Monuments and Slums Mingle in Capital

Monuments and Slums Mingle in Capital
August 26, 1963
August 1963
Washington D.C.
original article

Southern Illinoisan (Carbondale, Illinois)
original article

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The civil rights marchers may not see it all, but this is a city nerved by power, lined with marble, vibrant with areas of beauty and blighted by contrasting areas of squalor. It is a city of great monuments and slums, of complex law and petty crime, of history and lethargy. To the 100,000 or more civil rights marchers expected here Wednesday, Washington will be a symbol of national power, a capital where men and women petition for redress of grievance. They will gather at the base of the soaring Washington Monument, the center of a vast complex of greenery and marble, a monument that looks east to the Capitol, north to the White House, west to the Lincoln Memorial and south to the Jefferson Memorial and the Tidal Basin rimmed with cherry trees. Then they will march a few blocks down huge avenues and across parklands to the Lincoln Memorial, a temple in the style of the Parthenon in Greece. These are the symbols of government and beauty and history that draw almost 5 million tourists to Washington each year. But Washington has other faces, too...
The civil rights marchers may not see it all, but this is a city nerved by power, lined with marble, vibrant with areas of beauty and blighted by contrasting areas of squalor. It is a city of great monuments and slums, of complex law and petty crime, of history and lethargy. To the 100,000 or more civil rights marchers expected here Wednesday, Washington will be a symbol of national power, a capital where men and women petition for redress of grievance. They will gather at the base of the soaring Washington Monument, the center of a vast complex of greenery and marble, a monument that looks east to the Capitol, north to the White House, west to the Lincoln Memorial and south to the Jefferson Memorial and the Tidal Basin rimmed with cherry trees. Then they will march a few blocks down huge avenues and across parklands to the Lincoln Memorial, a temple in the style of the Parthenon in Greece. These are the symbols of government and beauty and history that draw almost 5 million tourists to Washington each year. But Washington has other faces, too...
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