Luck notwithstanding, it will take an unprecedented combination of power and principle to resolve the plight of America's cities. Last week in Washington, the beginnings of such a partnership were welded at a day long "convocation" of the newly formed Urban Coalition. The group included Henry Ford II, Walter Reuther, David Rockefeller, George Meany, A. Philip Randolph, I. W. Abel, Whitney Young, John Lindsay. The list, 1,200 strong, comprised mayors and millionaires, bishops and union bosses.
The delegation, commanding an impressive proportion of the nation's economic, spiritual and intellectual resources, had assembled neither...