Bayard Rustin's influence on American culture is perhaps immeasurable. He played a key role in infusing the Civil Rights movement with the principles of nonviolence; one of the movement's ablest strategists, he was responsible for organizing two of its most momentous events. In this biography, Jervis Anderson, who once worked with Rustin, describes the life of this leading Black intellectual from his imprisonment as a conscientious observer during WWII to his relationships with Dr. King, A. Philip Randolph, Roy Wilkins and Dorothy Height and the controversy he caused in his later years when he took issue with certain aspects of the Black Power movement. Written with the cooperation of Rustin's friends and colleagues, and with complete access to his personal papers, this is the definitive biography of one of the most important heroes of the Civil Rights movement.