A Racial Justice March in Washington Hopes to Build on Its 1963 Inspiration

While the protest will commemorate the 1963 march and Dr. King’s iconic “I Have a Dream” address, its larger purpose is to rally African-Americans and others on behalf of concrete goals. They range from increasing voter registration and participation in the 2020 census to enacting a new version of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, said Tylik McMillan, the national director of youth and college at the National Action Network, which Mr. Sharpton founded in 1991.

A major goal, he said, is to push for passage of the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, backed by House Democrats and the Congressional Black Caucus, which would overhaul law-enforcement training and conduct rules to limit police misconduct and racial bias.

The killing of Mr. Floyd by the Minneapolis police in May and the national upheaval it provoked loom large over the march, as does the sense among civil rights leaders that action this year could set the course of American race relations for years, if not decades. Protests have continued this week in Kenosha, Wis., after a white police officer shot a Black man in the back several times.

“We can’t ignore the moment that we’re in,” said Kristen Clarke, the president of the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, which also is sponsoring the protest. “This is a march that is very much needed right now, given the fires that are raging as we deal with police violence, racial violence and voter suppression. It’s created almost a perfect storm.”

Among the speakers at the event are Ms. Clarke and Mr. Morial, as well as family members representing Mr. Floyd; Breonna Taylor, an emergency medical technician killed in March in a raid by police officers in Louisville, Ky.; and Eric Garner, who died after being held in a chokehold by the police in New York City in 2014. The speeches, which begin at 11 a.m. Eastern, will be followed by a march from the Lincoln Memorial to the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial on the Mall.

The event will be livestreamed by the N.A.A.C.P., another sponsor, and covered on cable by BET. It also will be accompanied by a so-called virtual march conducted online.