University of Virginia Library

The March

Concepts of numbers are difficult for
people to handle. Though we throw figures
around, referring to a billion dollars, 93
million miles, and other large quantities,
human beings are simply not equipped to have
a concrete idea of quantities that large. So no
one will really ever know how many people
were in Washington Saturday. All we can say
is that there were more people than we had
ever seen, more than we could ever count,
more than we ever were certain existed.

From the Monument that afternoon, we
could see people, masses of people, in every
direction. They sat huddled in the cold all the
way to the reflecting pool. They were
streaming in vast, almost frightening, numbers,
towards us from 15th Street and up the
Mall from the Capitol. The effect on those
present was electric. For those who had come
to fear that may be Spiro Agnew was the voice
of America, here was reassurance. For here
was what seemed to be an infinite number of
beautiful people, marching arm in arm,
smiling at the policemen, at each other. For
them, at that moment, it didn't matter that
the President was ensconced in the White
House watching a football game. It seemed so
obvious at the time that such an enormous
crowd would generate its own power, that the
warmth in half a million hearts, the fervent
prayer for peace in half a million minds would
somehow transcend the political interests that
keep the nation at war.

No matter what the Attorney-General,
angered by the tear gas that wafted into his
window and desperate to assert that the
Administration enjoys the support of the
people, might say to the contrary, it was so
much a peaceful demonstration that the
isolated outbursts engineered by the Yippies
fade into insignificance. It was peaceful
because the crowd and the police were
determined that it would be so, and in this
determination was found a fellowship that
led, at various points along the march, to
students helping police restrain the crowds, to
police donning peace buttons, and to jubilant
exchanges of the peace sign. Even when the
tear gas was released and the cops donned
their riot helmets and gas masks, most of the
demonstrators realized that the gas was used
so that billy clubs would not be necessary.

The theme of the day, as first enunciated
by the Beatles, was that all peace needed was
a chance - "All we are saying is give peace a
chance." And in the midst of such a people, it
truly seemed that all peace needed was a
chance, that judging by the people on the
Mall, peace was the natural condition of man.
"What would happen if they gave a war and
nobody came?"

But of course the war will go on, at least
until an election gives the Great Silent
Majority the opportunity to declare its
allegiance, to peace or to Nixon, at the polls.
Like Woodstock, the march will take its place
with the events, that highlight the emergence
of a new culture in this country, and years
from now the people who will say they were
there would overflow into the Potomac. The
march may mean little to the Nixon regime,
especially if they can succeed in discrediting
it, as the Attorney-General has already
attempted to do and as Spiro undoubtedly
will soon. But for those who were there, and
for those in the country who turned in to its
vibrations, it will serve as a powerful
reinforcement in their belief that peace will
ultimately triumph.