The March

The March is an award-winning documentary by filmmaker James Blue (1930-1980) about the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom in August of 1963. Blue filmed participants as they prepared for the March in their home cities, followed them as they traveled to Washington, and recorded their reactions as they listened for the first time to Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s iconic speech “I Have A Dream” on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. Edward R. Murrow once said The March was “the finest argument for peaceful petition of redress of grievance that has ever been put on film.” In response to the President’s call to “rework and reedit” to feature the commitment made by Presidents Kennedy and Johnson to civil rights, Carl Rowan, who succeeded Murrow as the director of the USIA on February 20, 1964, implemented the changes Johnson and Rusk had discussed. In April 1964, he filmed a three-minute introduction in which he declared that Blue’s film illustrated the Kennedy and Johnson administrations’ commitment to freedom. George Stevens Jr. and James Blue opposed this action, but they were overruled. The President’s Cut includes the Rowan three-minute introduction.