Face the Nation transcripts August 25, 2013: Powell, Lewis, McCaul, and Reed

(CBS News) Below is a transcript of "Face the Nation" on August 25, 2013, hosted by CBS News' Bob Schieffer. Guests include: Gen. Colin Powell, Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga., Sen. Jack Reed, D-R.I., Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, Margaret Brennan, David Rohde, Marian Wright Edelman, Ben Jealous and Taylor Branch.

SCHIEFFER: Today on Face the Nation, 50 years after the march on Washington has Martin Luther King Jr.'s dream come true?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They marched on Washington today.

(SINGING)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: For one day, while the congress, the country and the world watched, they took over the nation's capital in the name of civil rights. What was its impact on the real Washington-- that is, the Washington that governs the United States of America? In the lead, Martin Luther King, the man hailed today above all the others.

MARTIN LUTHER KING JR., CIVIL RIGHTS LEADER: I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream. I have a dream.

SCHIEFFER: Today, we'll talk about King's dream and the state of race relations with some prominent African-American leaders, including former Secretary of State Colin Powell, and legendary civil rights leader, Georgia congressman, John Lewis, who was with King that day. Plus, we'll hear General Powell's advice to the president on the crisis in the Middle East.

POWELL: In both Egypt and Syria, America has to take a much more -- a much more clever role.

SCHIEFFER: We'll also talk about the situation in Syria with Senator Jack Reed and Representative Mike McCaul. It's all ahead on "Face the Nation."

ANNOUNCER: And now from CBS News in Washington, Face the Nation with Bob Schieffer.

SCHIEFFER: Good morning, again. Tens of thousands turned out in Washington yesterday to mark the 50th anniversary of the march. We'll begin today with someone who was not in Washington when Dr. King spoke and didn't know about the speech for weeks. Colin Powell was an army officer in the jungles of Vietnam, but his wife and son were in Birmingham. It was the summer Bull Conner had sicced police dogs on black protesters there. So as Powell fought the Viet Cong, his father-in-law was back in Alabama guarding his family.

POWELL: My wife didn't share all the details with me. She didn't want to bother me. And mail took weeks to travel to Vietnam in those days, but I really got a sense of what happened when I got back from Vietnam later that year, shortly after Kennedy was killed. And I realized what was going on in the country. And as a soldier, I couldn't participate in this. I could just watch it. And as I watched it unfold, I said, you know, this is a time for America to live up to its creed. And this is the time for us to understand that segregation and Jim Crowe-ism, and these awful laws are not just a burden for African-Americans, they are a burden for all Americans. America is carrying this horrible weight on its shoulder that we at one time hoped would be relieved by the Civil War. But the Civil War didn't do it, not withstanding President Lincoln's desires before he was assassinated when he talked about the rebirth of the nation, the nation of the people, for the people, by the people, but he meant all the people. But it didn't happen. And Jim Crowe and segregation came in. So we needed a new effort, a new civil war. And the leader of that war was Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

SCHIEFFER: I was very interested to read in "Time" magazine in their special issue devoted to this anniversary, you said the "I Have a Dream" speech held up a mirror for all Americans to look deeply into the spirit and soul of our country. If that same mirror were held up today, what do you think it would show?

POWELL: I think it would show that enormous progress has been made. African-Americans and other minorities have moved to the top of every institution in American society, whether it's politics in the form of the president; or in the military; or in finance, or in corporate America, in media America. And so a lot has been accomplished. And we should be so proud of our accomplishments. But at the same time, that mirror should show us that there are still problems in this country, that there is still racial bias that exists in certain parts of our country, that we cannot be happy until every youngster gets a quality education, regardless of where he lives or the color of his or her skin. We've got to be sure that we do everything we can to make equal opportunity in jobs and economics available to all Americans. So I would say-- and if Dr. King was here, I'm quite sure he would say-- congratulations on all the progress that has been made, but let's keep going, the dream is not fully achieved yet.

SCHIEFFER: This year, the Supreme Court voided part of the Voting Rights Act that came in 1965, the part that instructed. It said that if the States had had a history of segregation, had to get the approval of the federal government before they could make changes in their election processes. The court told the congress to update that, but congress in the state of gridlock it is now, obviously, nothing is going to happen. What did you think of the Supreme Court's decision?

POWELL: I would have preferred that they did not reach such a conclusion, but they did. And I can see why they would reach such a conclusion. The concern I have now is that many states are putting in place procedures and new legislation that in some ways makes it a little bit harder to vote. You need a photo ID. Well, you didn't need a photo ID for decades before. Is it really necessary now? And they claim that there is widespread abuse and voter fraud. But nothing documents, nothing substantiates that. There isn't widespread abuse. And so these kinds of procedures being put in place to slow the process down and make it likely that fewer Hispanics and African- Americans might vote I think are going to backfire because these people are going to come out and do what they have to do in order to vote. And I encourage that.

SCHIEFFER: Some Republicans have been behind these efforts to tighten up voter ID laws and all that sort of thing. Are they closed- minded about -- this?

POWELL: Well, I don't know if I would characterize it that way. I think some of them honestly feel that it is appropriate to ask for more identification. But when they start to say let's restrict the number of voting hours or make it harder for students to vote, then I have to get a little bit suspicious of it. But here's the -- here's what I say to my Republican friends, the country is becoming more diverse. Asian-Americans, Hispanic-Americans, and African-Americans are going to constitute the majority of the population in another generation. You say you want to reach out. You say you want to have a new message. You say you want to see if you can bring some of these voters to the Republican side. This is not the way to do it. The way to do it is to make it easier for them to vote and then give them something to vote for that they can believe in. It's not enough to say we have to have a new message. We have to have a new substance to that new message.

SCHIEFFER: What do you think the implications and the fallout of the Trayvon Martin case will be?

POWELL: I think that it will be seen as a questionable judgment on the part of the judicial system down there. But I don't know if it will have staying power. These cases come along, and they blaze across the midnight sky, and then after a period of time, they're forgotten.

SCHIEFFER: After the Trayvon Martin verdict came in, the president spoke very passionately about his own experiences as an African-American. He talked about walking across the street and hearing people click locks, their car doors, things of that nature. How did you feel about that? Were you glad to see him doll that? And would you like to see him be more passionate about race questions?

POWELL: Yeah, I'd like to see him be more passionate about race questions, and I think that was an accurate characterization of some of the things we are exposed to. I mean, in my lifetime, over a long career in public life, you know, I've been refused access to restaurants where I couldn't eat, even though I just came back from Vietnam. "We can't give you a hamburger. Come back some other time." And I did, right after the Civil Rights Act of 1964. I went right back to that same place and got my hamburger, and they are more than happy to serve me now. It removed a cross from their back. But we're not there yet. We're not there yet. And so we've got to keep working on it. And for the president to speak out on it is appropriate. I think all leaders, black and white, should speak out on this issue.

SCHIEFFER: Should he do more? I mean, he is the first African- American president. Is there more to be added to his legacy here?

POWELL: He's the president of the United States. So he -- I always like-- I used to refer to myself the secretary of state who happens to be black, not the black secretary of state or the black chairman. There ain't a white one somewhere. And so he has a responsibility to the whole country. And I think he should speak out on these issues, not just because he's the first black president but because he is the president of the United States. And this is a problem that affects all of America, not just black Americans. It is something that is still a residual effect of our history, the racism that existed by law, segregation, slavery, and I think we're slowly, surely moving away from this. And it's going to change -- it's going to require more change in the hearts and minds of people. But we're going to get there. I have no doubt about that.

SCHIEFFER: More and more as we watch the situation in Egypt unfold, it seems that we have somehow less and less influence on events. What advice do you have for the president right now on what we should be doing, what can we do to influence events there?

POWELL: As I view the situation now, the military leadership, General al-Sisi and his colleagues have essentially -- to use a poker term-- gone all-in. I don't think anything we do right now is going to pull will suddenly al-Sisi from that position. He feels it is his place now to bring order to the society. I think what we have to be ready to do is when things have quieted down, make sure the Egyptians know -- not only the generals but the others know -- that America is ready, willing and able to help with you economic assistance, with any assistance you need in putting in place institution, but with a requirement that you have to go from this military-controlled society to a society that is based on representational voting for all Egyptians to decide what kind of a government they wish to be living under. Some of the tools that we love to talk about here -- should we have economic aid or should we continue to provide military aid to Egypt -- this is all, sort of, trivial. He can do without it. And if we don't give it to him, it won't affect his actions right now. And if we give it to him, it probably won't change his behavior. And so I think that's, sort of, a side issue, whether we provide aid or not aid. The more fundamental issue is he is committed to bring what he considers stability to the country, put down the demonstrations. And we have to make sure that, as he moves in this direction, we'll have to caution him about becoming too repressive and some of the violence that has been perpetrated against people who were just demonstrating. And so it is -- it is not a good situation, and I deplore, as everybody does, the number of lives that have been lost. But, hopefully, this will quiet down in the near future, so that we can get back to a sensible path to a democratic Egypt.

SCHIEFFER: And the situation in Syria?

POWELL: The situation in Syria -- I consider it just about, now, a civil war. And who's -- who's going to prevail remains to be seen. I have no affection for Mr. Assad. I've dealt with him. I know him. And he is a pathological liar, with respect to my interaction with him. But at the same time, I am less sure of the resistance. What do they represent? And is it becoming even more radicalized with more Al Qaida coming in? And what will -- what would it look like if they prevailed and Assad went? I don't know. And so, in both Egypt and Syria, America has to take a much more -- a much more clever role. We don't -- we shouldn't go around thinking that we can really make things happen. We can influence things and we can be ready to help people when problems have been resolved or one side has prevailed over the other. That's when I think we can play a role. But to think that we can change things immediately, just because we're America, that's not necessarily the case. These are internal struggles, and the parties inside those countries are going to have to sort it out amongst themselves.

SCHIEFFER: Let me just ask you, in closing, on this anniversary, what are your thoughts? My thought is that this country has come so far. I mean, it's easy to say that, "Well, we still have a lot of problems." And we do. We do. But we should not overlook how far we have come since 1963. I have seen things that I couldn't have imagined. I have seen the president of the United States. I was able to achieve high positions in our government. Increasingly, if you have education; if you have the background; if you have the right grooming in your family and you apply yourself and you have ambition, you can rise to any height you want to in this country. That is a remarkable improvement from 1963. And so I think we should be very proud of what we've accomplished. But we should not say "all done; it's all OK," because it isn't. And I think, if Dr. King was here, he would be jabbing us -- you know, education, housing, jobs, economic opportunity. That's what he would be walking about and talking about and marching about.

SCHIEFFER: Colin Powell. We'll be back in a minute.

LEWIS: We must say "Wake up, America! Wake up," for we cannot stop, and we will not and cannot be patient.

SCHIEFFER: And that was a very young John Lewis, 23 years old, as a matter of fact, up there on the podium with Martin Luther King Jr. Congressman Lewis joins us now to talk about that day. You heard Martin Luther King on the radio. You had been inspired by him. In college you organized sit-ins in Nashville. You became a freedom rider. You risked your life on the Southern bus stations by simply sitting in the seats that had been reserved for whites. You had been beaten and arrested many times before you got to that day in August of 1963. Congressman, welcome to the broadcast. I want to start a little before that -- that day, because you went with Martin Luther King Jr. and a delegation in June of that year to tell President Kennedy about the march on Washington. And he was not happy about it.

LEWIS: Well, I remember that day very, very well, meeting with President Kennedy. A. Philip Randolph, one of the leaders during that period, spoke up and said, "Mr. President, the Marxists are restless against (inaudible). The Marxists are restless, and we're going to march on Washington." You could tell by the body language of the president -- he, sort of, started moving and twisting. And he said, "Mr. Randolph, if you bring all these people to Washington, won't there be violence and chaos and disorder? And we will never get a Civil Rights bill through the Congress." And Mr. Randolph responded and said, "Mr. President, this will be an orderly, peaceful, nonviolent protest." We came out of that meeting and we spoke to members of the media and we said we had a meaningful, productive meeting with the president of the United States, and we told him we were going to march on Washington.

SCHIEFFER: Now, you were -- you were pretty much a firebrand in those days. I'm told you actually toned down the speech that you had planned to make. Why was that?

LEWIS: Well, some people thought my speech was a little too strong. Some were saying maybe a little too militant. I said in the beginning, in my prepared text, I thought the Kennedy-proposed legislation was too little and that it was too late. And in another part of the speech, I said, "You tell us to wait. You tell us to be patient. We cannot wait. We cannot be patient. We want our freedom and we want it now."

SCHIEFFER: Did Dr. King -- did he weigh in on that? Did he say, "John, maybe that's a little beyond where we should go"?

LEWIS: Yeah, Dr. King said, as he read some of the text -- he said, "John, that doesn't sound like you." I couldn't say no to Martin Luther King Jr. He was my inspiration. He was my hero.

SCHIEFFER: When you heard Martin Luther King speak, the whole part about "I have a dream" just -- just came out. That part wasn't written down. But as you heard it, what did you think of it?

(CROSSTALK)

DR. MARTIN LUTHER KING JR.: I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream."

LEWIS: I knew he was not just speaking. He was preaching. He transformed the marble steps of the Lincoln Memorial into a modern-day pulpit. And he knew. He knew he was making contact. Dr. King grew up in a church in Atlanta, and when he started preaching, his father would say to him from time to time, "Make it plain, son. Make it plain." So when he got to "I have a dream," he was making it plain.

SCHIEFFER: It was after that, of course, in the same year, that President Kennedy was assassinated; Lyndon Johnson became the president. And in 1965, you organized the march on Selma, Alabama, which also came to be a turning point in -- in this movement. Others -- you and others were beaten. We all saw it on television. Tell me about that day.

LEWIS: Well, on Sunday, March 7, 1965, about 600 of us attempted to march from Selma to Montgomery, to dramatize to the state of Alabama and to the nation that people wanted to register to vote. All across the South, it was almost impossible for people to register to vote, simply because of the color of their skin. There was one county between Selma and Montgomery -- the county was more than 80 percent African-American. There was not a single registered voter in the county. So we had planned to walk all the way from Selma to Montgomery and take our concern to Governor Wallace. On that day, I was wearing a backpack, which became fashionable. I thought I was going to be arrested and I thought I was going to go to jail. So in this backpack I had two books, one apple, one orange -- I want to have something to eat -- and toothpaste, a toothbrush. I thought I was going to be in jail, I wanted to be able to brush my teeth. We get to the highest point on the bridge, down below we saw a sea of blue Alabama state troopers and a man identified himself and said, "I'm Major John Cloud of the Alabama State Troopers. This is an unlawful march. You will not be allowed to continue. You must return to your homes or go back to your church."

JOHN CLOUD: And you are ordered to disperse now and go back to your church.

LEWIS: And Jose Williams, who was walking behind me from Dr. King's organization said, "major, give us a moment to kneel and pray before we can pass the word back for people to kneel and pray." The major said, "troopers advance." We saw these guys putting on their gas masks. They came toward us, beating us with night sticks and trampling us with horses. I was hit in the head by a state trooper with a night stick. I had a concussion at the bridge. I thought I saw death. I thought I was going to die.

SCHIEFFER: I think anyone, including me, who saw those pictures, would never forget them. And it was eight days after that, that Lyndon Johnson introduced the Voting Rights Act.

LEWIS: I want to say to you that President Johnson never gets the credit that he should receive. The night he gave that speech, it was the most meaningful speech any American president made in modern time on the whole question of vote rights or civil rights. And when he concluded that speech, he said, "and we shall overcome." Dr. King cried. I was sitting next to him. I cried. He introduced that deal. And the Congress passed it. And 48 years later, the Supreme Court gutted it, put a dagger in the heart of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

SCHIEFFER: Well, you know, Justice Scalia said that provision amounted to a -- this is his -- his two words -- "racial entitlement."

LEWIS: I was shocked. I was shocked. I couldn't believe that a member of the United States Supreme Court was saying providing a way, making it possible for people to participate in a democratic process would be described as a racial entitlement.

SCHIEFFER: Final question, what do you think Martin Luther King would say today if he could look at America, see where it was, where we are have come?

LEWIS: 50 years later if Dr. King could speak to us, he would say we've come a distance, we have made a lot of progress. You're in the process of laying down the burden of race. But we're not there yet. He'd be grateful to see an African-American as president of the United States. It's almost unreal, unbelievable, Dr. King was there. 150 years since the Emancipation Proclamation, 50 years since I made the speech on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, and look what you have done. Dr. King would say my dream is in the process of becoming real.

SCHIEFFER: John Lewis. Thank you so much.

LEWIS: We thank you very much, sir.

SCHIEFFER: Back in a moment with some personal thoughts.

SCHIEFFER: I was still a newspaper reporter in Fort Worth when Martin Luther King Jr. spoke that day. I watched it all on television with wonder and relief -- wonder at the power of his words, relief that it had all gone so peacefully. By then, I considered myself an enlightened person on race, but I had grown up in Jim Crowe Texas where whites and blacks lived in worlds separate in ways large and small. I never shook hands with a black person until I was in the air force -- not that I didn't want to, I just never had the occasion. They lived on one side of town, I lived on the other. Schools were still mostly segregated, and the newspaper where I worked generally ignored news about black people. White people were not accustomed to seeing so many black people in one place as converged in Washington that day. So it made them nervous. They worried it could turn into a race riot, a concern we later learned -- and you heard John Lewis say -- was shared by President Kennedy. It did not turn into a race riot, instead it was a turning point in American history, a day that changed America, not just for African-Americans, but for all of us. I know. I was there back in the olden days. Some of our stations are leaving us now. For most of you, we'll be right back with more on Dr. Kings' legacy with Marian Wright Edelman, Ben Jealous of the NAACP, and author Taylor Branch. And we'll have the latest on the situation in Syria.

SCHIEFFER: Welcome back to Face the Nation page 2. The other big news this week, a suspected chemical weapons attack in Syria. The death tolls ranges from several hundred to maybe more than 1,000. If it is determined the Assad regime is behind this, it would be the largest attack using chemical weapons in the Syrian conflict. This morning, the Syrian government said it would allow U.N. inspectors into the country. President Obama, of course, has said the use of chemical weapons would be a red line. So where does that leave the United States? To talk about it, we turn first to a senior Democrat on the Senate armed services committee, Jack Reed of Rhodes Island. Well, as I understand it this morning, they're going to let the inspectors in. Does that make any difference?

REED: It will help because one of the first things that we have to do is verify, although there is increasing evidence that the Assad regime conducted a horrific attack on its own people, but we have to verify that it was directed by the Assad regime. Because that will allow us to build an international coalition, which is absolutely necessary to take any further steps in Syria. And also, it will help defuse some of the countries like Iran and Russia, who are trying to pawn this off on the rebels, the opposition. So it's critical. And then, after that, of course, the president has to consider what response he might take.

SCHIEFFER: Well, what do think he ought to do, Senator?

REED: Well, first of all, I think he has to be careful about defining what is our objective. And in this situation, I believe our objective is to make it prohibitive for any country to use chemical weapons, weapons of mass destruction. So a military option that would be limited to that point is something that he should be thinking about very carefully. But I think we can't let ourselves get into a situation where this becomes a springboard for a general military operation in Syria to try to change the dynamic. That dynamic is going to be long-term, very difficult, and ultimately established and settled by the Syrians, not by foreign powers.

SCHIEFFER: Well, I mean, you know, there are so many things to consider here. Let's say, for example, he decides to send some cruise missiles in there to take out their chemical weapons, if we even know where they are, and I'm not sure that we do. And what if Syria then decides, well, they'll just retaliate by lobbing a few artillery shells into Israel? I mean, this could set off a conflagration that goes all across all of the Middle East.

REED: It could. And that's why this has to be an international operation. It can't be a unilateral American approach. It has to have support internationally, but not just politically but militarily. And we have to make it very clear what our objective is, which is to say we will not tolerate the use of these weapons of mass destruction, not only by the Syrians, but by anyone else. And I think, if we do that, we have a possibility of avoiding more complicated consequences. But as you point out, this is a regional conflict. It transcends boundaries into Lebanon with Hezbollah, with their attacks. It has ramifications all through the region. So we -- this is a very difficult situation. And we have to be careful. But the first step is ensuring -- and that's why this inspection is helpful -- who did it? Was it ordered by the highest levels of the Syrian command? And if that's the case, we can put a line down and say we won't tolerate this.

SCHIEFFER: Is there any hope or any chance, do you think, Senator, that we might get on the same page as the Russians and get them to join? Because if Russia and the United States could get together on this and somehow at least broker a cease-fire, that would seem to be a -- I think that's probably as good as we could do right now, is just get them to stop fighting.

REED: I think you're absolutely right. I think what's happening in the country is a fragmentation, that there are areas being controlled by Sunni rebel forces. There are areas controlled by the Assad government. There are Allawite Shia groups. There are Kurdish areas. So there's a fragmentation. The first step, I think, would be a cease-fire. If the Russians change their course -- and they have been very unhelpful -- but if they change their course -- and they would only do that if they recognized that their self-interest was at stake. And, frankly, if it looks like there's an escalation of chemical attacks within Syria, that has to disturb the Russians. So I think Secretary Kerry and the president have to work for this conference in Geneva, work at least for a cease-fire, and then from there begin hopefully to build -- and ultimately it will be the choice of the Syrian people -- an arrangement where this -- the horrific slaughter that's going on stops.

SCHIEFFER: All right. Well, Senator, we thank you so much for coming by this morning.

REED: Thank you.

SCHIEFFER: We're going to turn now to Representative Mike McCaul. He is the chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee. He, of course, is a Republican. He also serves on the House Foreign Affairs Committee. He is joining us this morning from Boston. Congressman, what's your advice to the president right now?

MCCAUL: You know, my advice would be to have a foreign policy as it relates to Syria. I think -- you know, there's no good outcome here. We have a puppet of Iran who has used chemical weapons. We have a rebel faction forces that are being hijacked now by Al Qaida. And I think the number one chief objective is not to even pick sides here but to pick the American side, and that is to do everything we can to secure and destroy these chemical weapons. My greatest fear as chairman of Homeland Security is these weapons ending up in the wrong hands, say some Al Qaida jihadists, who we know are there fighting in the rebel forces, and that could be a direct threat not only to Western interests in the Middle East but also directly to the homeland security of the United States.

SCHIEFFER: So how do you go about doing that? We know the president, one of the options being considered, is cruise missiles. Would you go so far as to say we ought to put American troops in there to find and secure destroy these weapons?

MCCAUL: I don't think the American people have an appetite for troops on the ground in Syria. I do know that the military is laying out options for the president. We do know there are four warships off the coast of Syria. Missiles are an option to try to take out these chemical stockpiles. And I think that's an option the president should be looking at. But again, my chief concern is -- is that we have allowed this to fester. We've had a wait-and-see policy and hoping for the best. And we had a time to support moderate forces in toppling the Assad regime, and we failed to do that. And now we have no good outcome. And now we have a situation where we have a mecca -- every time I get briefed on this issue, it gets worse because it's become a mecca for the jihadists. They are traveling from all over the world, Al Qaida factions, into Syria to fight the Assad regime. So I don't really see any good outcome here. Again, the number one chief objective should be to secure and destroy these chemical weapons. If we have to do it militarily as a last resort, then so be it. I do not favor putting our men and women on the ground in Syria.

SCHIEFFER: But you would support, if the president orders cruise missiles, an attack by cruise missiles? You would support that? What about, also, U.S. military planes in there? Would you support that?

MCCAUL: Well -- and there's no guarantee the cruise missiles will be able to take out all the chemical weapons. There has been a lot of talk about a no-fly zone. That may have been helpful a year ago. A no-fly zone will only benefit the rebel forces. Again, who are the rebel forces? Fifty percent of the rebel forces are Al Qaida and the jihadists. So I don't know which side to pick here. All I know, I want to pick the American side and protect them from any use of these chemical weapons against Americans.

SCHIEFFER: So I'd go back to the question I asked you, if he launches a cruise missile attack, you will support that?

MCCAUL: If the military advises the president that this could destroy the chemical weapons stockpiles, I would support that.

SCHIEFFER: Do you see -- I just asked Senator Reed -- do you see any hope that we could get the Russians to join with us to try to broker some kind of a cease-fire?

MCCAUL: No, I think there was a great opportunity for -- you know, we need an international coalition to deal with this. The United States cannot do this alone. And we had an opportunity with the Russians to do that. But now the relationship between the White House and the Putin administration is so bad and lacks so much credibility that I think that's very difficult. We have a shared interest. I do believe that the Russians do not want these chemical weapons used, as does the United States. So we do have an opportunity here that I hope the president will -- will try to take advantage of. But one concern I have is this, sort of -- you know, the "reset" button with Putin has, sort of, reset us back to the Carter administration, where they view us as more of a weaker power, not negotiating out of strength but out of weakness. And I think that's a real problem here.

SCHIEFFER: All right. There's a problem there. There's no question about that. Thank you, Congressman. And we'll be back in a minute.

MCCAUL: Thanks, Bob.

SCHIEFFER: For more now on the U.S. options in this Syrian crisis, we want to talk to our State Department correspondent Margaret Brennan and David Rohde, a foreign affairs columnist for Reuters. Margaret, you had some late news from the State Department, their reaction to Syria saying it will allow the -- the inspectors to come in there?

BRENNAN: Well, the U.N. has confirmed that its team will be on site for this fact-finding mission as soon as tomorrow. The White House, however, thinks that's not good enough. This is five days after the alleged attack. There's been significant artillery fire, significant shelling that has degraded what evidence exists on the sites. So in the administration's view, this is not necessarily a question of whether or not a chemical weapons attack happened. They believe there was one. it's just building that chain of evidence, and that's what the U.S. intelligence community is looking at right now.

SCHIEFFER: So do you think this is increasing the possibility that we will take some sort of military action here?

BRENNAN: The rhetoric certainly seems to be pointing in that direction. But what we do know is that there is a hard diplomatic push under way. The U.S. ambassador to Syria, Robert Ford, is in Istanbul today. He's meeting with the president of the Syrian opposition. And what we know is that the White House -- they want to see an exit before they enter here. There's a lot of pressure on the Syrian rebels to explain what happens in the next 12 hours. If we act, what are you actually going to do here? Because, by their own admission, by many's analysis, they're not ready to run the country. We're not looking at intervention that would necessarily take out the Assad regime. We're looking at, sort of, an extraction here, something that would plug in, hopefully, into an existing infrastructure, maybe some kind of transitional government. And that's what people are talking about at this point.

SCHIEFFER: David, realistically, what are our options here?

ROHDE: I think you're going to see potentially a Tomahawk missile strike, long-range air strikes that won't endanger American service men. I think chemical weapons are different. The U.S. will use those strikes to try to destroy the Syrian Air Force, to punish Assad, send a message that chemical weapons are unacceptable. We'll work with the FSA -- I think we have to keep arming them and push with the Russians, but there has to be a response from the U.S. government. Chemical weapons are different and it is -- it's just getting worse in Syria.

SCHIEFFER: Do you see any possibility that we could somehow convince the Russians that it's also in their interest to try to broker some sort of a cease-fire and then, sort of, take it from there?

ROHDE: Not until Assad's calculus on the ground changes militarily. So if you eliminate his air force, which weakens him, and you have a serious effort to arm the Syrian rebels, there are Syrian opposition members that hate the jihadis; they hate the al-Nusra front, but we're not backing them. And we, sort of, have to make a move here. No U.S. ground troops, no U.S. invasion -- sort of what Secretary Powell said. You shape things. You try to put the moderate Syrians in a position to play a major role. If they fail, you step back, but you do try to do something.

BRENNAN: And there has been such a debate within the administration about that moderate opposition. Because the State Department and that team has really tried to help build them up, but they don't have a lot of backup on that front. They haven't been able to deliver the weapons that the White House said they were going to give. The weapons that have been coming through, these Chinese-made missiles being paid for by the Saudis are coming in through the north and the south. But the help from the United States of America hasn't been clear, and it hasn't been loud. And there's the bet, if you help them, they'll be our guys. If you don't, we don't know. Maybe those weapons will end up in the wrong hands. ROHDE: The Saudis are giving weapons to the jihadis. The Qataris are giving weapons to the jihadis. We have stepped back; we tried to have our local allies deal with it. It hasn't worked. There has to be a bigger, new approach and the White House has to take a risk.

SCHIEFFER: What -- we also have to be thinking about what is going to be the response from the Syrians if we do this? Because you've got all kinds of things. You've got Iran over there who's saying don't do it. What if they decide -- I posed this question earlier -- drop a few artillery shells into Tel Aviv?

ROHDE: That's the problem. I mean, Assad could carry out another chemical attack. You know, what do we do then? Again, I just fall back on chemical weapons are different. This hasn't happened in 20 years. There has to be a price for gassing hundreds of civilians. There has to be.

SCHIEFFER: Do you agree with David that you don't see any possibility we put U.S. troops in there, Margaret?

BRENNAN: Well, the administration has said boots on the grounds is not an option. These strikes, these other options that General Dempsey has outlined in that letter that was made public, including saying, "Hey, we should back these moderate opposition fighters," are probably the most likely. Interesting to see that, from the United Nations, Jeff Feltman, formerly of the State Department, will be in Tehran. He'll be talking to them about backing off, perhaps, their clients.

ROHDE: That's a question: Do you allow Iran into some kind of peace talks about Syria? They are the key player, along with Russia. The U.S. doesn't want to do that. We may have to do that if we want to eventually create a cease-fire.

SCHIEFFER: Thanks to both of you. For more on this, be sure to wash "CBS This Morning" tomorrow. And we'll be right back with more than on the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

SCHIEFFER: And we're back now to talk some more about Dr. King's legacy and the 50th anniversary of the march. There that day, joining us now, Marian Wright Edelman, the founder and president of the Children's Defense Fund. She started her career as a lawyer for the NAACP in Mississippi. Also here, Taylor Branch, the historian who has, of course, written four books on Dr. King and the Civil Rights era. His latest, "The King Years," recently out in paperback. And of course our friend, Ben Jealous, the president of the NAACP. Well, I want to start with you, Marian. When you were there, did you realize at the time the effect that Dr. King's speech was going to have?

EDELMAN: Yes. And I realized, as one among the hundreds of thousands that were present that we were at a transforming moment of nonviolent witness that was unprecedented in our history. As you indicated, people were expecting violence. But here you had a huge, multiracial, multifaith, multigenerational -- and I was 24 at the time -- witness...

SCHIEFFER: What did you feel like? Were you excited? Were you...

EDELMAN: I was exhilarated. I felt empowered. I felt connected. It's always good to know that you're not alone and that there are all these people coming out to say, "We're committed to making America, America." So it strengthened me as I was being trained to go down to Mississippi and practice law. It was a great day.

SCHIEFFER: Taylor, you've written all these books about the Civil Rights. Were you there that day? I'm...

BRANCH: No, I was at summer football camp in high school in south Georgia...

(LAUGHTER)

And it was over 100 degrees. I wish I had been there.

SCHIEFFER: Yeah, but when did you come to find out about it and know about it? Were you interested in that kind of thing in those days?

BRANCH: I -- I had been -- my whole formative years, the Civil Rights movement was tenacious, changing my life's interests. The Bull Connor demonstrations, when they put dogs and fire hoses on children, in May, May 2nd and May 3rd, were an awakening experience for me as a white Southerner in the segregated South. So, yes, I was aware of it, but not the march itself until later because I was at football camp.

SCHIEFFER: I was so interested this morning to hear Colin Powell talk about he was in Vietnam when it happened, didn't know about it for a couple of weeks later, but after the Bull Connor things that had happened, his father-in-law was there in Birmingham, basically guarding his wife and child while he was away. I just thought, the irony of that...

BRANCH: The march didn't come out of nowhere. It came out of those demonstration. That's what made it happen. That's what made President Kennedy introduce the Civil Rights act in June. So it was part of a continuing recognition that this was not only the principal obstacle to freedom but it was also the gateway to freedom in race if we could -- if we could deal with it.

SCHIEFFER: So the obvious question, then, to you, Ben, what -- what now? As you look back on it, how far have we come? How far do we have to go?

JEALOUS: You know, when I was a journalist in Jackson, Mississippi, in the early 90s, my old publisher used to say, "The only problem with the New South is that it continues to occupy the same space and time as the Old South."

(LAUGHTER)

And the reality is that there is much -- there's too much about these times that is -- you can draw too straight of a parallel. We're fighting for voting rights now in a real urgent way that we really haven't had to since then.

JEALOUS: A lot of folks who came there yesterday were moved because of the senseless killing of a young black man. In this case it was Trayvon Martin. Back then it was Medgar Evers. And so there -- I think the beauty of this moment is that we have young people who are really being baptized in the struggle, who are focused on winning victories now. They are winning big wins, whether it was last year, just five miles from here in Maryland, where we saw the state abolish the death penalty, pass the DREAM Act, pass marriage equality, just in one year; or whether it's New York City, where we just passed a real racial profiling ban with teeth; or if these young people who are demanding that the minimum wage be raised to $15. Kids trying to survive on $7.25 -- you just can't -- who feel like they have nothing left to lose. And so we are very much now in a real movement moment. Young people are in -- are at the forefront, often, and we're winning big wins. And I think we can be hopeful.

SCHIEFFER: Let me ask -- were you going to say something, Marian? Go ahead.

EDELMAN: Well, we've been celebrating the dream, and we can celebrate the progress, but the agenda, I think, that Dr. King would be proposing today would be clear. Of course he would be fighting voter suppression. Of course he would be speaking out against mass incarceration and stand-your-ground laws. And we've got to stand our ground against any more enactment of those laws and so that the Trayvon Martins of our world can walk without racially being profiled. But he would be calling for a close of the morally obscene wealth and income gap in this country that has left millions of people out of our economy. He would be calling for a poor people's campaign, as he was when he was killed in Memphis, when we've got 46 million, rather than 35 million, poor Americans and 16.2 poor children, rather than the 11 million when he died. He told us about the opportunity to use our wealth to close these gaps and to use our wealth to make sure that everybody had their basic necessities. We still have not heard him. He would be talking about jobs, jobs, jobs, decent wages. He would be talking about education. Our schools are still too much segregated and still very much unequal, and 80 percent of our black kids cannot read at grade level. And he would be calling for prevention measures to make sure we had an early childhood system to get children ready for schools. This is a time to finish the bounced check that still has not reached -- the American promise has not reached the millions and billions of those left outside, and we need to get this country to realize that its greatest economic, military and national security problem does not come from any enemy without. It comes from our failure to invest in our children, who are uneducated, a majority of whom are going to be color. Our babies already are. And that's going to be our undoing.

SCHIEFFER: Taylor, let me ask you about this move to tighten voter registration and all of that that's going on. The Supreme Court throws out that part of the law that says states with a history of segregation no longer have to get approval of the federal government before they can change the voting process?

BRANCH: Well, I -- I think that it shows that there's an awful lot of resistance to the whole notion that the dream is ahead of us in the United States. Where I go, the biggest complaint I get is "Why do you keep raising all this racial stuff? We're over it."

(LAUGHTER)

And it seems to me that the basis of America is to say, to say that we should get over talking about race is like saying a democracy should get over having elections. I mean, it's the basis of how we deal with one another and how we have -- form a more perfect union. We advance when we -- when we do it in ways that -- that bless not only race, but I'm a white Southerner. Dr. King said that dealing with race in 1963 would help the South. And manifestly, it did. It liberated the white South. You never heard of the Sunbelt South when it was segregated. It was poor. It was terrorized. It was all invested in this thing. Blessings flow when we deal with race forthrightly. It is a very, very dangerous thing to try to avoid it. To me, the central unaddressed question in America today is what degree partisan gridlock is driven by race. We don't talk about that. We all -- everybody says partisan gridlock is poisoning America, but nobody asks how much of it, underneath, is driven by race and racial resentment? And in that sense we've gone backwards since 1963 because we're not really recognizing how we got to all the blessings that people take for granted.

SCHIEFFER: Ben, if you had one thing that you could say -- there are many things you'd like to see changed -- one thing you could see changed in the next year in this country, what would it be?

JEALOUS: We have to restore the Voting Rights Act. The right to vote is the right upon which our ability to defend all of our other rights is leveraged, and the Supreme Court has done real harm in a shamefully activist way, and we need Congress to come together like they have in the past and make sure that we can protect the right to vote for all people in this country.

SCHIEFFER: All right. Well, you know, it's -- it's wonderful to hear all three of you this morning. And I thank you all for coming on this very special day and this very special broadcast. We'll be back in a minute.

SCHIEFFER: That is it for us today. We will leave you today with the final thoughts of Martin Luther King Jr. on that hot August day, 1963.

KING: From every mountainside, let freedom ring.

(APPLAUSE)

And when this happens, when we allow freedom to ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children -- black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics -- will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual, "Free at last, free at last, thank God almighty, we are free at last."