[King, Martin Luther Jr.]. [Vietnam War]

Pay Tribute to the Memory of Martin Luther King Jr. Saturday April 27th. March Against the War, Racism, Poverty, Repression and the Draft...Rally at San Francisco Civic Center...[caption title and first few lines of text]

San Francisco: [1968]. Broadsheet on blue paper, 13.5 x 8.5 inches. Slight discoloration along top and bottom edges, minor edge wear, a few soft creases, old horizontal folds. Very good. Item #3397

An exceedingly rare broadsheet advertising a multi-faceted public march and rally against the Vietnam War and "racism, poverty and repression," which took place in San Francisco, California about three weeks after the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. The organizers of the event, the April 27 Mobilization Committee, framed the day's activities around Dr. King's opposition to the Vietnam War; the broadside calls for the protesters to "pay tribute to the memory" of Dr. King, his portrait is printed at the top of the front side of the broadsheet, and the entirety of the verso prints excerpts of an April 4, 1967 speech by Dr. King railing against the Vietnam War.

Particularly interesting is the eclectic list of speakers who participated in the day's events on April 27, 1968, which included Muhammad Ali, Vanessa Redgrave, Jeanette Rankin, Bobby Seale, Arnold True, and Sidney Roger. Ali was in the midst of his appeal after his conviction for draft evasion the previous year, and was a natural candidate to speak against the injustices of the Vietnam War. Bobby Seale, co-founder of the Black Panthers, was four months away from participating in protests at the 1968 Chicago Democratic Convention, after which he was arrested and tried as part of the sham Chicago Eight fiasco. The diversity of the speakers echoes the quantity of different issues represented by the current broadsheet: Civil Rights, the Vietnam War, the recent assassination of Dr. King, Muhammad Ali's legal fight against the war, Bobby Seale's controversial role with the Bay Area Black Panthers, women's rights, and the role of the American military. We could locate no other copies of this broadsheet in auction history or OCLC.

Price: $850.00