From marching in Selma to serving as U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. under President Jimmy Carter, Andrew Young has shaped history. Now 93, he looks back on his extraordinary life and the work still left to do. GPB's Pamela Kirkland sits down with Andrew Young in this bonus episode of Georgia Today.
“It's the funny thing about birthdays — everyone has them, but nobody knows what to do with them,” Andrew Young said, just days before his 93rd birthday.
The former U.S. ambassador to the U.N. under President Jimmy Carter, two-term Atlanta mayor, congressman, and civil rights hero still maintains a lively pace. He admits he’s not happy about no longer having a driver’s license, but that hasn’t slowed him down in his tireless pursuit of social justice and equity through his foundation.
At just 19, after graduating from Howard University in Washington, D.C., Young stood atop King's Mountain in North Carolina, where he had a revelation.
“I knew that there must be some purpose for me, and the basis of knowing my purpose is that there's something I can do that nobody else can do," Young said. "And that's what's happened to me. I have done what nobody else wanted to do.”
That realization guided him through seminary, activism, and ultimately into the heart of America’s civil rights movement.
Looking back on his life Young says he did eventually find his purpose, as he saw it. “My purpose is to do God's will, each and every minute of my life,” Young says.
Before joining Martin Luther King Jr.’s Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), Young served as a pastor at small churches in Marion, Ala., and Thomasville, Ga. In 1957, an invitation to an Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity event set him on a path that would change his life.
“They had invited Martin Luther King to speak, but worried he might have to cancel. So they invited me as a backup. And then both of us showed up.”
As Young’s involvement in the movement deepened, he became one of King’s closest confidants — answering letters, researching topics, and helping organize pivotal civil rights marches in St. Augustine, Fla., and Selma, Ala.
The Selma march on March 7, 1965, later known as Bloody Sunday, became a turning point in the fight for voting rights, but Young recalls that it wasn’t planned as such.
“The march on Bloody Sunday was a mistake," he said. "It was the first Sunday in March, and we thought it was the second Sunday — or at least the people did.”
That morning, 200 to 300 people arrived, ready to march to Montgomery. Caught off guard, Young called King, who was in church.
“We can't turn these people around,” Young told him. “There's a group of policemen at the bottom of the hill. They're not going to let them go far. And I don’t know whether they'll arrest them or just turn them around.”
King’s response was clear: “Well, don’t you go.”
Young stayed back, praying over the group before watching them march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge — where they were brutally attacked by state troopers. The violence that day galvanized the nation and propelled the signing of the 1965 Voting Rights Act.
Young’s role during the civil rights movement was often described as a mediator among towering figures like King, John Lewis and Hosea Williams. He said the role was essential, but definitely was not easy.
“It was miserable,” he says with a laugh. “I was never as militant as Hosea wanted me to be. And I was never as humble as [James] Bevel wanted me to be. I was always wrong because everybody wanted to be next to Martin Luther King.”
Young is one of the last surviving members of King’s inner circle. He was there when King was assassinated in Memphis, Tenn., in 1968. In moments of doubt, he still draws strength from King’s words.
“I go back to Martin Luther King," Young said. "‘Truth crushed to earth will rise again.’ He said it over and over. ‘Truth forever on the scaffold. Wrong forever on the throne. Yet that scaffold sways the future. And behind the dim unknown standeth God within the shadows, keeping watch above his own.’
At 93, Young remains deeply engaged with the world. While concerned about America's divisions, he resists comparisons to the past, choosing instead to focus on the country’s progress.
“I think that if I was not a man of faith, I'd be scared to death,” he admits. “But I don't know what the future may hold. But I do know who holds the future. And so I'm really calm."
Despite its challenges, he believes America still carries goodwill on the global stage.
“Everywhere I've been in the world, I've been welcomed. People love America because they see us as being fair to everybody. We've come a long way, but we still have a long way to go. And I don't doubt that we will make it."
Young shies away from discussions about legacy, choosing instead to measure his success through his family — four children, nine grandchildren, and two great-grandchildren.
“I don't know that any of them is perfect," he said. "All of them think they are perfect, and they all want to be perfect. And that's enough for me, because I'm far from perfect and never been even close."
For those still searching for their purpose, Young’s advice is simple:
“Just go out anytime, look up and look around. And see what you see. If you're in Atlanta, any direction in which you look is amazing.”
“It's been a wonderful life. And I can't think of any place I’d rather live,” he says.
