Document 5.15.2: Excerpts from President Johnson’s Commencement Address at Howard University, June 4, 1965

Civil rights leaders and the media recognized the far-reaching implications of the President’s address at the historically black college, concerning the effective means of eradicating racism.

“To Fulfill These Rights”

You do not take a person who, for years, has been hobbled by chains and liberate him, bring him up to the starting line of a race and then say, “you are free to compete with all the others.” And still justly believe that you have been completely fair…We seek, not just equality as a right and a theory but equality as a fact and equality as a result…Much of the Negro community is buried under a blanket of history and circumstance. It is not a lasting solution  to lift just one corner of that blanket. We must stand on all sides and we must raise the entire cover if we are to liberate our fellow citizens…Perhaps most important…is the breakdown of the Negro family structure. For this, most of all, white America must accept responsibility. If flows from centuries of oppression and persecution of the Negro man…..

There is no single easy answer…

Jobs are part of the answer….

Decent homes…are part of the answer…