On November 20, 2013, in the East Room of the White House, President Barack Obama presented the Presidential Medal of Freedom to sixteen people. Three of them had died, and someone close to each came up to accept. When the announcement came, "Walter Naegle accepting on behalf of his partner, Bayard Rustin," a gray-haired man walked to the front of the room.
The citation
The White House had announced the honorees in August, fifty years after the March on Washington. Its citation called Rustin "an unyielding activist for civil rights, dignity, and equality for all," who "promoted nonviolent resistance, participated in one of the first Freedom Rides, organized the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, and fought tirelessly for marginalized communities at home and abroad." It ended: "As an openly gay African American, Mr. Rustin stood at the intersection of several of the fights for equal rights."
The words read at the ceremony went further. Rustin was "openly gay at a time when many had to hide who they loved," and his belief that we are all members of a "single human family" took him "from his first Freedom Ride to the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender rights movement."
The blank sheet of paper
In his remarks, the President told a story about the morning of the March. Early on August 28, 1963, the Mall was far from full, and reporters began to wonder whether the day would be a failure.
“But the march's chief organizer, Bayard Rustin, didn't panic. As the story goes, he looked down at a piece of paper, looked back up, and reassured reporters that everything was right on schedule. The only thing those reporters didn't know was that the paper he was holding was blank.”
Then he said plainly why Rustin had been kept in the background: "for decades, this great leader, often at Dr. King's side, was denied his rightful place in history because he was openly gay. No medal can change that, but today, we honor Bayard Rustin's memory by taking our place in his march towards true equality, no matter who we are or who we love."
How Washington remembered him
The medal came late, but Rustin's name had been turning up in presidential words for twenty years. On the thirtieth anniversary of the March, August 28, 1993, President Bill Clinton issued a statement saying that "such visionary leaders as Martin Luther King, A. Philip Randolph, and Bayard Rustin understood three decades ago, jobs and freedom are inextricably linked." That was four months after the 1993 March on Washington, where Urvashi Vaid spoke (April 1993).
In June 2016, at the White House's Pride Month reception, President Obama quoted Rustin directly:
“We need in every community a group of angelic troublemakers.”
"I like that," the President added. The phrase is also the name of the Bayard Rustin Society's newsletter, The Angelic Troublemaker, whose first issues are on this site (March 2025, July 2025).
Sources
- White House, "President Obama Names Presidential Medal of Freedom Recipients," August 8, 2013 (archived White House).
- President Obama, "Remarks by the President at Presidential Medal of Freedom Ceremony," November 20, 2013 (archived White House).
- White House photographs of the ceremony, Barack Obama Presidential Library, National Archives (NAIDs 312475522 and 312475532).
- President Clinton, statement on the 30th anniversary of the March on Washington, August 28, 1993, Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents, vol. 29, pp. 1656–57 (govinfo).
- President Obama, "Remarks at a Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Pride Month Reception," June 9, 2016 (govinfo, DCPD-201600389).
