Chap­ter Sev­en of the book focus­es on John Lewis’s sig­nif­i­cant role in the civ­il rights move­ment dur­ing the peri­od lead­ing up to the March on Wash­ing­ton in 1963. Fol­low­ing a break­through in Nashville, where non­vi­o­lent protests led to promis­es of deseg­re­ga­tion, Lewis con­tin­ued his advo­ca­cy by orga­niz­ing a swim-in at a seg­re­gat­ed swim­ming pool and a human bar­ri­cade at a local super­mar­ket. This block­ade gained sig­nif­i­cant media atten­tion, reflect­ing a broad­er shift in civ­il rights activism, which includ­ed increas­ing unrest and a rise in “mil­i­tan­cy” across Amer­i­can cities. In June, Pres­i­dent Kennedy intro­duced a civ­il rights bill in response to the mount­ing pres­sure from activism, espe­cial­ly after the Uni­ver­si­ty of Alaba­ma stand­off.

By mid-June, Lewis received an invi­ta­tion from the Stu­dent Non­vi­o­lent Coor­di­nat­ing Com­mit­tee (SNCC) chair­man to attend an emer­gency meet­ing in Atlanta, where Lewis was unex­pect­ed­ly elect­ed as SNC­C’s new chair­man. This marked a tran­si­tion as SNCC shift­ed its focus from col­lege cam­pus­es to rur­al South­ern com­mu­ni­ties. Under Lewis’s lead­er­ship, the orga­ni­za­tion sought to address broad­er social and eco­nom­ic injus­tices, mov­ing beyond deseg­re­ga­tion.

Dis­cus­sions regard­ing a march on Wash­ing­ton began to form, large­ly led by civ­il rights vet­er­ans A. Philip Ran­dolph and Bayard Rustin, aimed at address­ing job and free­dom issues. Many lead­ers were ini­tial­ly skep­ti­cal, fear­ing the march would lack a clear, mil­i­tant mes­sage. Rustin and his team worked to include var­i­ous civ­il rights, labor, and reli­gious orga­ni­za­tions, even­tu­al­ly entic­ing SNCC into the fold.

In prepa­ra­tion, Lewis faced the chal­lenge of want­i­ng to express the urgent demands of his orga­ni­za­tion in his speech while nav­i­gat­ing the expec­ta­tions of the broad­er coali­tion, which includ­ed accom­mo­dat­ing Pres­i­dent Kennedy’s civ­il rights agen­da. As the march date approached, ten­sions esca­lat­ed regard­ing the con­tent of Lewis’s speech, which was expect­ed to cri­tique the pres­i­den­t’s bill. Lewis fought to main­tain the speech’s integri­ty despite pres­sure from oth­er lead­ers to dilute its urgent mes­sage.

On the day of the march, Lewis deliv­ered a speech that artic­u­lat­ed the demands of the civ­il rights move­ment, empha­siz­ing the neces­si­ty for imme­di­ate change and express­ing the frus­tra­tions of the Black com­mu­ni­ty. His pow­er­ful deliv­ery and con­tent res­onat­ed with a mas­sive audi­ence gath­ered in Wash­ing­ton, ele­vat­ing the move­men­t’s nar­ra­tive and Lewis’s sig­nif­i­cance with­in it. The chap­ter con­cludes with the suc­cess­ful out­come of the march and its role in fur­ther­ing civ­il rights, set­ting a piv­otal moment in Amer­i­can his­to­ry.