Dr. King Day - we need to listen to the man's words more than ever

As we celebrate the greatness of Dr. Martin Luther King, it's useful to actually read and listen to what the man actually said. With that in mind, here are a couple of excerpts from the "Letter from a Birmingham Jail" that Dr. King wrote in 1963.

We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed. Frankly, I have never yet engaged in a direct-action movement that was "well timed" according to the timetable of those who have not suffered unduly from the disease of segregation. For years now I have heard the word "wait." It rings in the ear of every Negro with a piercing familiarity. This "wait" has almost always meant "never." It has been a tranquilizing thalidomide, relieving the emotional stress for a moment, only to give birth to an ill-formed infant of frustration. We must come to see with the distinguished jurist of yesterday that "justice too long delayed is justice denied." We have waited for more than three hundred and forty years for our God-given and constitutional rights. The nations of Asia and Africa are moving with jetlike speed toward the goal of political independence, and we still creep at horse-and-buggy pace toward the gaining of a cup of coffee at a lunch counter. I guess it is easy for those who have never felt the stinging darts of segregation to say "wait." But when you have seen vicious mobs lynch your mothers and fathers at will and drown your sisters and brothers at whim; when you have seen hate-filled policemen curse, kick, brutalize, and even kill your black brothers and sisters with impunity; when you see the vast majority of your twenty million Negro brothers smothering in an airtight cage of poverty in the midst of an affluent society; when you suddenly find your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you seek to explain to your six-year-old daughter why she cannot go to the public amusement park that has just been advertised on television, and see tears welling up in her little eyes when she is told that Funtown is closed to colored children, and see the depressing clouds of inferiority begin to form in her little mental sky, and see her begin to distort her little personality by unconsciously developing a bitterness toward white people; when you have to concoct an answer for a five-year-old son asking in agonizing pathos, "Daddy, why do white people treat colored people so mean?"; when you take a cross-country drive and find it necessary to sleep night after night in the uncomfortable corners of your automobile because no motel will accept you; when you are humiliated day in and day out by nagging signs reading "white" and "colored"; when your first name becomes "nigger" and your middle name becomes "boy" (however old you are) and your last name becomes "John," and when your wife and mother are never given the respected title "Mrs."; when you are harried by day and haunted by night by the fact that you are a Negro, living constantly at tiptoe stance, never knowing what to expect next, and plagued with inner fears and outer resentments; when you are forever fighting a degenerating sense of "nobodyness" -- then you will understand why we find it difficult to wait. There comes a time when the cup of endurance runs over and men are no longer willing to be plunged into an abyss of injustice where they experience the bleakness of corroding despair. I hope, sirs, you can understand our legitimate and unavoidable impatience...

We can never forget that everything Hitler did in Germany was "legal" and everything the Hungarian freedom fighters did in Hungary was "illegal." It was "illegal" to aid and comfort a Jew in Hitler's Germany. But I am sure that if I had lived in Germany during that time, I would have aided and comforted my Jewish brothers even though it was illegal. If I lived in a Communist country today where certain principles dear to the Christian faith are suppressed, I believe I would openly advocate disobeying these anti-religious laws.

Those words are as relevant as ever in 2020. Actions are decided to be legal/illegal and enforced because people in charge decide to make a certain act legal/illegal and decide whether to enforce it. All of these things are choices, and it is up to the people to remove those who are choosing unwisely and/or destructively.

And I find myself repeating this next part a lot, especially as the 2020 primaries get closer.

I must make two honest confessions to you, my Christian and Jewish brothers. First, I must confess that over the last few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro's great stumbling block in the stride toward freedom is not the White Citizens Councillor or the Ku Klux Klanner but the white moderate who is more devoted to order than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says, "I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I can't agree with your methods of direct action"; who paternalistically feels that he can set the timetable for another man's freedom; who lives by the myth of time; and who constantly advises the Negro to wait until a "more convenient season." Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.

In your statement you asserted that our actions, even though peaceful, must be condemned because they precipitate violence. But can this assertion be logically made? Isn't this like condemning the robbed man because his possession of money precipitated the evil act of robbery? Isn't this like condemning Socrates because his unswerving commitment to truth and his philosophical delvings precipitated the misguided popular mind to make him drink the hemlock? Isn't this like condemning Jesus because His unique God-consciousness and never-ceasing devotion to His will precipitated the evil act of crucifixion? We must come to see, as federal courts have consistently affirmed, that it is immoral to urge an individual to withdraw his efforts to gain his basic constitutional rights because the quest precipitates violence. Society must protect the robbed and punish the robber.

I had also hoped that the white moderate would reject the myth of time. I received a letter this morning from a white brother in Texas which said, "All Christians know that the colored people will receive equal rights eventually, but is it possible that you are in too great of a religious hurry? It has taken Christianity almost 2000 years to accomplish what it has. The teachings of Christ take time to come to earth." All that is said here grows out of a tragic misconception of time. It is the strangely irrational notion that there is something in the very flow of time that will inevitably cure all ills. Actually, time is neutral. It can be used either destructively or constructively. I am coming to feel that the people of ill will have used time much more effectively than the people of good will. We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the vitriolic words and actions of the bad people but for the appalling silence of the good people. We must come to see that human progress never rolls in on wheels of inevitability. It comes through the tireless efforts and persistent work of men willing to be coworkers with God, and without this hard work time itself becomes an ally of the forces of social stagnation.

Settling will only get you so far, and is a sign of accepting defeat. I know it's easy for me to say as a white guy, but accepting defeat and inferior outcomes are not things I am into these days.

And let me also include this great compilation of Dr. King speeches on economic power, and the lack of empowerment that comes with poverty, which he came to recognize as every bit the social problem that legal segregation was. Never forget that when Dr. King was shot in Memphis, he was standing up for the rights of striking workers.



"All labor has dignity. But you are doing another thing. You are reminding not only Memphis, but also the nation, that it is a crime for people to live in this rich nation, and receive starvation wages. "

"We all read one day 'We hold these truths to be self-evident, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. But if a man doesn't have a job or income, he has neither life, nor liberty, [nor] the possibility of the pursuit of happiness. He merely exists. "

And here is an excerpt of Dr. King being interviewed on the Tonight Show in early 1968 by Harry Belafonte (!), where he admits that getting the right to vote and ending Jim Crow didn't do much to change the second-class existence that poor people around America were dealing.



I'd like to see the right-wingers that will try shamelessly latch onto Dr. King tomorrow to follow those words on poverty and economic power. Somehow, I'm guessing they won't. Nor will they listen to Dr. King's words about the tricks that the white power structure uses to pass voting laws that seek to return us to the days of Jim Crow and second-class citizenship for a lot of Americans, and to lessen the chances that those in power will be held accountable. I bet a 90-year-old Dr. King would be furious at the extra barriers in 2020 that have been put in place to prevent voting and in receiving basic human benefits that are intended to hurt one class at the expense of another.

I can't help but note that 7 months after Dr. King was assassinated, 43% of voters chose Richard Nixon to be president, which was enough for him to sneak by. I think you can point to the start of this country's decline of hope and advancement from that point on. Sure, there have been strides in some social areas, but it sure seems like we've been going backward in others. And our economy still isn't working for a whole lot of people these days, with many seeing their wages repressed, with those people beholden to their bosses and insurance companies instead of having the freedom to choose their own destinies.

We gotta get back to trying to reach the more perfect union that Dr. King wanted to see. 2020 may be the last chance for those changes to happen in any kind of stable way.