Bayard Rustin,
M.L. King’s March Organizer:
Known later in life as a “civil rights activist,” Rustin (1912-1987) joined the Communist Party USA (CPUSA) as a young man in 1936. His grandmother Julia was a member of the NAACP and close friend of black communist WEB DuBois, editor of the official NAACP organ, “The Crisis.” Rustin sang in the chorus of fellow black communist Paul Robeson in entertainment venues across the country in the late 1930’s, and in 1936 joined the Young Communist League at New York City College. The CPUSA pursued young black men like Rustin as the issue of democratic rights for the Negro was a central ingredient in their strategy to bring an end to capitalism, and “the full unleashing of the struggle for Negro liberation” meant “bringing up the strategic reserve of democracy and socialism” and striking at the “Achilles heel of American imperialism.”
Rustin was convicted of avoiding military service and sent to prison for two years in 1944 for draft-dodging; and on January 23, 1953, the Los Angeles Times reported his conviction and sentencing to jail for 60 days for lewd vagrancy and homosexual perversion.
From 1955 to 1960, Rustin served as an associate, advisor and personal secretary to Michael King, later known as Martin Luther King. It was during his service to King that he attended the 16th Convention of the CPUSA in February 1957, and one month later, he and King founded the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). King presided as president of the SCLC and his vice-president was Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth, who was also the president of an identified communist front known as the Southern Conference Educational Fund.
Soon after returning from a Moscow visit in 1958, Rustin organized the first of King’s marches on Washington. The official organ of the CPUSA, “The Worker," openly declared this march to be a communist project and endorsed it. Although he officially left King’s employ in 1961, Rustin was called upon by King to be second in command of the much larger march on Washington which took place on August 28, 1964. Bayard Rustin’s replacement in 1961 as secretary and advisor to King was Jack O’Dell, also known as Hunter Pitts O’Dell. According to official records, in 1962 Jack O’Dell was a member of the National Committee of the CPUSA. He had been listed as a communist party member as early as 1956. Rustin also served as coordinator of black socialist A. Philip Randolph’s 1963 March for Jobs and Freedom in Washington, as well as director of the A. Philip Randolph Institute.
Sources:
Wikipedia
Asa Philip Randolph, Sally Hanley, Chelsea House, 1989
The Negro and the Communist Party, Wilson Record, Atheneum, 1971
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