obs to the Afro-American community. The
planned march, which will be discussed more fully in a later chapter, was
then called off. Although the march was canceled, Randolph hoped to keep
the March on Washington Movement alive. He wanted to create a permanent
mobilized community. This, too, failed to materialize, but, if it had not
been for the war, his efforts might have been more successful. In
September, 1942, Randolph called a meeting of the March on Washington
Movement before which he outlined his program. He told the conference
that slavery had not ended because it was evil, but because it was
violently overthrown, Similarly, he said that if they wanted to obtain
their rights, they would have to be willing to fight, go to jail, and die
for them. Rights would not be granted; they must be taken if need be. His
plan was to organize a permanent mass movement on a nationwide basis and
to conduct protests, marches, and boycotts. This was an adaptation of
some of Gandhi's techniques to the Afro-American problem.

The March on Washington Movement was to be an all-Negro movement. Yet,
Randolph did not intend it to be anti-white. He pointed to the fact that
every organization must have its own purposes, that Catholic groups
concentrated on their interests in the same way as labor groups strove to
gain their objectives. Any oppressed people must assume the major
responsibility for furthering their goals. They might accept help and
cooperation from outside, but they must, in the final analysis, rely on
self-organization and self-help. One of the by-products of this, Randolph
believed, would be the development of self-reliance within the
Afro-American community and the destruction of the slave mentality.
Although individual blacks within the community could join other
organizations, and while the movement itself might cooperate with other
organizations, the March on Washington Movement itself was to be
exclusively for blacks. It was a racial movement for racial advancement.

Randolph went on to envision an organization with a challenging action
program. Millions of supporters would be divided into a network of small
block units. Each would be headed by a block captain. This would
facilitate instant, mass mobilization. At a moment's notice, a chain of
command could be activated, and millions of marchers would be in the
streets. Randolph also envisioned repeated, gigantic marches aimed at
Washington and state capitals. He could a