In 1967, Martin Luther King was planning a new march on Washington. He called it the Poor People’s Campaign.
It would bring thousands of blacks and whites to the capital to demand jobs and fair pay. He had traveled to Chicago to try to end segregation in the schools and unfair housing practices there. He had also begun to actively oppose the war in Vietnam. But his work on the Poor People’s Campaign had to wait. Memphis garbage workers were on strike. They needed someone well known to help their cause. An old friend of King’s asked him to join them. In March of 1968, King led 6,000 people in a march through Memphis. Toward the rear, young blacks started to throw rocks and break windows. Looting began. King was rushed to safety. But he knew he had to return to Memphis and finish the job.
