A history professor describes the impact and history of the opening speech made during the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom on August 28, 1963 by the trade unionist A. Philip Randolph whose vision and fight for equal economic and social citizenship began in 1941. He first called for a march on Washington in 1941 to press for equal opportunity in employment and the armed forces. He called for an end to segregation and a living wage for every American. Randolph's egalitarian vision of economic and social citizenship is the strong thread running through the full history of the March on Washington Movement. It was a movement of sustained grassroots organizing linked locally to women's groups, unions, and churches across the country. This work delivers a new understanding of this emblematic event and the broader civil rights movement it propelled.