March Against Vietnam War

Apr. 17, 1965 - More than 15,000 students and a number of their elders picketed the White House in spring sunshine today, calling for an end to the fighting in Vietnam. Walking three and four abreast in orderly rows and carrying signs, the students clogged the sidewalk.

The principal occupant of the White House was at his ranch in Texas.

In early afternoon, the marchers paraded to the Sylvan Theater, on the grounds of the Washington Monument, for a series of speeches. Then they walked down the Mall to the Capitol, bearing a petition for Congress. 

The demonstration was initiated by Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), a left-leaning but non-Communist group with chapters on 63 campuses throughout the country. It had the support of several civil rights organizations, Women Strike for Peace, and other groups. The supporting rights organizations included the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC).

Sandy Smith, a 19-year-old student at Michigan State University, carried a sign reading “War on Poverty, Not War on People.”Miss Smith, who said she had never before participated in a public demonstration, said: “I feel that the President responds to public opinion — look what he did on civil rights — and I want him to know that public opinion is behind him if he sees the possibility for negotiations.”

Brad Soule, a 21-year-old senior at Amherst College, said he had come “to raise Vietnam as an issue.” He said civil rights was a more popular issue at Amherst, but that a recent “teach-in” on Vietnam had stirred student interest.

A student from East Carolina College in Greenville, N.C., said: “The war in Vietnam is essentially a civil war. A preponderance of the Vietnamese people want us to leave.”

Bob Malone, a 22-year-old from Springfield, Va., added that “our statement that we are defending freedom there is a fiction.”

Across Pennsylvania Avenue, near Lafayette Square, a dozen members of the American Nazi party and 100 members of the Delaware Valley Citizens for Victory Over Communism staged counterdemonstrations.

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