D.C. march today is a living tribute to Bayard Rustin

Duane C. Ingram

is a former vice president of programs at the Urban League of Philadelphia

Hans Johnson

is president of Progressive Victory, a consulting firm in Washington

Today, thousands of Americans will participate in a march in Washington to demand full constitutional rights for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people.

The march follows a transformative national election last fall that ushered a son of the civil rights movement into the Oval Office, progressive Democrats into federal power unknown for a generation, and LGBT leaders into unprecedented access to public service.

For Philadelphians, today's march has special significance. The event and newfound political traction of the movement fulfill the dream of a little-known local hero, Bayard Rustin of West Chester.

Rustin was a central figure of the great civil rights struggles of the last 60 years. Both black and gay and frequently attacked by ally and foe alike for his sexuality, Rustin did not live to see a day when he would be unconditionally welcome in the halls of power, when all of his identities could expect the full protection of federal law. That day at last has come.

Colleagues and protégés in the hundreds describe Rustin as a giant of community organizing and social-justice strategy. He was an inspiring person who unleashed song and sermon to cajole activists of all ages into participation in sit-ins, antiwar protests, and national marches as massive as they were well-orchestrated. Long before the BlackBerry and Facebook, he used mail, the telegraph, the telephone, and contacts in the media to ensure his message reached around the globe.

Rustin was a Quaker who believed deeply in nonviolent resistance to oppression and went to federal prison for more than two years during World War II rather than fight. He later traveled to India to gain a deeper understanding of the tactics of Mahatma Gandhi. Through labor leader A. Philip Randolph, Rustin grew close to the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and schooled him in nonviolence during the Montgomery bus boycott. He later organized the 1963 March on Washington, which culminated in Dr. King's legendary "I Have A Dream" speech.

Rustin's grit, grace, and tenacity gained respect despite a career-long smear campaign from the right and left. Numerous black civil rights leaders shunned his involvement in the movement, viewing his being gay as an unpardonable and politically explosive sin. Attempts to ostracize him continued even as some of his critics carried on extramarital affairs or other lapses of decorum.

Both Dr. King and Randolph had the laudable capacity to see beyond sexual orientation. They helped solidify Rustin's standing against assaults personal and hypocritical. Throughout the 1960s and '70s, Rustin leveraged the legacy of his twin champions in the Christian church and the labor movement to create progressive political power from the grassroots into government.

Until Rustin's death in 1987 at the age of 75, he was organizing for nuclear disarmament, living wages, and free and fair elections both overseas and domestically. Rustin showed that social movements, through visibility at strategic moments in time, can remind the nation of its conscience and hold up a mirror to its soul. More than anyone else in American history, he ranks as our patron saint of coalition-building.

He felt the danger of gay-baiting to derail even the most formidable alliance on the brink of winning change and foresaw a broad-based effort to advocate the dignity and equality of gay people. In the twilight of his own life, he noted, "The barometer of where one is on human rights questions is no longer in the black community; but the gay community, because it is the [gay] community which is most easily mistreated."

His insight reflects more than self-interest. As a lifelong crusader against cruelty, Rustin understood that sadism would not be stopped unless the particular ways that people and institutions sought to inflict it against LGBT individuals were outlawed.

The activists who retrace Rustin's steps on the National Mall today to call for enhanced enforcement against hate crimes and protections against antigay bias in jobs and housing owe him a tremendous debt of gratitude. So do African Americans who carry Dr. King's dream in their hearts and cheer the ascendancy and success of Barack Obama.

Grassroots organizing and coalition politics hold the potential for winning prosperity and equality for all Americans, irrespective of race, class, religion, gender, or sexual orientation and gender identity. Bayard Rustin knew that our democracy's founding promises of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness were meaningless unless they were redeemed in application to those whom society scorns. Particularly in the state that gave him to the world, it is time for society to know and celebrate the name of Bayard Rustin.