Reverend Dr. William Barber and the Moral March return to Raleigh Saturday for HKonJ – Historic Thousands on Jones Street – to call on state legislators to address their 14 point agenda.

This is the 13th annual Moral March. This year, the march will be focused on the vulnerability of children to public policy decisions.

Barber spoke to press this week in the lead up to Saturday. He said though much has changed since when the Moral March began in 2007, the central idea has stayed the same.

“We knew then, and felt then, that this work was critical. We began when Democrats were in office, we continued through Republicans in the leadership because we take a moral position, rooted in our deepest moral values, religious and constitutional, that the poor, the vulnerable should be in the first and foremost first place of our attention when it comes to public policy.”

There will be a rally beginning at 9 a.m. on the corner of Wilmington and South streets on Saturday before the march.

This year’s march will be the first to feature a mother’s brigade to bring attention to how public policy affecting families also affects their children. Barber said public policy surrounding deportation, Medicaid expansion and public school is currently harming North Carolina children. The march’s agenda also pushes for liveable wages, affordable housing, collective bargaining and environmental justice.

“These are the questions we will raise on Saturday,” Barber said. “These are the policy demands we will make on Saturday, on behalf of the children. On behalf of families. To declare we do not have to have these realities, these are realities that exist because of regressive public policy.”