Burns sets the scene for the events of 1963, describing Martin Luther King's development from his debut on the national stage during the Montgomery Bus Boycott of 1955-1956 through the lunch counter sit-ins, the freedom rides, Bayard Rustin's role in the development of King's views on nonviolence, the failures of the Albany movement, James Meredith's effort to enroll at the University of Mississippi, and the machinations and prevarications of the Kennedy White House on civil rights.