Postcard - Bayard Rustin

Bayard Rustin (March 17, 1912 - August 24, 1987) was a leader in social movements for peace, civil rights, socialism, nonviolence, and gay rights. Rustin worked with A. Philip Randolph on the March on Washington Movement in 1941 for an end to racial discrimination in employment. He was imprisoned for resisting the draft in World War II and then worked on the staff of the War Resisters League for many years. Rustin organized Freedom Rides and helped to organize the Southern Christian Leadership Conference to strengthen Martin Luther King Jr.'s leadership, teaching King about nonviolence and later serving as an organizer for the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. Rustin was a lifelong activist, despite efforts to marginalize him due to his socialist and pacifist beliefs and because he was a gay man during a time of virulent homophobia.