On May 4, to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the May Fourth Movement, more than 100,000 students from 130 institutions of higher education in 30 cities (including Beijing, Wuhan, Shanghai, Kunming, and Nanjing) held marches of unprecedented scale.

At 8:30am, students from Beijing's different institutions of higher education gathered at their respective campuses. Afterwards, the contingents shouted slogans such as "Uphold the May Fourth Spirit, Strive for Democracy and Freedom", "Science Builds the Country, Education is the Root", and "Dialog, dialog, must have equal dialog; with no honesty, it's all just empty talk". The marches took three routes toward Tian'anmen Square. Around noon, the students began arriving at the Square. At around 3:00pm, a representative of the Beijing Students' Autonomous Federation read out the "May Fourth Manifesto", which stated: "70 years ago today, a large number of students also gathered before Tian'anmen Gate Tower. From that moment, a great new chapter began in the history of the China… This student movement is the largest democratic student movement since the May 4th Movement. It is the continuation and development of the May Fourth movement. It is unprecedented and has been a huge success. The results are also reflected in the fact that a large number of senior students and graduate students have become leaders of the student movement, making the whole action more mature and more rational… The Beijing Students' Autonomous Federation, elected by representatives of 47 institutions of higher education, is a completely new organization. It will definitely be of great significance to future democratic reforms and will be a driving force." At the same time, Zhou Yongjun announced that Beijing universities would resume classes the next day.

References: Zhang Wanshu, "The Big Bang of History: A Complete Record of the June 4th Incident"; "The Critical Moment – Li Peng Diaries"