at a Dollar General store in Jacksonville.
“You can’t let hate prevail and it’s on the rise, not diminishing. Silence is complicity and we’re not going to remain silent,” Mr. Biden told guests who included Martin Luther King III, the oldest son of King and Coretta Scott King; his wife, Arndrea Waters King; and their daughter, Yolanda.
Bernice King, the youngest daughter of the 1960s civil rights icon, attended along with civil rights activist the Rev. Al Sharpton and other Black leaders.
Mr. Biden is using the march anniversary to promote his economic vision and efforts on behalf of Black Americans, a key voting bloc for Democrats. He says his legislative agenda and focus on equity is centered on King’s dream that all Americans be treated equally.
“While we’ve never fully lived up to that promise as a nation, we have never fully walked away from it, either,” Mr. Biden wrote in an op-ed for The Washington Post. “Each day of the Biden-Harris administration, we continue the march forward. That includes a fundamental break with trickle-down economics that promised prosperity but failed America, especially Black Americans, over the past several decades. It has exacerbated inequality and systemic barriers that make it harder for Black Americans to start a business, own a home, send their children to school and retire with dignity.”
Beyond the economy, the administration is scolding the state of Florida over updated curriculum standards that say some enslaved people used skills learned in captivity for their “personal benefit” later on.
And it is generally chastising states that are taking a closer look at history standards and library books.
“It’s important that children understand, again, the beauty of the greatest democratic nation in the history of the world, but also the challenges that brought us to this point,” said Stephen Benjamin, director of the White House Office of Public Engagement.
Mr. Biden told civil rights leaders that it is important to push back against those “trying to erase history” and efforts to “ban books.”
“We’re going to get it done,” he said.
The GOP is trying to make inroads with people of color by pointing to high inflation and saying Mr. Biden’s big-spending priorities made everyone worse off. Republicans also say so-called woke policies tend to cast Black Americans as victims in need of a helping hand instead of self-sufficient Americans.
Sen. Tim Scott, a Republican who is running for president, points to his rise from poverty to becoming the first Black U.S. senator from South Carolina as the embodiment of the American dream.
Rep. Burgess Owens, Utah Republican, reflected on his efforts as a young man to fight Jim Crow laws and said young Black Americans need role models, but should not be cast as inferior or unable to lift themselves up.
“To be sure, Dr. King’s vision was not solitary; it fueled a broader movement led by countless visionary Black men and women. These post-World War II pioneers, armed with education and an unwavering work ethic, dismantled discrimination, leaving a legacy of faith, discipline, and respect that guides us today,” Mr. Owens, who is Black, wrote in a “reflections” piece shared by House Speaker Kevin McCarthy. “Yet, more insidious racism persisted — a narrative subtly sowing self-doubt and inferiority within the Black community. This narrative portrayed Black Americans as inherently inferior, incapable of embodying character traits like honesty, work ethic, loyalty, and leadership.”
Mr. Biden says he is using the levers of government to benefit Black communities, pointing in his op-ed to low unemployment and efforts to expand health insurance while slashing poverty rates.
Vice President Kamala Harris, meanwhile, marked the anniversary of the march by saying the fight for equality isn’t finished.
• Tom Howell Jr. can be reached at thowell@washingtontimes.com.
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