Poor March Demonstrators Seek Students for Building Shanty Town

Organizers of the Poor People's Campaign are seeking between 200 and 300 students to spend next weekend in Washington, D.C., building a shanty town to house 6000 demonstrators.

A spokesman for the campaign, Stoney Cooks, who visited Harvard Saturday, warned that there is "a possibility of arrests" at the construction site. The Southern Christian Leadership Confrence, which is leading the campaign, has said that it may build the shanty town on public property even if Washington officials refuse to issue a permit.

Cooks said that SCLC has arranged for an alternate site on private property, but that a final decision on the location of "The City of Hope," as it will be known, has not been made.

Student Supporters

Cooks met here with several student supporters of the campaign, including leaders of the Association of African and Afro-American Students. One local organizer for the campaign, Steven J. Kelman '70, said yesterday that supporters would set up tables in the Houses and at Radcliffe Wednesday urging students to participate.

Kelman said he doubted that buses would be chartered to take students to Washington this weekend. But he said that buses would be chartered for demonstrators scheduled for the Memorial Day weekend.

The first demonstrators--in a caravan that left Memphis, Tenn., last week after a memorial service for the Rev. Martin Luther King--will arrive in Washington a week from today. Other caravans are scheduled to join the first group during the five days after its arrival.

March from Boston

A march from Boston will begin Friday. It is slated to reach Washington May 17.

The two-month campaign began last week. As marchers gathered in Memphis 150 representatives of the poor met in Washington. They petitioned cabinet officials and congressmen/for more jobs, better housing, and a guaranteed income.

Demonstrations in support of the demands will begin May 20 and continue until mid-June. By then, SCLC planners expect Congress to have taken action--or to have indicated that none will be taken. A massive march--which organizers hope will be larger than the 1963 civil rights march that brought 200,000 people to the capital--will be held May 30.

Cooks said that plans are being made for 5000 students to participate in the campaign from May 29 to June 8. He said that SCLC is setting up a free university," at which "movement people and poor people will talk about what's happening and what students can do."

"Rather than everybody doing their own thing this summer," said Cooks, "we want them to do the poor people's thing." He said that students would be asked to accompany groups of poor people when the Washington campaign disbands, and to work with them for the summer.