are the trees standing tall for justice. >> you cannot stand by. you cannot sit down. you have to stand up and speak up, and speak out, and get in the way. make some noise. >> a live look at the crowds around the lincoln memorial here on the national mall as tens of thousands have gathered from all over this country and to mark the 50th anniversary of the march on washington, and the good saturday afternoon to you, everyone. i am craig melvin coming live from the feet of the lincoln memorial continuing our coverage. we heard speech from civil rights and political leaders ranging from attorney general eric holder of course here and house speaker -- house minority

leader nancy pelosi and the families of trayvon martin and of course martin luther king iii scheduled to join us at some point here over the next hour or so, and again right now thousands about to start retracing the steps that marchers took 50 years ago. so has peter alexander who is along the march route and let me start with you. what is the scene like right now? >> so right now we're along the route on independence avenue and you can see the police are clearing the way as they arrive here at the martin luther king memorial. we are joined by so many people who witnessed history as we wait to see those who participated in it, one of those voices is the gentleman i met today named franklin delano, no roosevelt,

but williams. you happened to be here on that day, for the first time visiting your sister. you didn't know you would be witnessing history. >> did not know. it was just a thing the kids in the neighborhood, we all came down and we were here and climbed in the trees >> you told me as you said earlier you were climbing the tree to be part of it and you were one of the foot soldsers for many years and as you looked around this crowd today, what is it this mean to you to witness the people that have gathered here to be a part of it? >> i am so glad to see so many young people because that's what we need right now. we need more young people out there in front of this, 50 years and still a lot to do. >> i appreciate your being with us, mr. williams, right now. you can see as we look forward there is jill lourie there and so many people that witnessed history firsthand as they pass now for the first time by the monument, the memorial that honors the life of martin luther king.

>> a big thanks to you. we will check in in just a few moments. of course the speech that dr. king gave back in 1963 has had tremendous emotional and cultural meaning ever since he gave that speech. in fact, president obama referenced that speech just yesterday in new york. >> 50 years after the march on washington and the i have a dream speech, obviously we made enormous strides. i am a testament to it. you are a testament to it. the diversity of this room and the students who are here.

>> president obama will be here wednesday making a speech and just feet away from me on the 50th anniversary, the day that dr. king gave that speech here some five decades ago, with more on the back story of king's speech and the legacy as well, joined now as you can hear helicopters above me and ed schultz and michael dyson as well and also from austin, texas, presidential historian douglas brinkley. good to see you. listen to one of the most famous lines from the i have a dream speech in 1963.

>> i think we have doug brinkley there and when did the term i have a dream, when did it make it into the famous speech? >> i think it did a lot of people and your coverage pointed out weren't leaping on that phrase as much and i have a dream within seconds afterwards and kennedy met with martin and the i have a dream getting a lot of media coverage and it is almost a story line of its own, the story of the dream. there is also the story line of the truth of the civil rights movement the guy that has done more than anybody is julian bond. working in the early '60s, he didn't just push for voting rights, he ran in georgia for the house of representatives and held his principle. he made noise like john lewis said today and he said i think

we have to be sympathetic to vietnam and draft dodgers as they were called back then and tried to not allow julian to have a seat to be represented and then he has gone on his whole career. it has been so bray. recently he was arrested over the keystone pipeline. he has fought for gay marriage so when we are talking about all of the great figures of this r era, julian bond really deserves a call out. in the history field he always makes sure scholars like myself are exact and anybody doing a ph.d. dissertation clears it with him because he is a meticulous scholar of the movement. >> doctor, let me bring you in. >> i went to a church in albany, georgia, and a woman was praying one night and said i have a dream. king heard that.

in his typical baptist preacher fashion said i will use that one day, and so he extracted that phrase from prathea hall, one of the great preachers of her generation, now dead, and she was a member of snip and he used that energy of prayer and extracted that phrase and first used it in the detroit speech and then the speech in washington. >> i think one of the things to remember about dr. king, he was always operating on multiple levels in the context of the speech. he had just visited the university of virginia, only about three months before the march on washington 15 years ago where he was given a very academic speech and really spoke from the professor voice and academic voice about philosophy. remember, the university of virginia is mr. jefferson's university. it is the president, the founder who wrote that bad check, who

wrote of course that extraordinary founding document that said we take it as self evident that all people are created equal and endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights and if if there was any self evidence on the mountain in 1776 than the fundamental human equality and so we see in king drawing on his ak sem i can self and a moment of african-american american woman dom preacher dom and the great historic document. >> we talk about the historic speeches and you can see tens of thousands getting ready to start. >> the sheer number of young people we have seen matching today, lots of folk who is have come up from various colleges and universities and from all

over america to participate in this commemoration. >> i am going to defer to melissa on this one. your daughter is here. what does it mean? >> it means everything. my father and his twin brother were here 21 years old and stood here 50 years ago. i talked to my father and uncle yesterday and the first question they said to me is will your daughter be there? her being here allows a completion of enter generational pathway of struggle and i talked about it on msnbc before, that i was raised with the belief, a simple belief, that the struggle continues, that you do not have all the answers, you are picking up the struggle from before and passing it forward. >> i think we're at a unique time in history because we have a black president who wants to connect and has connected continually with young people and as we move from this march,

i have always been one in the news business to say what does this mean? where do we go from here? president obama now is positioned to pick up the torch and carry what martin luther king advocated for and believed in and fought for, and because now we really have a new set of challenges in front of us in a new age, and i do believe that with the political climate in this country right now there is only one president obama can go. he is not going to be facing re-election. he can be a real leader as he closes out his term to push for civil rights, social justice, to make sure the vote is protected, and michael eric dyson, i think the president is uniquely positioned in history right now to be able to capture what has been delivered here today and carry it through a process of completion. >> part of barack obama's

genius, being able to absorb all the environment around him, repurpose it for what lies ahead of him, because he faces a unique challenge no other black man in history faced, the leader of the free world and most powerful black figure in the history of this country and out of his own existential and personal experience to a broad nation and i think he will fill himself up to that challenge which is why he called john lewis and upon his ancestors to be able to express that. >> we have to take a quick break here. we are also watching developments out of the white house as well, what president obama has been meeting with the national security team today to weigh military options against syria in light of the syrian government's apparent use of chemical weapons earlier this week. we will have a live report coming up. we cannot let our coverage of this event happen without making note of the site where i am sitting right now at the edge of the iconic lincoln memorial

above the statue and of abraham lincoln and mind me inscribed these words, in this temple, as in the hearts of the people for whom we save the union, the memory of abe ra lamb lincoln issen tliened forever. according to the national park service, the crowds at the lincoln memory's 1922 dedication ceremony were segregated. we'll be right back. [ female announcer ] research suggests cell health plays a key role throughout our lives. one a day women's 50+ is a complete multivitamin designed for women's health concerns as we age. with 7 antioxidants to support cell health. one a day women's 50+. with 7 antioxidants to support cell health. we provide the exact individualization that your body needs. this labor day, don't invest in a mattress until you visit a sleep number store. once you experience it, there's no going back. oh, yeah! at our biggest sale of the year,

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again, a live look here. national mall, tens of thousands

continue to march in commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the march on washington here in washington, d.c., and one of the things also that struck a lot of folks throughout the course of the day, the signs we have seen people carry. everything from as you can see there interracial profiling and we're marching for trayvon and i even saw a sign encouraging folks to stop uranium drilling. voting rights as well. the civil rights movement took root not just here of course in the united states but also across the world. recently i sat down with the mayor of birmingham, alabama, who described the impact that movement had on out-african president nelson mandela. >> nelson mandela made the statement one of the things that encouraged him during his 26 years of incarceration on robben island in south africa is if change could come to birmingham

in the american south, change could come to south africa. >> nbc news contributor charlene was the first african-american woman admitted to the university of georgia and covering nelson mandela in decades and in close contact with his family and joins me live as well. shirley, can you elaborate a little bit more on what we just heard from the mayor there? what do we know about dr. king's influence and the civil rights movement and the influence of that on nelson mandela? >> of course the parallel history, the african national congress, nelson mandela's party was formed in the early 1900s, just after the naacp, so martin luther king and nelson mandela were aware of the parallel history and someone on your program just said a few moments ago, martin luther king operated on multiple levels. in 1964 when he was in the struck nel america, he was also

talking about the struggle against what he called the worst racism in the world in south africa and he went to london and talked to people from different countries including africa about the need to support sanctions and so forth and at this point nelson mandela was in prison and had been in prison since the early '60s serving what we thought at that time was a life sentence. he said that in prison he followed the prisoners, he himself, followed the struggle of black americans and said because we were linked by nature and proud by choice and thanked when he came to america after he was free he thanked americans and the u.s. congress for putting sanctions on south africa that helped move the struggle closer to the kind of freedom americans in the civil rights movement enjoyed here and the kind of freedom that nelson mandela was looking for. he said there was an unbreakable bond between blacks in the

united states and blacks in south africa. there is a synergy there and a connection and then of course there was the free south africa movement which started even much later after the civil rights movement had gained quite a bit of its goals and those demonstrations including which president obama as a young man took part helped to move south africa to where it is today which is that you have one person and one move and a long struggle to go and nelson mandela is not well and his family says he is improving, his condition is critical but stable, and so there continues to be this real synergy between people in south africa and people in america and they weren't all black, but of course the added issue of freedom for blacks in america and freedom for blacks in south africa made it as much a black struggle as it was an international interracial struggle.

>> and there are approaches to that struggle of course very different. dr. king, famous for his non-violent approach and nelson mandela made no secret of the fact from time to time the struggle would in fact require some. >> it was a peaceful struggle for generations, and when nelson mandela himself said in his book that when it became clear this non-violent approach would not work, that is when they had to resort to violence. he said of course martin luther king is a christian and i am a christian, and so you have to look back in christianity and violence dates back, mandela says, to christ who threw the money lenders out of the temple and even arch wish op tooutu talked about the just war and

there were differences in the approach and respect on both sides for the movements in both instances and those leaders, martin luther king and nelson mandela, icons of our generation and generations surely to come. >> i know you are in close contact with the mandela family as i just reported, critical but stable, that's the word we're getting right now on his condition. what more can you tell us? >> i think that's essentially it. his daughter tells me that there are times when he is on a ventilator which is helping him breathe because he's had problems with his lung that date back to the time he was in prison and working in the lime quarry and inhaled so much of the dust from that quarry and so he is being supported by a ventilator, but there were wrong reports he was in a vegetative state. he was never in a vegetative state. he is alive. he opens his eyes. he smiles when people come in that he knows, and so it is in

god's hands and mandela's hands now when if, whenever the transition time has come, but it has not come now, and as far as i can hear from members of his family and other close associates, he is hanging in there as he has always done when he is faced with difficult challenges. >> charlene hunter, thank you so much, the latest on nelson mandela's condition also and a little bit more on the unique relationship between the two men, not so much the men but the movements themselves. thank you so much. always a pleasure to have you on. >> my pleasure to be here. >> the united states postal service is marking the anniversary of the march on washington with a new limited edition forever stamp. it was unveiled yesterday with the help of congressman john lewis and access gabrielle union and the last of the three stamps issue this had year remembering the movement and the first in

the series celebrated the emancipation proclamation and the postal service honored rosa parks with the forever stamp, and marked with one word, courage. ♪

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speech as well, sylvia lieberman was 22 years old when she came to march in 1963. now retired philadelphia public school teacher, and reporter tremaine lee is here who road the about us from florida with a handful of dream defenders, some young people that came to the march this year, we have seen lots of young people. sylvia, let me start with you. then and now. similarities and differences. >> the similarities were the same in that the focus was then on the need for equal quality education in order to equalize the future for all students. it hasn't changed. it is still the same. it hasn't really gotten too much, too advanced in the 50

years. and the unemployment rate is no better in the differential between black youth and white youth. it is still about 13 or 13% as the difference. so that hasn't changed. >> the spirit of the march is then versus the spirit of the march is now and i imagine you interacted with folks today. big difference or about the same there? >> i really think it is about the same. it is hard to judge. i was very young. i was two months out of college. i was all kinds of enthusiastic. i went to hear dr. king because he was speaking what a greed with before i came as did my friends. we thought this is a no-brainer, it will take no time, a year, maybe two, and the country will be there. i don't think it is the same

feeling today. >> tremaine, you were on the bus with dream defenders, rode up from florida. how was that? >> it was an awesome experience. i think so often we have to question when are young people going to step up and the tragic of the trayvon martin killing the seeds were planted and on that bus, maybe 60 kids not only enthusiastic and forthright in their efforts but seamlessly go between political theory and lamar and amazing energy and focus anded enthusiastic and willing to keep pushing and fighting. it was interesting. >> what motivated them this time. >> for them it is part fulfilling the dreams, the ideals laid so many years ago and still for them like the fight is not over and still bring awareness to issues important to them, racial profiling and ending the school to prison pipeline and the trayvon situation and they want to be part of fulfilling those dreams. >> feels like i don't want to miss this important point we think it will take a year or two

and obvious the sense of injustice and just a few years we'll get it worked out and the idea that 50 years later you is it i will have bus loads of kids coming from the south facing so many of the same questions and i do think as much as we have a critique of young people not being involved, we also have a responsibility around this issue that no matter how obvious it may seem, that fights against injustice often take more than even a lifetime. >> that's an interesting point. you have to wonder whether any generation, instant gratification, whether we get that. there was a point made earlier this week the internet for all the good that it has done in terms of activism, it has created somewhat of an artificial idea that you can log on and give 10, $15, and that's it. i have been involved. >> and you know, speaking to what happens on the internet, speak about the campaigns and when millions of people signed a petition to force divestment from pepsi and kraft. it was the click of a button.

we can reconstruct one way or the other. >> the internet is a matter of strategy. you use the phone or the twitter feed to get people to move and even more about not losing the sense of purpose and optimism and courage even when you strike failure. that i think we have maybe been less -- we have done less of a good job in sort of shoring up our young people than you can come up against the barriers and fail and fail but it doesn't mean the whole movement will fail. >> and i was going to say one of the things i think about and what they said so important, a lot of the activism among young african-americans during the 1960s, it was fighting against that backlash against brown v. board of education, the access to the schoolhouse at least as important as the access to the woolworth lunch counter and there was a personal stake in literally not being able to access the thing that could lift you into the middle class. i think for a lot of younger people now what galvanized them is the equally personal stake

and the trayvon martin case is important and important not just because of this one death but because it ignited i think in a lot of young people the personal stake of not being able to leave your home and not be suspected. it is the same thing racial profiling gal voon eyeses in people and i think one thing that has the kendrick lamar community and join the dream defenders because it is something about something personal to young people and whether they are doing it in activism or physically, they're doing it with the same kind of sense of personal mission. >> let me end with you here really quickly. when you look back on 1963, what you are were marching for then, public education, and specifically, are we where you thought we would be then? >> oh, god, no. oh, god, no. society is cutting back on voting rights. society is going after voting rights instead of enlarging and

employment is narrowing. no. we're not going anywhere near where i hope we would be. nowhere. >> sylvia lieberman, thank you so much for your time and tremaine lee, thank you for your insight. you're looking at live pictures, washington, d.c., right side of your screen of course, the iconic lincoln memorial and left side of the screen some of the folks who have come from all over this country to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the march on washington. [ male announcer ] running out of steam?

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if you are wondering about the scaffolding, you should note that that is the result of earthquake damage here in washington, d.c., still being repaired. mara shive camis standing by wi reverend al sharpton. >> we would work to push this out and he says we don't want to commemorate. i want a continuation. then labor came in and saunders and wooin garden and all of the labor leaders and made it happen just like 50 years ago t shows we can build coalition and a dream and a vision and i think that we have made history today. >> reverend, we don't want to hold up the end of this march here. we will move forward. if i could, representative lewis, can i ask you a question, sir? voting rights has become a huge part of this issue right now. i am moving, sir, i am moving.

a lot of the voting rights act has fallen to congress. what is the way forward? >> we must mix what the supreme court said we needed to do because as i said before the vote is precious. it is almost sacred. we're not going to let them take it away from us. >> thank you very much, sir. that's going to do it for us. we'll try to grab more people later. >> determined mara there schiavocampo and that being wrapped up at the washington monument and john lewis there and new york morial who runs the national urban league and peter alexander as well. he is along the march route. what is happening now? >> it has been striking what we witnessed over the course of the last hour. it has been about 20 people wide, non-stop for most of the last 50 minutes or so where we're on independence avenue and as we give you a look you can see the crowd only now beginning to thin out and right alongside

the martin luther king memorial and it was moving just a short time ago as i had a chance to speak to a family with their kids and as they passed a mom looked at her son and said make sure you remember what you are looking at right now. we want to introduce you to some of the people we have had a chance to visit with today. you both came from south carolina today. if you can, as the march is thinning out, what has it meant for you to be a part of this? >> back in '63 i was very young and didn't have the opportunity to actually be a part of this. i do remember the desegregation of schools. i was in the fifth grade. i am telling my age. to be a part of this gives me opportunity to see how far we have gone and how far we have yet to go. >> i want to ask you, andre, about the issue of civil disobedience, to witness this peaceful day, i imagine it says a lot for the community still trying to accomplish so much. >> it does. we recognize civil disobedience is often necessary to bring the attention and awareness to needs

of the people and masses. i happen to be in briggs v. elliott in summerton, south carolina, preeminent to the brown versus board of education, and so i have that in my blood and also a father of two and i try to teach them the same and for this to continue in our minds and spirits. >> it is a pleasure to visit with both of you. we appreciate it. the march is moving. we have to let you keep going. thank you very much. it has been really a remarkable day, the weather has allowed everybody here to be able to appreciate this sun permitting. it has been hot as i said to a gentleman that waited with me for two hours said are you sure you can handle the sun and he said i am a son of a farm family. i will be just fine today. >> peter alexander, along the route, big thanks to you, sir. 50 years ago a lot of folks don't like to talk about how hot it was then. there were more than 1,300 people treated for heat

exhaustion that did not stop them then and today as peter indicated it has been a glorious day in terms of weather and all sorts of other reasons. what struck you most today as you heard the speech given. we heard dozens of speeches this morning. which speech stood out most to you? ? and not because he is our colleague but i thought reverend al sharpton gave a moving presentation and i thought it was forward-looking and heartfelt and captured the spirit of the way that movements are articulated by a civil rights leader that also is rooted in the church and one of the things about the original civil rights movement is the two big convening forces were the religious community which martin luther king junior came out of and the labor community, the organizing community which is where ralph antibiotic ebernathr and i thought reverend sharpton did really well. one of the biggest responses was to eric holder, and i think he

is a part of an administration, so it is an ironic position to be in as a civil rights advocate, but really he has brought that department back to the kind of advocacy that you really think you want the civil rights division to do, and i think that is why people reacted to him. >> it has been very interesting over the past few months to watch eric holder because we have seen him at the national urban league convention and at the naacp convention and here in d.c. two months ago addressing the 100th anniversary of delta sigma theta as well. eric holder made no secret of the fact he wants to make a protecting voting rights specifically part of his legacy long after he leaves the justice department. i would imagine that we are going to see eric holder at lots more gatherings like this as well. >> absolutely. >> more from washington, d.c. right after this. we want to show you more live pictures now because let me tell

you, this party does not appear to be ending any time soon. folks are hanging out here at the feet of abraham lincoln and sitting on the steps and there is another crowd over in the washington monument and i spent a great deal of time at the mlk memorial this morning and hundreds gathered there and of course throughout the course of the day and you can see folks continuing to march down independence avenue and in our nation's capital on this the day we commemorate the 50th anniversary of the march on washington. how 'bout we replace old and worn out with beautiful and durable. let's head to the one place with the flooring we want, the know-how we need, and low prices that won't trample our budget. then let's do some simple placing, locking... and admiring. a better-looking floor is just a few steps away. and... they're affordable steps. more saving. more doing. that's the power of the home depot.

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that's the power of german engineering. we're back live from the lincoln memorial on the national mall, washington, d.c., as you can see, the official march starting to wrap up and you can see of course reverend al sharpton and national action network and also a friend and colleague along with jesse jackson and they are praying at the end of the march just like they did 50 years ago. let's listen in. >> we know the hope that is alive in america and grant now to us the determination and dedication to not rest until freedom has been conquered. we thank you for this day and for the leadership that it has provided and the way all of those who sacrificed and the time and for the wonderful sense

of achievement and bless our leader al sharpton and all of those before him and all of tho he is that shall come after him. may we link together to make a wonderful tapestry of freedom and hope. in our name we pray and ask and everybody said amen. >> amen. >> all right, brother. >> amen. >> mark, mark. >> again, the official march starting to wrap up and that's down near the washington monument and reverend al sharpton, reverend jesse jackson, and a number of bona fide civil rights leaders in this country and reverend sharpton, as he indicated today from the podium as he said earlier this week in an interview wanted to make sure today was not seen as a

celebration, trymaine lee riding the bus up from florida with the dream defenders group and said he wanted to make sure this was not seen as a celebration. why do you think that? why do you think that? >> i think clearly even though we aare commemorating the 50th anniversary of this march and the speech at this moment in time, there is so much work to do particularly when it comes to social justice issues and racial profiling and the dream defenders honing in on and i think it is important for young people to know this isn't the end or celebration, it is just the beginning and it is the energy they're trying to harness now. >> mara schiavocampo on the route throughout the course of the day and let's check in with her as well. what do you have? we have mara. we'll get back to her in a few moments. she has been out there hustling. i am sure there are technical issues. when we get her back we'll go

back. live look. i think we have mara. go ahead. we continue to have technical difficulties. we will go back to mara when we are absolutely certain that we have her. we are certain that we have trymaine lee here. i will continue to talk to you. folks aren't leaving. folks are staying. the atmosphere today, you know, really as i said earlier, it has been at times like a church service and times very much like a family reunion as well. >> this is the moment where the grandfather is going to take the grandson. this is where the mother and father are going to take their son and daughter and tell them what this place means and then the symbolic nature and also the fellowship of people coming together for a common cause and the collective sense of feeling and depth.

>> 50 years ago they planned this thing and just two months they did it out of new york and of course we have heard so much about him and the chief organizer of the march 50 years ago when they planned this, they did not know precisely how many people were going to show up when it was over, a quarter of a million, and at least a quarter million and some have said that may have been a conservative estimate. we don't have any sort of hard figure for today. just eyeballing it, i can tell you tens of thousands, tens of thousands stretched all the way from the feet of the lincoln all the way back to the washington monument as well. you spent time with folks coming up from florida. we have also heard from folks who came from as far away as california. i talked to a guy earlier that said he flew in from california last night because he came 50 years ago and so he wanted to be a part of history the second time. we want to know how you are advancing the dream. snap a picture. tweet that picture with the hashtag advancing the dream and

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a live look at washington, d.c. and as we continue to watch folks parade through the streets here and as we also watch folks just hanging out at the feet of abraham lincoln. very nice saturday afternoon. i want to bring in my colleague

kristin walker not too far from here. standing by at the white house. president obama will be speaking and also not too far from here on wednesday, just a few feet away, on the actual 50th anniversary of the "i have a dream" speech and, kristin, i would imagine the president's speech writers have got to be at this particular point walking a very, very thin line in terms of preparing for a speech that a lot of folks will be making that compares between the president and dr. king. >> i think that's right, craig. i spoke to a senior administration official today who told me that president obama is hard at work on this speech as well. we know that he is often engaged particularly when he is delivering a speech of this magnitude. according to one administration official, though, president obama reached out to congressman john lewis a few days ago to get his reflections on the march. of course congressman lewis, the

last surviving speaker from the march and president obama thought he would not most appropriate person to remember the feelings and capture what it was really like to be there on the ground 50 years ago n terms of the pressure that president obama is feeling right now, which you bring up, craig, the fact that he is speaking in the same place at dr. martin luther king junior, i am told he will not compare and hope other folks won't compare the two speeches. the president believes this is a different speech at a different time and told there is a strong message to young people, a call to action as the president reflects on where the country has come from and where it is going and sort of what challenges lie ahead. there is a working draft and as is typical with this president, craig, it will be a working draft right up until that moment that he delivers it and he continues to work on it. craig. >> kristin walker from the white house for us on this saturday. kristin, thanks to you. >> thank you. >> again here at the washington -- here at the

lincoln memorial, peter alexander standing by along the march route. what do you have, sir? >> craig, sorry about that. moving around as we try to get a place to talk and i want to introduce you to one of the people from the event today. you can see the march passed and there is still history walking by everywhere you turn today. debra miles was in the front row on that day, august 28th, 1963. this if you can, debra, this is what? >> this is the pennant and commemorates the important day and i am wearing the approximate infrom that day. >> your father, a member of the quaker community was able to be here on that day. >> yes, he was head of the national -- well, he was part of the national council of churches, and because of his quaker background and role in the national council of churches, we came and we had front row seats and we weren't in the immediate circle. >> i am curious in a few words what images come to mind as you

remember staring up at dr. martin luther king on that day. >> it was interesting staring back at the reflecting pool and the sea of humanity was amazing, a blue sky, cloudless, and my father got up to take pictures and the memory i have of what his memory was was that as he watched the action, it was as if the arms of lincoln were reaching out to embrace martin luther king. he was very touched by that. it was a really poignant moment for him. >> touched by you spending a moment with us. we have seen a lot of unique paraphernalia as it were today. this piece of history is really special. >> i haven't seen this one today. >> we have not either until now. thank you very much. >> thank you. thank you. my honor. >> reporter: craig, we'll toss it back to you. >> what a markable story, peter. thank you so much. we're going to take a quick break. i see former mayor of atlanta, former u.n. ambassador, bona fide civil rights icon, one of

the men that helped lead the movement, andrew young, will join me on the other side of the break and we'll spend time talking to dr. maya angelou. more, live from washington, d.c., as we continue to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the march on washington. stay with us. [ male announcer ] this is jim, a man who doesn't stand still. but jim has afib, atrial fibrillation -- an irregular heartbeat, not caused by a heart valve problem. that puts jim at a greater risk of stroke. for years, jim's medicine tied him

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folks continue to linger here at the feet of abraham lincoln in washington, d.c., a live look at the lincoln memorial on the mall and tens of thousands gathered from all over the country to mark the 50th anniversary of the march on washington. good saturday to you, everybody, i am craig melvin coming to you live from the feet of the lincoln memorial marching along with dr. king on that historic day in 1963 a man named andrew young, former congressman, u.n. ambassador, atlanta mayor, and friend of dr. king honored to have him join me now. good to he so you, sir. you of course joined the southern christian leadership conference in atlanta, 1960. what was the movement like in those early days? >> the movement really was just an idea. it was an idea that had popped up really spontaneously with a group of students in the

sit-ins, and of course martin had been leader of the montgomery bus boycott since 1955 and everything that happened between '55 and '63 had been prepared at howard university and yale pennsylvania and georgetown and there was a legal framework that had been developed for the desegregation of america and to challenge the segregation laws under the edikts of the 14th amend am. we had an agenda. i say that because martin accepted the responsibility and chose the slogan for slcc to redeem from the triple evils of racism, war and poverty. his speech really was not about the dream.

his speech was about poverty. in the beginning of the speech that nobody remembers, he woef into the no he is that the constitution was a promissory note, and that remained unfulfilled, and that gradually people did not include women and it does not include children and did not include ex slaves, but we were fulfilling that constitutional mandate that all men are endowed by the creator with certain unalienable rights. >> you mentioned the legal framework and in the '50s and the '60s, the movement needed lawyers, needed armies of attorneys. >> we did. >> what does the movement need now? >> economists. >> no, no, that you really, i mean, several things have happened since dr. king's death that he was not aware of. one, the whole framework of the new deal, the great society, the marshal plan, eisenhower's

infrastructure development of highways, all of this was general consensus amongst americans as late as 1970, but then they began to peel away at it, and i was in congress in the ba banking committee when they decided to break up the international economy. we had some agreements at brenton woods in new hampshire from 1944 that had kept the world stable from 1944 to 1974. they ended those agreements and the price of oil was $2.50, and i said to the head of the federal reserve, if you don't have the dollar anchored to something, aren't people going to play politics with our currencies? he looked at me and he said, young man, you soon learn that the dollar doesn't need to you defend it.

now, the problem is that three months later oil was $30 a barrel and ten months later $60 a barrel and we left a gold standard and went on oil standard and have had a growing economy but when you add that to the internet and the fact that people can transfer money electronically, there is almost no way to manage a single nation's economy without bringing some global order to what is going on. >> let's go back to the movement. there was a lot of anticipation, even from president kennedy at the time, that such a large gathering of black people and the nation's capital would inevitably turn violent and the streets that day i understand virtually empty in terms of no rush hour traffic, businesses shut down, and marchers of course defied that.

why do you think there was such an anticipation of violence when dr. king himself had been such a staunch advocate of non-violence? >> well, it was fear and guilt. the people like j. edgar hoover had always felt that we would -- if given the opportunity we would treat them like we had been treated. that never was the case. that is one of the things about non-violence social change that we want to redeem the soul of america. we don't want to get even. we want to bring people together economically and socially. this movement was never about black people alone. it was black people in the south that suffered the most but what we saw here 50 years ago was we saw the movement becoming black and white and northern and southern and protestant, catholic, jew, and martin's

speech reached out all over the world because the constitution says we are endowed by the creator, not by our government. >> did you know then as you were listening to that speech 50 years ago, because a lot of folks don't realize that the "washington post" the next day, that speech was not front page news. it was barely mentioned. that was not the only publication where that was the case. did you know they know as dr. king was giving that speech what an important part of america's history it would become? >> well, it really wasn't just the speech. he made the speech in detroit before. >> yeah. >> it was the speech and the context of i agree with john lewis. we probablyr to a million than a quarter million but it was the masses of people that came from every sector of society that made that dream significant because it was not a black dream. it was a dream for the

fulfillment of the american constitution for all americans but also heard in south africa and heard behind the iron curtain and heard in china, and latin america and so in the '70s was a civil rights upheaval, human rights upheaval all over the world. >> i spent time last week in birmingham, alabama, with the mayor of birmingham. i was down there for a series of reports and the mayor of birmingham said something to me and i want to bring it up to you and i don't want to step on toes here. he said if the civil rights movement, if the civil rights movement itself were human body, and atlanta may have been the head, but birmingham was the heart, and in the decades that followed the movement, birmingham got the shaft in a lot of ways it did not reap a lot of the benefits of the movement so to speak. >> i agree with the first part. clearly fred shuttlesworth, i went to fred shuttlesworth's

church last december, december 17th, and i forgot why i was going. his wife called and said this is the anniversary of the third time fred church has been bombed. fred's church had been bombed three times in two years. there were 60 bombings of homes. there was a black youth castrated, a policeman pistol whipped one of his members, and just going into city hall to get a wedding license, marriage license, and birmingham was a ruthless and brutal place, and frankly, atlanta wasn't that way. we had already started on the path of desegregation and atlanta already made a commitment to be a city too busy to hate. >> yes. >> we had the luxury of being able to think a little bit and rest but fred had been under

pressure since the '50s, and he loved it. i never would have thought he would have lived, but he lived until a few years ago to almost 90. >> do you have some time? i have to take a quick break. i don't want to you go anywhere. >> okay. >> andrew young will stand by, ambassador andrew young will stand by for us throughout the hour hopefully. i want to go back to the march are mara has been standing by all day. how goes it out there? >> reporter: just wrapping up now and it was a very successful event by any measure. that march was led of course by virtually every living civil rights figure of our time, reverend al sharpton who was one of the organizers, jesse jackson, marc morial of the national urban league and a number of legislators and lewis

and representative pe loes and i the parents of trayvon martin, sybrina fulton and tracy martin. the crowd here, the turnout was really large. we don't have official estimates at this time. it was certainly tens of thousands if not exceeding 100,000 and so the turnout here was quite impressive. that march made its way down part of the length of the national mall from the lincoln memorial to the washington monument where we are now and passed on the way the martin luther king memorial which of course was not here 50 years ago, just dedicated two years ago and is the only memorial on the national mall to a non-president, and today of course that took on extra significance, gave people a moment to pause and reflect on the significance of that statue here on the mall. i had a chance to week with reverend sharpton and representative lewis about this event, about what they want from it and the key thing that both of them said was voting rights. this isn't just about commemorating an anniversary. this he have specific action

points that they hope will come out of this and number one on their agenda list is making sure that voters rights are protected and of course they cite the recent supreme court rulings as a major setback in that fight. one thing i found interesting early today i spoke to a woman that had been here 50 years ago and brought with her the program from that event, and inside the program were all the demands at that time and so it was interesting to go through them and take note of the things which had been accomplished, for example, desegregation of schools and then look at the things that had not, like unemployment, one of the demands was to make sure that all unemployed persons, white and black, were brought into the labor force and another was minimum wage and they were asking for a living minimum wage at the time they wanted it to be above $2, and of course now that would be much higher and you still hear the calls for a living minimum wage at this time. it gives you a little perspective into what we accomplished over the last 50 years and what a lot of folks say still needs to be done.

craig. >> mara schiavocampo, perspective indeed. thank you so much. are you watching msnbc's special coverage of the anniversary of the march on washington. much more ahead this hour here on msnbc. "stubborn love" by the lumineers did you get my email? i did. so what did you think of the house? did you see the school ratings? oh, you're right. hey babe, i got to go. bye daddy! have a good day at school, ok? ...but what about when my parents visit?

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we're still live here at the lincoln memorial 50 years after some 250,000 americans marched for the jobs and along with dr. martin luther king junior. i stumbled because i said 250,000. just a few moments ago andrew young corrected that figure. he said he was here that day. that was a conservative estimate. he said there were probably at

least a half million people. author maya angelou was a colleague of dr. king's at the southern christian leadership conference, a bona fide american institution and joins us now via telephone. dr. angelou, so honored to have you with us. >> thank you very much. i am delighted to be with you. i love you to speak a little louder. >> okay. you know what, for you, i will almost yell. dr. angelou. dr. king asked to you serve as the northern coordinator i understand for the sclc. when you look back on those days of the civil rights movement, what do you think its biggest accomplishment was >>caller: so much. two centuries of history in a matter of three years and the civil rights movement. we went through about two centuries of history. the title i had southern christian coordinator, the

southern christian leadership conference, was an honorarium really because the truth was i was a fundraiser. it makes me sound very important. the other title, but it was a fundraiser which was very important for the movement in that time. >> today, dr. angelou, thousands turned out to remember dr. king while remembering his legacy. what challenges remain to ensure that civil rights gains are not lost as our country moves forward? >> mr. melvin, i want to do the right thing. i want to stand on the right foot. when i meet my creator, that he or she, or maybe speaking in spanish, i don't know, would say you have done well. i sent to you do something, and

you have done well. i have tried to do and still try to do the right thing. that means to take responsibility for the time i take up and the space i occupy. it means to be ready to defend the rights of human beings anywhere they are asailed. all human beings. i happen to be african-american and 6 foot tall and black and female, so my charge may be quite a bit larger than other people's charges at this time, but as it is, i like myself. i can look in the mirror when i brush my teeth and say you are doing pretty good. i think that's what is asked of me. i think that is asked of each one of us. i like the statement that in evil times, times of evil, only when good people don't do anything to make them better.

>> you worked with malcolm x at the organization of african-american unity. after his assassination you went to work with dr. king. talk to us about these two men and their different approaches. >> you know, mr. melvin, the approaches were very similar in that they really wanted to do the best for everybody. i had met minister shabaz years before and i lived in ghana and when he came to ghana, he stopped at mecca and, he came to ghana and said to me and the other african-americans residents there, he said, i want to say to the world i was wrong. i thought that all white people were blue eyed devils. he said i met white men at mecca who had blue eyes and blonde hair and with whom i am happy to

call brother obviously racism is racism and i won't have it. i won't be a part of it. it is a great step for a man so adamantly against all whites and martin luther king seeing that he wanted me to come back to work with him one day, i am sorry, one month, because he wanted to keep the people's march on washington in washington until legislature could be changed. he said this is not a black people's march. it is poor people. black, white, spanish speaking, native american, all poor people and so this is -- i am willing to sacrifice myself for all of us, anyone who is being treated ill, ignored, and in fact abused, so they were very much

alike. i never hear anyone who really knew him and there are people like jesse jackson and john lewis and many, many men and women who knew him, very few people speak about their humor. martin was one of the funniest men and malcolm x would make you life when you were in the middle of crying. they could say something, turn a phrase, and suddenly you were gafawing, so i like the fact they were men and human beings and we have to say that so young people coming along would say you mean to tell me with the lives and deaths of martin luther king and malcolm x and the kennedys and these and that and there has been no change? you have to say yes there has been change.

we have seen change. we see a black man and a black family with a grandmother, a black grandmother in the white house. there have been changes. not enough. not nearly enough. we have to stand up and be counted on. we have to do it to make our country more than it is today, more than what james brolin calls these yet to be united states. >> poet, author, national treasure, maya angelou and before i let you go there is a man named andrew young sitting next to me who just wanted to say hello. >> i just to want say how much i love you. >> he is my darling. he is my darling. he is one of those who has never let us for get martin luther king or malcolm x are the real reason we come out to the malls and the same reason we come out in north carolina and to signify any that we still want freedom.

we still want fair play for everybody, the poor white in appalachia and the poor blacks and the poor asian and hispanic speaking and native american and the gay and the straight, we still want it. we're willing to stand up and be counted. i love you, andrew young, and you know it. >> i love you. you are a phenomenal woman, you. >> and we love you both. >> caller: >> only one speaker from 1963, just one speak from her that march 50 years ago was here to speak today, john lewis rallied the crowd on the national mall just a few hours ago and although the goals may be different this time around, lewis' demand for action was not. here is the impassioned u.s. representative now and then. >> i am not going to stand by and let the supreme court take the right to vote away from us.

[ applause ] you can not stand by. you cannot sit down. you have to stand up, speak up, speak out, and get in the way. make some noise. >> our demands, our determination, and our members, we shall stand and 1 u tho pieces and put them together in the image of god and democracy. we must say wake up, america, wake up, for we cannot stop and we will not. >> you are watching msnbc and we'll be right back. ooh! i love that just washed freshness, but then it goes to your closet...to die. so do what i do -- try new glow unstopables in-wash scent boosters.

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folking continue to linger around the washington monument and the lincoln memorial and the reflective pool here as well. lots of folks still out commemorating the 50th anniversary of the march on washington. lots more of our special coverage right after this. when you realize you need to switch to verizon, it's a reality check. i had my reality check when i'd be sitting there with my friends who had their verizon phones and i'd be sitting there like "mine's still loading!" i couldn't get email. i couldn't stream movies. i couldn't upload any of our music. that's when i decided to switch. now that i'm on verizon, everything moves fast. with verizon, i have that reliability. i'm completely happy with verizon. verizon's 4g lte is the most reliable and in more places than any other 4g network. period. that's powerful. verizon. get the nokia lumia 928 for free. playtime is so much more with a superhero by your side. because even superheroes need superheroes.

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we ain't going to let nobody turn us around. we are going to keep walking. we're going to keep on talking. we're going to keep on voting. we're going to keep on job building. we're going to keep on educating. we're going to keep on mentoring. we're going to keep on community building. we're going to keep on ending violence. we're going to keep on creating peace. we ain't going to let nobody turn us around. >> he is his father's son, is he not? where does the civil rights movement stand today?

the nation elected a black president twice. this year the racial divide in america seems wider than it has ever been to a lot of folks. the supreme court in june struck down key portions of the landmark voting rights act and george zimmerman that shot and killed trayvon martin on a florida street walking free in new york city. more than 4 million people stopped and frisked by police, 88% of them african-americans and back with us now former congressman and ambassador as well andrew young and president and ceo of the ncaa and sharon ifle is also here and alisha brooks f, director of the civil rights memorial center in montgomery, alabama and director of outreach at the southern poverty law center. a pbig thanks to all of you for sticking around. when you look at the gains made over the past 50 years or so, what do you make of the events over the past year in relationship to those gains?

>> well, you know, i think it is a bit sad in a way that here we can be 50 years hence and while so much has changed, so much seems the same. i mean, 50 years ago was the killing of a rather young black man that pushed so many people here, both to mourn and to commit themselves to make sure that he did not die in vain and here we are 50 years later and trayvon martin's family and his death and the movement playing a similar role. then 50 years ago we were fighting to protect our right to vote and now we are doing that again. what is different about these times and two things. we are further from slavery. we are beyond segregation. we have made real victories and there are some things that cannot be rolled back. the other thing is that it is easier to organize now than it was then. this week i will be turning in

1.7 million signatures to the u.s. department of justice calling for them to finally file civil rights charges against george zimmerman. >> what do you think the likelihood is that -- >> i think they are doing exactly what they should be doing which is investigating and digging down deep, and i think that it is a real possibility, but almost a half million of these poem signed using cell phones, and so so our young people have been baptized. and somebody 234 our generation will say rodney king and just kind of slip t seems unfortunately every generation gets baptized. they say every generation has to win it and rewin it again. that et cetera what we're doing right now.

>> sterling, ben jealous alluded to what you have spend a great deal of time over the past few months working on, voting rights in this country, of course the supreme court in june struck down a key provision of the voting rights act of 1965. update our viewers. update the folks still here as well listening to our broadcast here on the national mall where these new laws stand right now and what kind of impact they will have, not just on minority communities as well. we spend a lot of time talking about the fact that minority communities but we're not just talking about black and brown people here. >> you know, the supreme court issued its decision in late june striking down a key provision that removed what had been a protection in place for 48 years and stopped jurisdictions all over this country from implementing changes that may negatively affect minority voters and language minorities and required them to get permission. in the stroke of one pen and one decision the five member majority removed that

protection. we learned within hours of the decision all over the country officials decided they would impose voter suppression members they had not been able to impose before. the attorney general of texas tweeted two hours after the decision he would implement the voter i.d. law that we the naacp had stopped last year. that's the voter i.d. law that doesn't let students use student identification to vote. if you have a concealed gun carry permit you can use that so he tweeted that and the state, secretary of state of florida said we're free and clear now. we have seen what happened in north carolina, just a few weeks ago, and when that state passed the most restrictive voter suppression legislation we have ever seen. we have to step up now. we are stepping up. the civil rights are litigating and filing suits and congress also has to step up. they have the power to amend the voting rights act in response to the supreme court's decision to ensure that voters all over this country are protected. to your point about it not being

minority, i remind people all the time over 60% of the people that don't have a government issued photo i.d. in north carolina are women. >> yes. >> and i want you to stick around because i want to pose a specific question. there has been a great deal of talk about this year's march and the movement today and not just being about jobs and not just being about poverty but being about a woman's right to choose. being about same sex marriage. and being about a number of other issues as well. do you see it as that has the movement evolved or has it been co-opted? >> no. the movement really was always about jobs and freedom. i mean, he made in bones about the fact he was gay. he was the organizer of the march. we didn't dally in those kind of foolish things. we accepted people as they were, as dr. king said, on the content of their character, not on the

color of their skin or any of the other divisions, but what we're dealing with now is not just america. america has got to lead the world and the best things that ever happened to america not from our point of view was that so many of us were brought here. they are not the least bit prepared to deal with egypt. we have been floundering -- i mean, the global economy is falling apart. it is going to implode unless some of the young people who are here get pulled into the corporations and get pulled into the state craft and the economic development of the world. everything that happens anywhere in the world affects us everywhere. >> a leash a i want to make sure i get you in here. you of course responsible essentially for preserving the history of the civil rights movement.

what can we learn from the past as we move forward as a country? >> we can learn that people, ordinary people, regular, every day people like reverend george lee who fought for voting rights in 1955 in a town called bell zony, mississippi, william moore, a postman from maryland that walked a letter, was walking with a letter to the governor that was murdered, viola, a mother of five, people, regular people, not just the iconic leading we remember but regular people tired of the foot of oppression on their back and stood up and said no, they made the difference. they made this 50th anniversary of the march on washington possible, and i think it is important to remember the sacrifices they made. the southern poverty law center, in fact, was founded to ensure that the promises of that movement would be a reality, become a reality for every

person, and so we want to be inspired today by those who came before us. and as congressman lewis said and the clip that you played a little bit ago, that we have got to continue to stand up. we have to continue to demand justice. fredrick douglas says power concedes nothing without a struggle, and certainly the civil rights movement is an example of a struggle by the people. >> civil rights legend andrew young, thank you to you, ben jealous, president of the naacp, big thanks to you and cher lynn, always enjoy having you and lecia brooks from the civil rights memorial center in montgomery, alabama, big thanks to you as well and we'll look at the evolution of the civil rights movement. andrew young just alluded to it. we'll talk about it more. 50 years after the march on washington and it is no longer just, no longer just black and white. you're watching msc special

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welcome back to msnbc's special coverage of the 50th anniversary of the march on washington. hundreds of the tens of thousands who are assembled here today have decided to stick around, what was at times a church service and other times a family reunion has turned into -- it has turned into essentially a party here on the national mall on a saturday afternoon. welcome back, tens of thousands retrace the steps taken by some 300,000 roughly and made their way down independence avenue and passed the mlk memorial and

stopped at the washington monument. the brain trust is with us here, all live, all on set, lecia moody mills and the adviser for racial policy and always good to see you and angela rise here and principle of impact strategies and long time big wig at the congressional black caucus and reverend mcarthur, good to see you, director of faith and partnership and mobilization for the human rights campaign, reverend, thank you so much for being with us as well. enjoyed your comments earlier. i want to pick up on where we left off for the last panel and we were talking about what the movement itself has become. what the march today represented, how different it was this year versus five decades ago and the movement now encompasses lots of different groups. >> uh-huh. it absolutely does. i am glad that we're talking about it as the movement and not a bunch of disjointed allies

coming together in solidarity. i think with reseeing a collective movement now for the first time which is really huge that you have lgbt people who are actually speaking at this march and not doing it because they're talking about lgbt rights in their own bubble, they're doing it because the lgbt rights are part of our civil rights conversation. >> reverend, i want to come to you. so much has been made and you just heard about the role in organizing the movement and organizing the march 50 years ago and a lot made of the evolution of the movement. are you surprised at how quickly black people in general have started to come around if you will on same sex marriage rights in this country? >> i think black people, latino people, disenfranchised people understand what's at stake. this is not just about lgbt equality but it is as i eesh aspoke about, solidarity to address a number of issues. no longer can we afford the

luxury of living in silos. with very to work in coalition. sometimes that's uncomfortable. i think people understand there is more that we have in common we have more at stake working together. >> as the civil rights movement broadens out and starts to include other groups and starts to include other causes as well, does the issue of poverty, does the issue of jobs, do certainly issues become diluted? >> i don't think they become diluted. i think that we have to remember just as you said we're stronger together, you know, in unity. if we stand in unity with our latino brothers and sisters and other folk from immigrant families and backgrounds, we're stronger together f we stant together with people who may be low income, under employed or unemployed, we're stronger together, so we really have to learn the importance of what refu reverend jackson did with the

rainbow coalition. >> can i come back to the issues. you hit on economic justice which is so critical. i wrote an article about why it is an lgbt quality issue if you look at the core of every policy issue that we're trying to move today, be it employment protections, marriage equality, even school climate and bullying, the imperative is on create an economic climate so everyone in this country can thrive and that's at the core of this, like angela said, a shared value among all of our different iers >> earlier on the broadcast, i don't remember who it was but a few hours ago someone made the point one of the reasons the lgbt community has been as successful as it has been in terms of organizing fundraising and effecting change over the past few years is because they really ripped a lot of the pages right out of the handbook of the civil rights movement. >> inspiration, absolutely. when you have tools that are

proven to work, you certainly duplicate and use those and one point that i want to add is that we're living in the 21st century and our struggles are different. the battleground that we're fighting, the civil rights struggle is different. it is really important we get online and digitize and incorporate tools that are going to reflect where we are today and new strategies to move us forward. >> i would bid on that and i think it is important we understand that lgbt people were always part of the civil rights movement. >> yes. >> and rusten was the key strategist. the motion that now this is separate or new, that in and of itself is an invalid assumption. >> very interesting. i have heard more people talk beabout rusten today than ever d it is good to see and hear him get his due for all the work he did. i want to get owl of your perspective. i saw you. you spent a lot of the day taking pictures. >> yes. caught up in the moment. >> i think it is very easy i think sometimes to for get when you are covering history that you are also part of history and

you do have a front row seat to some pretty amazing stuff. that was not lost on me today. what was of all the speeches today that you saw, all the people that you saw, all the moments that you witnessed, what struck you most? >> reverend al tore it down. he tore it down, and the thing that really resonated with me is that in his remarks he made the point that we all have shared issues that we need to work towards and this is not about having white folks or lgbt community for that matter standing in solidarity with african-americans. the reality is if we don't have voting rights, then the new american majority that's most likely to vote to support progressive issues that support african-american ideal are the ones being suppressed in going to the polls. voting rights is all of our issue. it is not something distinct other groups ally with. that was the thing that resonated with me, this collectivism. >> reverend, how about you? >> for me it was the notion of being present.

i could not get past the fact that i as a black gay man who happens to be the father of five children and ordained member of the clerj sigh standing in this place at this point in time and i am clergy, am standing in this place at this time. and i'm very aware that it has to do with the sacrifices of people that knew nothing about me, but knew that the day would come that i would with here. and i couldn't shake that feeling that today was a spiritual feeling, for me and many others. >> i think for me, it was stalking to people who look just like me, and some who did not, but still felt like today was a call to action. it wasn't the action. it's a means to an end. like, we have to utilize today as a platform to continue the movement towards justice, whether that's gun safety, whether that's immigration reform, whether that's the resurgence of civil rights because we've been dialed back a just a little bit from the supreme court decisions and watching what happened with the george zimmerman verdict. folks get together today and said, this is just going to be a figurative representation of what we hope to do in the days

to come. >> aisha moodie-mills, angela ry, impact strategies, and reverend macarthur from the florida human rights campaign, thank you all for being with me today and thanks for spendi ini for spending so much time here in our network's capital. the networks of nbc universal are giving people another way to commemorate this historic week in time. stories and personal accounts from some of the most prominent civil rights leaders in the country are all together in one interactive site. a view into history like never before. you can share your own stories there as we. go to hisdreamourstories.com or you can watch it on xfinity tv.com on demand. in your busy day,

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nation's capital. folks just won't go home. they just won't leave. the march wrapped up some time ago, and as you can see, lots of folks have stuck around here at the field of lincoln memorial. his reggie smith, came up from atlanta, and you were here 50 years ago. >> i was here 50 years ago, my father brought me. but i'm glad to be here today and i thought it was a great time. i would have liked to have heard more about using economic means as a way to break down the democracy, because it's gotten conflated. democracy and capitalism are inflated, so as an hiv-positive man living with a wife who for the last 25 years has remained hiv negative, i would like to hear more about health as well, and make sure that the president's initiative around the affordable health care and the president's wife around let's move, those are the kind of things that will help us participate in all survival, or

else we'll be complicit in our own demise. >> how old are you? >> i'm 11. >> and where are you from? >> i'm from virginia. >> what part? >> fairfax. >> northern virginia. what brought you out today? >> i just wanted to know more about the history and it's very fun. i'm enjoying myself here. >> what did you learn today? not to put you on the spot. i know school probably hasn't started yet. >> well, i learned more about martin loouther king jr., and well, yeah, that's it. >> that's not it, that's a whole lot. so very nice to meet you. so thanks for coming out. i want to make sure i get down here as well. what's your name again? >> olived strickland. >> where are you from? >> from northern virginia. >> what brought you out today? >> i wanted to know more about the martin luther king history. i was only 2 when the march and he spoke before, so i was just interested and adamant today to

get out. >> was it everything you thought it would be today? >> yes, it was. african-american women have come a long way. and i wanted to represent today. >> thank you so much, represent, you did a big thanks to all of you. thanks so much for being here. and a big thanks as well for sticking around with us this afternoon. as we commemorate the 50th anniversary of the march on washington, we're not done yet, though! karen finney is standing by. disrupters, don't go anywhere. right now, 7 years of music is being streamed. a quarter million tweeters are tweeting. and 900 million dollars are changing hands online. that's why hp built a new kind of server. one that's 80% smaller. uses 89% less energy. and costs 77% less. it's called hp moonshot. and it's giving the internet the room it needs to grow. this&is gonna be big. hp moonshot. it's time to build a better enterprise. together.

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thanks for disrupting your saturday afternoon. i'm karen finney. and today we're live from our nation's capital, where thousands of men, women, and children came together to make their voices heard in the ongoing struggle to make social and economic justice a reality for all.