Lasting Change, Not Turnout, To Spell Success, Farrakhan Says

"That's been going on for 22 years, and no matter what I say, it never alters those words," he said.

Farrakhan said that a recent statement by former education secretary William J. Bennett, suggesting that aborting "every black baby in this country" would reduce the crime rate, will not follow Bennett the same way. "You won't say it for 20 years," he said.

And again yesterday, Jewish leaders chastised Farrakhan as a racist and an anti-Semite.

"Farrakahn's rally becomes our business when he invokes anti-Semitic imagery and words," said Ronald Halber, executive director of the Jewish Community Council of Greater Washington. "The African American community needs to look at how others are going to react to his message."

A decade ago, Farrakhan was largely shunned by mainstream black leaders, but this time civil rights groups, including the National Council of Negro Women, the Urban League and the NAACP, are supporting the rally along with several black religious groups.

Many who are going to today's event say the controversy surrounding Farrakhan is no controversy at all. Anthony Tate, who sings in the choir at Union Temple in Southeast Washington, said he marched with thousands of other men from Anacostia to the Mall a decade ago and plans to bring his girlfriend and her 17-year-old son today.

Tate, who is involved in the church's ministry for people living with HIV, said he's clinging to the hope that real change will result.

"It has to," he said. "We want something you can hold onto, not something that's just for 24 hours. That's really going to be difficult, because some people don't want to reach out."