Sample Lesson Material: Teaching MLK in the Classroom
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Below is a sample lesson plan you could design for you class:
Media Story: Dr. Martin Luther King Instructions: Class, below is factual material about Dr. Martin Luther King. You have just been hired by People Magazine to do a story and accompanying video about Martin Luther King. Please use the material below and any other research you find on your own to create a 2000 word biography of Dr. Martin Luther King along with a 3 minute video to be posted on the class YouTube pageResearch Reference Material:
Martin Luther King, Jr. was a pastor Baptist African-American born in Atlanta ( Georgia ) on 15 January 1929 and assassinated on 4 April 1968 in Memphis ( Tennessee ).
Militant nonviolent for civil rights of blacks in the United States, for peace and against poverty, he organized and directed actions such as the Montgomery bus boycott to defend voting rights , the desegregation and employment of minorities ethnic . He gives a speech celebrating the 28 August 1963 before the Lincoln Memorial in Washington during the march for jobs and freedom: “ I Have a Dream “. It is supported by John F. Kennedy in the fight against racial segregation in the United States , most of these rights are promoted by the “ Civil Rights Act “and” Voting Rights Act “under the presidency of Lyndon B. Johnson .
Martin Luther King became the youngest winner of the Nobel Peace prize in 1964 for his struggle non-violently against the racial segregation and for peace. He began a campaign against the Vietnam War and poverty , which ends with his assassination in 1968 officially attributed to James Earl Ray , whose guilt and participation in a conspiracy are still debated.
He was awarded posthumously the Presidential Medal of Freedom by Jimmy Carter in 1977 , the price of human rights UN in 1978 , the Congressional Gold Medal in 2004 , and is considered one of the greatest orators U.S. 1 . Since 1986 , the Martin Luther King Day is a holiday in the United States.
Martin Luther King arrested by police, 1950.
Martin Luther King is the son of a Baptist minister Martin Luther King Sr. and Alberta Williams King, church organist. He has an older sister, Christine King Ferris, and a younger brother, Albert Daniel Williams King. He grew up in America’s segregationist 2 . His first experience of racial segregation date of his six years when two white playmates told him they are no longer allowed to play with him. Her mother explained that it is because they are now white in segregated schools, but stressed that it is as good as anyone.
In 1939, he sang with the choir of his church in Atlanta for the premiere of Gone With the Wind .
He entered the age of 15 at Morehouse College , a university reserved for black boys, after skipping two years of high school and without having officially received his certificate of graduation. He graduated with the degree of Bachelor of Arts in Sociology on 20 June 1948 and returned to Crozer Theological Seminary for a Bachelor of Divinity in Chester ( Pennsylvania ) – which corresponds to a license in theology – he gets 12 May 1951 . He received a Doctor of Philosophy from the University of Boston 18 June 1955.
Accusations of plagiarism against his doctoral thesis at Boston University in 1991 to lead an official investigation of those responsible for this university. They conclude that about one third of the thesis is plagiarized from an article written by a graduate student previously, but decided not to withdraw as Martin Luther, because the theory is still “an intelligent contribution to know ” 5 . There is also tacit borrowings in some speeches of King, but Keith Miller argues 6 that in the latter case, it is common practice for African Americans and we can not regard this as plagiarism. However, as Theodore Pappas notes in his book on the subject 7 , Martin Luther had actually taken a course on intellectual production standards and plagiarism at Boston University.
He married, on 18 June 1953 , Coretta Scott, who takes his name to Coretta Scott King . They have four children: Yolanda , born in 1955, Martin Luther King III, born in 1957, Dexter Scott, born 1961, and Bernice, born in 1963.
In 1953 , Martin Luther King became the pastor of the Baptist Church of Dexter Avenue in Montgomery ( Alabama ). The southern United States was at this time marked by the violence committed against blacks, culminating in 1955 with the racist murder of Emmett Till , a 14-year-old activist pastor of George W. Lee and civil rights activist Lamar Smith.
The 1 st December 1955, when Rosa Parks , a black woman, is arrested for violating the laws segregated the city by refusing to give up her seat to a white man, he led the Montgomery bus boycott with the help of Pastor Ralph Abernathy and Edgar Nixon , director of the local National Association for the Advancement of Colored People . The black population supports the boycott and organized a system of carpooling . Martin Luther was arrested during this campaign that lasts 382 days and becomes extremely tense because of segregationist whites who resort to terrorism : the home of Martin Luther King has attacked the firebomb on the morning of January 30, 1956, and that of Ralph Abernathy and four churches, and King was the victim of physical violence 8 . The boycotters are often attacked physically but all 40,000 blacks of the city continuing to walk, sometimes up to 30 km , to reach their workplace. The boycott ended with a decision of the Supreme Court of the United States December 21, 1956 outlawing the segregation in buses, restaurants, schools and other public places.
In 1957, he played a key role in founding the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC, “Christian Leadership Conference of the South”), which he was elected president and remained until his death. The SCLC is a peaceful organization that actively participates in the Civil Rights Movement by organizing the African-American churches to conduct protests non-violent 9 . Martin Luther adheres to the philosophy of civil disobedience nonviolent as described by Henry David Thoreau 10 and used successfully in India by Gandhi 11 . Recommended by civil rights activist Bayard Rustin , he decides to use during demonstrations of the SCLC.
In 1958 he exhibited his views on racial segregation and the spiral of inequality and hatred it causes in the book Stride Toward Freedom, the Montgomery story (“the march of freedom”):
“Men often hate each other because they fear each other, they are afraid because they do not know, they do not know because they can not communicate, they can not communicate because they are separated. ”
So he signs copies of his book in a store in Harlem on Sept. 20, he is stabbed in the chest by Izola Curry, a black woman who accuses him of being a communist leader and will be considered as unbalanced. Martin Luther King narrowly escaped death, the blade of the cutter used with brushed the aorta . Martin Luther and forgives her attacker in a press statement emphasizes the violence of American society:
“The pathetic aspect of this experience is not the injury of an individual. It demonstrates that a climate of hatred and bitterness pervades our nation so that access of extreme violence must inevitably arise. Today me. Tomorrow it may be another officer or any man, woman or child who is victim of anarchy and brutality. I hope this experience will prove socially constructive, demonstrating the urgent need for non-violence to govern the affairs of men. ”
In 1959 he wrote the book The Measure of A Man ( The Measure of a Man ), an attempt to portray an optimal structure of political society, social and economic, which the piece What is Man? ( What is that a man? ) is drawn.
The FBI began to put on Martin Luther King listening in 1961, fearing that communists are trying to infiltrate the civil rights movement. No evidence is found, the agency uses some of the details recorded on a six-year term to try to get fired from his role as leader of the organization.
Martin Luther rightly expects that organized protests and nonviolent against the system of segregation in the south known as the Jim Crow laws will lead to extensive media coverage of the conflict for equality and voting rights of people with black skin. The reports of journalists and television reports showing daily humiliations and deprivations of African Americans in the southern United States, as well as violence and harassment made by segregationists against civil rights activists, then produce a wave of sympathy among the public for the civil rights movement which becomes the most important political issue of the American 1960s.
Martin Luther King organized and led marches for the right to vote of African Americans, the desegregation of the labor law and other fundamental rights. Most of these rights were passed as laws with the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Martin Luther and the SCLC are successfully applying the principles of nonviolent protest by choosing strategically places and method of protest leading to dramatic confrontations with segregationist authorities.
At Albany ( Georgia ) in 1961 and 1962, he joined the activists of the local Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People led by William G. Anderson, a black doctor. Martin Luther King intervenes because the DCS fails to advance the movement in spite of effective nonviolent actions (occupation of libraries, bus stations, restaurants reserved for whites, boycotts and protests) because of the ability of the Sheriff local Pritchett conducting mass arrest without violence and a dispersion of prisoners in the county. Martin Luther is also involved because the organization was criticized for weakly supported the Freedom Rides (“” freedom bus “against segregation).
When he intends to remain a few days and have only advisory role, he is arrested during a mass arrest of peaceful demonstrators. He refuses to pay the deposit until the city makes no concessions. The agreements are “dishonored and violated by the city” since his departure 14 .
Martin Luther King back in July 1962 and was sentenced to 45 days in jail or $ 178 fine. He chose jail but has quietly released after three days by the sheriff Pritchett who arranges to pay the fine. King comment
“We had seen people thrown out of restaurants … expelled from churches … and thrown in jail … But for the first time, we witnessed someone threw and kicked out of prison. ”
After nearly a year of activism without tangible results, the movement begins to weaken and divide between radicals and moderates. During a demonstration, young black throw stones at the police: Martin Luther King asked a halt of all protests and a “Day of Penance “to promote non-violence and maintain morale. Later, he was again arrested and detained two weeks.
If despite the mobilization movement in Albany fails to achieve immediate results, it serves as a strategic lesson to Martin Luther and the civil rights movement who decide to focus on specific topics in order to obtain symbolic victories:
“The mistake I made was to protest against segregation generally rather than against one of its different facets. [...] A victory of this kind would have been symbolic and would have galvanized our support and morale … When were planned our strategy for Birmingham months later, we spent many hours assessing Albany and trying to learn from our mistakes. Our review does not only helped us to make our future more effective tactics, but also revealed Albany was far from being a total failure. ”
Nevertheless, local activism continues as media attention turns to other subjects. The following spring, the city will cancel all of its segregation laws.
Birmingham
16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham headquarters of the civil rights movement during the campaign and where the attack took place on 15 September 1963.
In 1960, the population of Birmingham is 350,000 people, 65% white and 35% black 15 . It was then a city that maintains and ensures the local law the largest racial segregation in the United States in all aspects of life, both in public and private institution 16 . At that time, only 10% of the black population is registered as voters 17 and the average standard of living is less than half that of whites, wages for the same position are commonly much lower than 18 . Birmingham has no black police officer or firefighter, or seller in the store, or driver or bank employee, employment for the black population is restricted to manual labor to steel mills. A black secretary can not work for a white boss. Unemployment among blacks is two and a half times higher than whites . Fifty unsolved racist attacks between 1945 and 1962 gave the city the nickname “Bombingham” . Black churches where civil rights are discussed are prime targets 21 and the city is particularly violent against the freedom riders .
A local civil rights charge, the Rev. Shuttlesworth tried to fight well by winning in court desegregation of city parks, but the city reacts by closing them. The home and the church where the pastor exercises are then the target of several bomb attacks 22 . After the arrest of Shuttlesworth in 1962 for violating segregation laws, and after a petition to the mayor was “thrown away” by the mayor himself 23 , the pastor asks the help of Martin Luther King and SCLC, highlighting the crucial role of Birmingham in the national struggle for racial equality 24 .
The protests began with a boycott at Easter 1963 to encourage entrepreneurs to open up jobs for vendors and other posts for people of all races, and to stop segregation in stores, for example in the form of funds reserved whites. When business leaders resisted the boycott, Martin Luther and the SCLC began what they called the C project, a series of nonviolent protests such as sit-ins in restaurants and libraries, kneeling black people in churches reserved whites, peaceful protest marches, all made to cause arrests. Martin Luther summarizes the philosophy of the Birmingham campaign of 25 :
“The purpose of [...] direct action is to create a situation that is such a bundle of crises it inevitably opens the door to negotiations. ”
President John F. Kennedy addresses the American people about civil rights June 11, 1963.
He is himself arrested on April 13, and that is where he wrote the famous Letter from Birmingham Jail ( Letter from Birmingham Jail ), a treaty defining its fight against segregation . It receives direct support of President John Fitzgerald Kennedy , his wife Coretta that of Jacqueline Kennedy , he was released a week later.
While the campaign does not have enough volunteers, organizers, despite the hesitations of Martin Luther King 26 , recruit students and children in what is called by the media “the Children’s Crusade.” May 2, hundreds of students, pupils and students are prepared and trained to participate peacefully in the demonstrations. They are violently arrested by police using dogs, but jets of high pressure water with such force that they could tear the clothes or throw a young woman over a car 27 . In response, despite the instructions of the SCLC, parents and bystanders began to throw projectiles at the police but are reasoned by the organizers. The decision to use children even in a nonviolent demonstration is criticized, among others by the Minister of Justice Robert Francis Kennedy and activist Malcolm X who said that “real men do not put their children in line of sight ” 28 . Martin Luther, who remained silent and out of town when one of his friends organized events for children includes the success of the event and said the evening worship service 29 :
“I was inspired and touched by that day and I had never seen anything like this. ”
The scenes of police violence widely reported by international media causing reactions and highlight racial segregation taking place in the southern United States . The senator from Oregon Wayne Morse Birmingham compares to apartheid in South Africa 30 . The prisons are full, some children going directly before them, singing to be arrested. The city is on the verge of collapse because no civilian trade and economic downtown does not work anymore.
Governor George Wallace sends the state police to support the local police chief.
Debris from the Gaston Motel, where Martin Luther stayed had little before, after the bombing of May 11, 1963. Endommageait another bomb at the same time the house of his brother, the Reverend Alfred Daniel Williams King.
Robert Kennedy sent the National Guard to avoid overflow on May 13 after two bomb attacks against a hotel where Martin Luther King had lived, and against the house of the brother of the latter, which had degenerated into demonstrations against the police. On May 21 the Mayor resigns, the police chief is returned in June and all signs are removed and segregated public places open to black 31 .
At the end of the campaign, Martin Luther’s reputation has been considerably strengthened 32 and Birmingham is part of the success of the march to Washington .
Sunday 15 September, a bomb attack the Ku Klux Klan against the Baptist Church, 16th Street during prayer causes the deaths of four young black girls and injuring 22 children. The attack caused national outrage and strengthens the civil rights movement.
The March on Washington
Main articles: Walk to Washington to work and freedom and I have a dream .
King spoke at the March on Washington in Washington, DC .
Representing SCLC, Martin Luther King is the leader of one of six major civil rights organizations for organizing the march to Washington to work and freedom . It is one of those who accept the wish of President John F. Kennedy to change the message of the march.
The president, who had publicly supported Martin Luther King had already intervened several times to get him out of jail 33 , had initially opposed the principle of the march because he feared a negative impact on the vote of Rights Act Civic. The original purpose of the march was to show the plight of African Americans from the southern states and the federal government’s failure to ensure their safety and their rights. The group of six accepts the pressure and influence presidential spend less radical message. Some civil rights activists think while walking has only a sanitized and inaccurate view of the situation of blacks, Malcolm X is then called “the farce on Washington”, and members of the organization Nation of Islam who participate in the march will be suspended temporarily 34 .
Walking is however specific requests:
the end of racial segregation in public schools;
significant legislation on civil rights (including a law prohibiting racial discrimination in the workplace);
protection of civil rights activists of police violence ;
a minimum wage of $ 2 for all workers without distinction;
an independent government in Washington, DC , which depends to a congressional committee.
Despite tensions, the march was a huge success. More than 250,000 people of all ethnic groups meet on August 28 1963 against the Capitol , in what is the largest event having taken place so far in the history of the U.S. capital.
The climax of the struggle of Martin Luther King is his famous speech “ I Have a Dream “, where his intention and hope to know a fraternal America. This statement is considered one of the best speeches in American history with the Gettysburg Address of Abraham Lincoln .
St. Augustine Civil Rights Act and Nobel Peace
Main article: Civil Rights Act of 1964 .
President Lyndon Johnson signing the Civil Rights Act before Martin Luther King, 2 July 1964.
Despite the ruling of the 1954 Supreme Court Brown v. Board. Board of Education , which declared racial segregation unconstitutional in public schools, only 6 black children admitted into white schools in St. Augustine in Florida . The houses of two families of these children are burned by white segregationists and other families are forced to leave the area because parents are fired from their jobs and can no longer find in other locally.
In May and June 1964, direct action is led by Martin Luther King and other civil rights leaders. A night walk around the old slave market sees protesters attacked by white segregationists and results in hundreds of arrests. The prisons are too small, the detainees are kept in direct sunlight the following day. Protesters are thrown overboard by the police and by the lack of segregation and drown while trying to reach the beaches Anastasia Island reserved for whites.
The tension reached its climax when a group of black demonstrators and white flowing into the pool at the Monson Motel closed to blacks. The photograph of a police officer to arrest a protester plunging and that of the owner of the motel side of the hydrochloric acid in the pool to release the activists went around the world and even served to discredit the communist states to freedom of speech States United. Protesters endure the physical and verbal abuse without fighting back, causing a movement of national sympathy and support to the vote of the Civil Rights Act July 2, 1964.
October 14, 1964 , Martin Luther King became the youngest winner of the Nobel Peace Prize for leading nonviolent resistance in order to eliminate racial prejudice in the United States.
“Bloody Sunday” (Bloody Sunday)
Main article: Selma to Montgomery Marches .
Police of Alabama expect protesters to Edmund Pettus Bridge.
In December 1964, Martin Luther and the SCLC joined forces again to those of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) in Selma , Alabama , where SNCC worked to register voters on the electoral lists for months 35 . Selma is then an important place for the defense of voting rights for African Americans. Half of city residents are black but only 1% of them are registered as voters, the registrar, which is only available two days a month, open late and lunch breaks to undergo extension 36 .
On Sunday, March 7, 1965, 600 civil rights activists leaving Selma to try to reach Montgomery , the state capital, to present their grievances through peaceful march. They were arrested after a few kilometers Edmund Pettus Bridge by police and a hostile crowd who reject violently with clubs and tear gas . This day will be known as the Bloody Sunday 37 and marked a turning point in the struggle for civil rights. Reports showing police brutality allow the movement to win the support of public opinion and point to the success of the strategy of nonviolent Martin Luther King, which is not present at this first step, trying to delay it after his meeting with President Lyndon B. Johnson .
Two days later, Martin Luther led a symbolic march to the bridge, an action that appeared to have negotiated with local authorities and caused misunderstanding activists in Selma. The movement then seeks the protection of justice to do walking and Federal Court Judge Frank Minis Johnson, Jr., ruled in favor of the demonstrators:
“The law is clear on the fact that the right to petition their grievances with the government can be exercised in groups of large amplitude [...] and these rights may be exercised by marching, even along a public road. ”
3200 marchers leave Selma finally Sunday, 21 March 1965 , traveling 20 km per day and sleeping in fields. It was during this trip that Willie Ricks drafted the term “ Black Power “. When they reach the capitol in Montgomery, Thursday, March 25, the marchers are 25,000. Martin Luther King then gave her speech “How Long, Not Long” ( How Long, Not Time ). The same day, the white civil rights activist Viola Liuzzo was murdered by the Ku Klux Klan marchers while back in his car. Martin Luther attended his funeral and President Johnson intervenes directly on television to announce the arrest of the culprits.
Less than five months later, President Johnson signs the Voting Rights Act giving the right to vote without restriction.
Chicago
Martin Luther and Coretta Scott King , 1964. Life in the slums in Chicago was very hard for the King family.
In 1966, after the success of the south, Martin Luther King and other organizations of civil rights groups are trying to spread the movement to the north, Chicago became the main objective. Martin Luther and Ralph Abernathy , both from middle class , move to the slums of Chicago as part of an educational experience and to show their support and empathy with the poor.
The SCLC formed an alliance with the CCCO ( Coordinating Council of Community Organizations ), an organization founded by Albert Raby, Jr., and the CFM ( Chicago Freedom Movement ). In spring, the testing is carried out by black couples or white to reveal discriminatory practices by real estate companies. The tests reveal that the selection of couples who apply for housing is based on no income, the course, the number of children or other socioeconomic characteristics (because couples have exactly the same), but on the skin color.
Several large peaceful marches are organized in Chicago, Abernathy later wrote, the reception reserved for them is worse than in the south. They were received by a crowd and hate throwing bottles, and Martin Luther and it really begin to fear that a riot is triggered. Beliefs of Martin Luther King face his responsibility to take hers to a violent event. If Martin Luther believes that a peaceful march will be dispersed in the violence, he prefers to cancel the security of all, as was the case during the bloody sunday . He still leads the marches despite death threats on his person. Violence in Chicago is so intense that it overwhelms the two friends.
Another problem is the duplicity of leaders of the city when King faces the political machine of Mayor Richard Daley , considered the last “boss” of a major American city. Following requests from King of racial integration of neighborhoods like Chicago Lawn , Daley organizes a “summit conference” and sign an agreement with King and Abernathy to stop discrimination in housing. But the agreement has no legal scope is then largely ignored by the city 38 . Abernathy can not stand the living conditions in slums and secretly moved after a short time. Martin Luther King remains and written about the emotional impact that this represents for Coretta and his children to live in such harsh conditions.
When Martin Luther and his allies returned home, they left Jesse Jackson , a young seminarian who had already participated in actions in the south, who organized the first successful boycotts for the right to access to the same jobs, which will be a success as the lead program of equal opportunity in the 1970s.
Against the Vietnam War and poverty
Bombing Napalm south of Saigon , 1965.
In 1965, Martin Luther King began to express doubts about the role of the United States in the Vietnam War . On April 4, 1967, a year before his death, he made New York the speech “Beyond Vietnam: the time to break the silence.” He denounces the attitude of the United States in Vietnam and insists “they occupy the country as an American colony” and the U.S. government called “the largest supplier of violence in the world today.” He also stresses that the country needs a greater moral change 39 :
“A true revolution of values will soon look upon in a shameful manner the striking contrasts between poverty and wealth. With righteous indignation, it would look beyond the seas and would see the capitalist individualist West investing huge sums of money in Asia, Africa and South America, just to make profits and without any concern for social improvements in these countries, she would say: “It’s not fair. ‘”
He believes that Vietnam makes it difficult to achieve the objectives set by Johnson in his speech on the state of the Union of 1964, announcing a “ war against poverty . ” Martin Luther King was already hated by many white racist southern states, but this speech returns many major media against him. Time called the speech “demagogic slander that sounded like a script for Radio Hanoi”, and The Washington Post King states that “decreased its usefulness to his cause, his country, his people.”
Martin Luther often said that the North Vietnam “did not begin to send a large number of supplies or men until American forces had not arrived by the tens of thousands.” He also hailed the agrarian reform undertaken by the North 40 . He also accuses the U.S. of having killed a million Vietnamese, “mostly children” 41 . He proposed in a letter the Vietnamese Buddhist monk and pacifist Thich Nhat Hanh , who struggle to stop the conflict, the Nobel Peace of 1967.
Ground troops were evacuated by Huey Hogs near Cu Chi , 1966.
Martin Luther King also said in his speech 42 that “true compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar, she can see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring. [...] Vietnam to South Africa via Latin America, the United States are on the wrong side of world revolution. ” Martin Luther questioned “our alliance with the landowners in Latin America” and asked why the United States repress instead of supporting revolutions “peoples barefoot and shirtless” third world.
The speech is a reflection of the political evolution of Martin Luther King in his last years, due in part to its affiliation with the Highlander Research and Education Center Progressive. Martin Luther began to speak of a need for fundamental changes in political and economic life of the nation. He expressed more frequently opposed the war and the need to redistribute resources to correct racial and social injustices. Although his public addresses are reserved to avoid being labeled communist by his political enemies, in private, he says often support Democratic Socialism 43 :
“You can not talk about a resolution of the economic problem of Negro without talking about billions of dollars. You can not talk about the end of the slums without first saying that profits should be made on the slums. You really falsify because you are dealing with people now. You are dealing with the captains of industry [...] Now it means you move in rough seas, because it means that something is wrong … with capitalism … There must be a better distribution of wealth and maybe America must move toward a democratic socialism. ”
Martin Luther King had read Marx while he was at Morehouse, but while he rejects the “traditional capitalism”, he also rejected Communism because of “his materialistic interpretation of history” that denied religion, its ” ethnic relativism “and its” political totalitarianism ” 44 .
The Poor People’s Campaign
Poor in California during the Great Depression .
From November 1967, King and the team of Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) met to discuss the new legislation, race riots ( hot summers ) and the emergence of Black Power 45 . They decided to organize the Poor People’s Campaign (the Campaign for the poor) to fight for social justice . Qualified by the pastor of the “second phase in the civil rights movement” 45 , it was to fight against poverty , wherever it comes from, and does not restrict the defense of African Americans. King then said: “It should not be just black people, but all the poor. We need to include Native Americans , the Puerto Rican , the Mexicans , and even the White poor. » 45
However, the campaign is not supported by all leaders of the Civil Rights Movement, including Bayard Rustin . Their opposition includes arguments on the fact that the campaign goals are too broad, unrealistic demands and that this will accelerate the movement of repression against the poor and black 46 .
Martin Luther King crosses the country to and fro to collect a “multiracial army of the poor” who march on Washington and commit a peaceful civil disobedience to the Capitol, if need be until the convention sign a declaration of rights of the poor man. The Reader’s Digest speak of an “insurrection.”
This “poor reporting” demand a government jobs program to rebuild American cities. Martin Luther King sees an urgent need to confront the Congress that had demonstrated its “hostility to the poor” to “military funds with distributing generosity” but providing “poverty funds with miserliness for.” Its vision is a change that is more revolutionary than mere reform: he cited systematic flaws of racism, poverty, militarism and materialism , and that “the reconstruction of society itself was the real problem to be resolved ‘ 47 .
But Luther King’s assassination in April 1968 severely affected the country. It was nonetheless launched in May, culminating with a march on Washington, but failed to achieve its objectives 45 .
Murder
End of March 1968 , Martin Luther King moves to Memphis ( Tennessee ) to support scavengers local blacks who are on strike since March 12 in order to obtain better pay and better treatment. African Americans were paid $ 1.70 an hour and were not paid when they could not work due to climate, unlike white workers 48 , 49 . Violence erupts around the peaceful marches, a young African-American is killed 50 .
The balcony of the Lorraine Motel where Martin Luther was assassinated King. The building now houses the National Civil Rights Museum.
April 3, at Mason Temple (Church of God in Christ, Inc.. – World Headquarters), Martin Luther made the prophetic speech “ I’ve Been To The Mountaintop ” (“I have been to the mountaintop”) to a euphoric crowd:
“It does not really matter what happens now … Some began to [...] about the threats that loomed. What could happen to me from one of our sick white brothers … Like everyone else, I would live a long life. Longevity is important but I am not concerned about that now. I just want to do the will of God. And he permitted to climb the mountain! And I looked around me, and I’ve seen the promised land. I might go there again with you. But I want you to know tonight that we as a people will get to the promised land. And I’m so happy tonight. I have no fear. I’m not afraid of any man. My eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord! ”
April 4, 1968 at 18 h 01, Martin Luther King was assassinated by a white segregationist on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis in Tennessee . His last words were to musician Ben Branch, who was performing that evening at a public meeting attended by Martin Luther 51 :
“Ben, plan to play Precious Lord, Take My Hand (Lord, take my hand) to the meeting tonight. It plays the most beautiful way. ”
His friends inside the motel room hear gunshots and ran to the balcony to find Martin Luther King shot in the throat. He was pronounced dead at St. Joseph’s Hospital 05 to 19 h. The murder caused a wave of race riots in 60 cities of the United States (125 in total 52 ) which resulted in numerous deaths and requires the intervention of the National Guard 53 .
Five days later, President Johnson declared a national day of mourning (the first for an African-American) in honor of Martin Luther King. 300,000 people attended his funeral 54 the same day, and Vice President Hubert Humphrey (Johnson was a meeting on Vietnam at Camp David and there were fears that the presence of the President causes protests of pacifists) . Riots erupt in anger in over 100 cities by 46 victims 2 .
At the request of his widow, Martin Luther made his own funeral oration with his last sermon “Drum Major” recorded at the Ebenezer Baptist Church . In this sermon, he asked that his funeral no mention of his honors are made, but it is said he had tried to “feed the hungry,” “naked dress”, “be right on the issue Vietnam “and” love and serve humanity. ” At her request, her friend Mahalia Jackson sang his favorite hymn, Take My Hand, Precious Lord .
The city of Memphis negotiate an end to the strike in a manner favorable to the garbage after the assassination 55 , 56 .
According to biographer Taylor Branch, King’s autopsy revealed that despite having only 39 years old, his heart seemed that of a man aged 60, showing the effect of stress physically 13 years in the movement Civil Rights 57 . Between 1957 and 1968, King had traveled over 9.6 million kilometers, spoke in public more than 2500 times, was arrested by police more than twenty times and physically assaulted at least four times 58 .
Investigations and recent developments
Two months after the death of Martin Luther King, James Earl Ray , an escaped, was captured at the London Heathrow airport as he tried to leave the UK on a false passport Canada in the name of Ramon George Sneyd. Ray was quickly extradited to Tennessee and charged with the murder of Martin Luther King, who admitted the murder March 10, 1969, before retracting after three days. On the advice of his attorney Percy Foreman, Ray chooses to plead guilty to avoid the death penalty. He was sentenced to 99 years in prison.
Tomb of Martin Luther King Martin Luther King, Jr. National Historic Site in Atlanta on that reads “Free at last” (Finally Free).
Ray returns to his lawyer, claiming that the perpetrators of the murder are a “Raoul” Johnny and his brother whom he met in Montreal in Canada. It tells more of that “he had not fired on King personally” but he could be “partially responsible without knowing it,” indicating a track of conspiracy . He then spent the rest of his life trying in vain to reopen his case based on his innocence.
On 10 June 1977 , shortly after testifying before a congressional committee on the murders that he did not kill Martin Luther, he escaped with six other convicts Brushy Mountain Penitentiary in Tennessee. It was taken on June 13 and returned to prison 59 .
In 1997, Dexter Scott King, the son of Martin Luther King, Ray met and publicly supported Ray’s efforts to get a new trial 60 .
In 1999, a year after Ray’s death, Coretta Scott King , widow of Martin Luther and leader of civil rights too, and the rest of the King family won a civil trial against Loyd Jowers (owner of a restaurant not far from Motel) and “other conspirators.” In December 1993, Jowers had appeared in the Prime Time Live for ABC News and had revealed details of a conspiracy involving the Mafia and the government to kill Martin Luther. Jowers said during the trial have received $ 100 000 to arrange the assassination of Martin Luther King. The jury of six blacks and six whites Judge Jowers guilty and states that “federal agencies were involved” in the assassination plot 61 . William F. Pepper, Ray’s former lawyer, represents the King family at the trial and produced 70 witnesses 62 , 63 , 64 . Following this, the family of Martin Luther King does not believe that Ray has something to do with the murder 65 .
In 2000, the Department of Justice U.S. ends an investigation into the revelations of Jowers, but found no evidence that could prove a conspiracy. The investigation report recommends that there be no new research until new reliable facts are not presented 66 .
Allegations of conspiracy
Some speculate that Ray was just a pawn in the same way as the alleged assassin of John F. Kennedy , Lee Harvey Oswald was supposed to have been (see Assassination of John F. Kennedy ). The evidence put forward by its supporters are:
Ray’s confession was obtained under pressure, and he was threatened with death penalty 67 , 68 .
Ray was a petty thief and burglar, he had no criminal record indicating a violent crime with possession of firearms 69 .
Two ballistic tests conducted on the murder weapon, a Remington Gamemaster, have never proved that Ray was the assassin that the weapon was not really the one used to murder 70 , 71 .
Witnesses the murder of King saying that the shot did not come from the pension mentioned in the survey, but a bush next to her. A bush off a few days after the assassination 72 .
April 6, 2002 , the New York Times reported that a pastor, the Rev. Ronald Denton Wilson, claimed that it was his father Henry Clay Wilson, who had assassinated Martin Luther King, Jr., not James Earl Ray. He said that his motives were not racist policies but, thinking that King was a communist 73 .
In 2004, Jesse Jackson , who was with King at the time of his assassination, note 74 :
“The fact is there were saboteurs to disrupt the march. Within our own organization, it was discovered that a very important person was paid by the government. So infiltration within, saboteurs from outside attacks and of the press. [...] I will never believe that James Earl Ray had the motive, money and mobility to have done that himself. Our government has been heavily involved in preparing the ground and I think the escape route for James Earl Ray. ”
A friend and colleague of King, James Bevel, summarizes more steeply 51 :
“There is no way that a white boy 10 cent can develop a plan to kill a black man $ 10 million. ”
Biographers David Garrow and Gerald Posner oppose contrary to the findings of William F. Pepper has led the judgment of 1999 accusing the government of involvement in the murder of Martin Luther King, Jr. 75 .
The thought of Martin Luther King
Civil disobedience and nonviolence
Monument to Martin Luther King at the University of Uppsala , Sweden .
In Letter from Birmingham Jail written April 16, 1963 when he was arrested for a nonviolent demonstration, Martin Luther King responds to eight white priests of Alabama who wrote four days ago a letter entitled A Call unit . If they admitted the existence of social injustice, they expressed the belief that the battle against racial segregation should take place in the courts and not in the street. Martin Luther then responds that without direct action and powerful like he did, the civil rights would never be achieved.
He writes: “ wait has almost always meant never , “and he argues that civil disobedience is not only justified against an unjust law, but also that “everyone has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws.”
The letter includes the famous quote “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere” but the words of Thurgood Marshall to repeat: “A Justice delayed is justice denied” 76 .
Until the end of his life, Martin Luther King remains opposed to radicalization and violence advocated by the Black Power and stresses that “The riots are not the answer” and considers this method as ineffective beyond the very opposite nature riots in his doctrine of non-violence, morality and faith 77 :
“If we say that power is the ability to change things or the ability to succeed its goals, then this is not the power to engage in an act that does not accomplish this: and this regardless the noise you make and the number of things that you burn. ”
For him a guerrilla like Che Guevara is a “romantic illusion”. He prefers the discipline of civil disobedience that defines not only a right but also a tribute to a democratic energy untapped. Similarly to poverty, he asked the militants to “use all the power of nonviolence on the economic problem,” although nothing in the U.S. Constitution does not guarantee a roof and a meal. Martin Luther King recognized the difficulty of the task but asked not to be intimidated by those who make fun of non-violence. He noted the similarity of their struggle with that of Jesus 78 79 :
“Public opinion has turned against him. They said he was a troublemaker. He used civil disobedience. He refused the dictates of the law. ”
Crowd to march on Washington of 1963.
For Martin Luther, nonviolence is not only fair but necessary because just as the cause of origin, means failure violence and the cycle of vengeance on the law of retaliation , as it defends the ethic of reciprocity 80 :
“The ultimate weakness of violence is that it’s a downward spiral, causing the very thing it seeks to destroy. Instead of weakening evil, it multiplies it. Using violence, you can kill the liar, but you can not kill the lie, nor establish the truth. Using violence, you can murder the hater, but you can not kill hatred. In fact, violence is simply growing hatred. And it continues … Make hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night without stars. Darkness can not drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate can not drive out hate: only love can do that. ”
He also claims that the end can not justify the means unlike the formula Machiavelli 81 :
“I’ve always preached that nonviolence demand that the means we use must be as pure as the end we seek. I tried to make clear that it is wrong to use immoral means to achieve a just end. But I must say now that it’s as bad or worse yet, to use moral means to preserve immoral ends. ”
In his Letter from Birmingham, he meets even the priests, who accuse him of creating opportunities to violence with peaceful civil disobedience in a racist environment, as one who demands justice in a non-violent can not be the troublemaker 82 :
“In your statement you assert that our actions, even though peaceful, must be condemned because they precipitate violence. But is this a logical assertion? Is it not as if you condemn a man who was robbed because the fact that he has money would have created the act of theft? ”
Racial equality, freedom and pride
Beyond his fight for racial equality, the discourse I have a dream where he imagines that his “four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of person “and the political victory with the votes of the Civil Rights Act and Voting Rights Act , Martin Luther King recognized that racial equality is not only the laws that defend anyone, but especially the way this person is perceives itself 83 :
“As long as the mind is enslaved, the body can never be free. Psychological freedom, a strong sense of self-esteem , is the most powerful weapon against the long night of physical slavery. No Emancipation Proclamation lincolnienne or charter of civil rights johnsonienne can totally make this kind of freedom. The negro is free when he reaches the depths of his being and he will sign with pen and ink of his humanity affirmed its own declaration of emancipation. And with a spirit straining toward true self-esteem, the negro must reject the handcuffs proudly self-abnegation and say to himself and the world: “I am somebody. I am a person. I am a man with dignity and honor. I have a rich and noble. ” ”
Pacifism and personal commitment
Body of men, women and children at My Lai massacre conducted by the U.S. Army, March 16, 1968.
Martin Luther King said that nonviolence is not only a correct method, but also a principle that must be applied to all people, anywhere in the world, and compares the campaign to nonviolence acclaimed United States to the violence of the Vietnam War favored by some of the American public:
“There is something strangely inconsistent in a nation that acclaims you when you say” Be nonviolent with Jim Clark ” 84 , but will curse and damn you when you say, “Be nonviolent with small children in Vietnam brown ” 85 . There is something wrong with this release. ”
For Martin Luther, non-violence should lead to pacifism , especially in the context of the Cold War and the military strategy of mutual assured destruction that could lead to the Apocalypse 86 :
“Men, for years now, have talked about war and peace. But now they can not just talk. It is no longer a choice between violence and nonviolence in this world it is a choice between nonviolence and nonexistence. ”
Martin Luther King often invoke personal responsibility to develop world peace 87 . For him, the triumph of good over evil is inevitable, despite frequent setbacks and wars in history 88 :
“I refuse to accept the notion that cynical nations after nations must go downstairs to the militaristic hell of thermonuclear destruction. I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. This is why the property, even temporarily defeated, is stronger than evil triumphant. ”
He admits that this view is idealistic and moral difficult to achieve in this historical context, but emphasizes that consciousness and the ideal of justice must not retreat from adverse public opinion, the political calculation or a task that seems insurmountable 89 :
“On some positions taken, cowardice asks the question:” Is it safe? “Opportunism raises the question:” Is it politic? “, And vanity joined them and asks:” Is it popular? “. But conscience asks the question: “Is this fair?”. And there comes a time when someone needs to stand for something that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular but must do so because his conscience tells him it is right. I think today there is a need for all people of goodwill to come together in one great act of conscience and say the words of the old Negro spiritual , “We will not study war”. This is the challenge of modern man. ”
Spiritual life against material comforts
Martin Luther King Monument, Yerba Buena Gardens, San Francisco , USA .
Martin Luther King, without advocating a return to voluntary simplicity nor become a critical development as Gandhi warned against the American way of life which the race for consumption and materialism can turn man away from the cause of good and spirituality 90 :
“Now the great temptation and the great tragedy of life is that we allow so often outside of our lives to absorb within our lives. The great tragedy of life is that we allow too often the means by which we live to get away from the purpose for which we live. [...] What is the advantage for a man to gain the whole world means – airplanes, televisions, electric lighting – if he loses the end: the soul? ”
He said that profound change is akin to a revolution of values that will defeat the greatest evils of civilization 91 :
“I am convinced that if we want to be on the right side of the world revolution, we as a nation to undertake a radical revolution of values. We must rapidly begin to move from a society “oriented things” to a company “person-oriented”. When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, materialism and militarism are impossible to beat. ”
Faith, love and power
By vocation of pastor, Martin Luther King puts the Bible at the heart of his message, whereas humanity was too long “in the mountains of violence”, she must go to “the promised land of justice and brotherhood. ” For this purpose it is a divine mission because it “would never be satisfied with unfinished goals [...], still maintain some sort of divine discontent” 92 .
This divine message of love and it passed by the Gospel according to him involves an unwavering face of adversity, “a harsh spirit and a tender heart” 93 , as taught directly by Jesus to his disciples 94 :
“Jesus recognized the need to mix opposites. He knew that his disciples would face a difficult and hostile world, where they would have to confront the recalcitrance of political and intransigence of the protectors of the old order [...] And he gave them a form of action, “Be wise as serpents and as harmless as doves.” ”
The love is no longer for Martin Luther only an end but a means to achieve peace and global justice, and he refutes the notion of weakness of love What have issued some philosophers including Nietzsche 95 :
“The application of a global community that raises problems with neighbors beyond the tribe, race, class and nation is in reality a call for an unconditional and universal love of all humanity. This concept is often misunderstood and often misinterpreted, so quickly evaded by Nietzsche in the world as weak and cowardly force, has now become an absolute necessity for human survival. When I speak of love I do not speak a kind of sentimental and weak response. I’m not talking about a force that’s just sentimental nonsense. I speak of a force that all major world religions have seen as the supreme unifying principle of life. Love is the key that opens the door that leads to ultimate reality. ”
Meet Martin Luther King and Lyndon Johnson at the White House, 1966.
Martin Luther King considers that the power in this context is not something inherently wrong from the moment it is understood and used properly, that is to say when he is not regarded as the opposite exactly the love . For him, the misinterpretation that love is the relinquishing of power and authority to a denial of love is the reason why Nietzsche rejected the concept of Christian love and Christian theologians the Nietzschean concept of will to power .
“Power without love is dangerous and abusive, and love without power is sentimental and anemic. Power at its best is love implementing the demands for justice, and justice at its best is power correcting everything that hinders love. ”
A power struggle without love or conscience is doomed to failure, either for whites or blacks. For him “it is this collision of immoral power and powerless morality which constitutes the major crisis of our time” 96 .
Although a man of faith, Martin Luther is for secularism and approves a decision of the Supreme Court to ban prayer in public schools. He comments that “it does not seek to outlaw prayer or belief in God. In a pluralistic society like ours, which must determine what prayer should be said and by whom? Legally, constitutionally or otherwise, the state has certainly not that right ” 97 .
Science and Religion
For Martin Luther, when violence and war become so destructive, it is also because the speed of scientific progress has outpaced the development of ethics and morality, which could not always restrain its negative applications. If said humorously, “Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and men confused. ” 98 , Martin Luther King did not make the science responsible for all evils and so far has emphasized its complementarity with religion and ethics in Human Development 93 :
“Science Inquiry; religion interprets. Science gives man knowledge which is power religion gives man wisdom which is control. Science deals mainly with facts; religion deals mainly with values. The two are not rivals. They are complementary. ”
Compensation history
Martin Luther KIng at a press conference on his book Why we can not wait ( Why we can not wait ), 8 June 1964.
Several times, Martin Luther King expressed the view that African Americans and other disadvantaged Americans, should be compensated for the wrongs that have been done historically.
Interviewed by Alex Haley in 1965, he said that only give equality to African-Americans could not remove the income gap between themselves and whites. He says he is not seeking full restitution of wages never paid during the slavery , which he believes to be impossible, but proposes an agenda for government compensation of $ 50 billion over 10 years to all disadvantaged groups.
He stressed that “the money spent would be more than justified by the benefits it would bring to the entire nation through a spectacular decline in school dropout, family separation, crime rates, illegitimacy, of huge social spending, riots and many other social ills ” 97 .
In his book Why we can not wait to 1964, he developed this idea, explaining that the settlement of unpaid work was an application of common law 99 .
Sources and inspirations
Martin Luther King wrote his first encounter with the idea of civil disobedience, nonviolent was reading Civil Disobedience are of Henry David Thoreau in 1944 when he was at the University of Morehouse College:
“Here, with the courageous refusal of a man from New England to pay his taxes and his choice of jail rather than support a war that would expand the territories of slavery in Mexico, I had my first contact with the theory of nonviolent resistance. Fascinated by the idea of refusing to cooperate with an evil system, I was so deeply moved that I reread the book several times. ”
Thoreau made him aware that active struggle against non-violent but the damage was also right and necessary that helping the good, and the means and forms of this struggle were countless 100 :
“I became convinced that noncooperation with evil is as much a moral obligation as cooperation with good. No other person was more eloquent and passionate to spread the idea that Henry David Thoreau. As a result of his writings and personal witness, we are heirs to a legacy of creative protest. The teachings of Thoreau have relived in our civil rights movement, in fact they are more alive than ever. Whether expressed by a sit-in at a restaurant, a bus for freedom in Mississippi, a peaceful protest in Albany (Georgia) a bus boycott in Montgomery (Alabama), all these are the harvest of insistence of Thoreau that we must resist evil and that no moral man can patiently abide injustice. ”
The civil rights leader, theologian and educator Howard Thurman was an early influence on him. This is one of the classmates of Father Martin at Morehouse College , and he became the mentor of the young Martin Luther and his friends. The missionary work of Thurman had taken him abroad where he met and conversed with Mahatma Gandhi . When Martin Luther King is at the Boston University , he often visited Thurman, then dean of Marsh Chapel.
The civil rights activist Bayard Rustin , who was Mahatma Gandhi as a teacher, advises Martin Luther King to follow the principles of nonviolence since 1956. He serves as advisor and mentor in its infancy and will be the main organizer of the march to Washington. But the homosexuality of Bayard affirmed its commitment to democratic socialism and its links with the Communist Party of the United States of America have that many black or white leaders ask Martin Luther to distance with him.
Very inspired by the success of the nonviolent activism of Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King visited his family in India in 1959, with assistance from the group Quakers of the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) and NAACP. The trip deeply touches, improving his understanding of nonviolent resistance and its involvement in the struggle for civil rights in America. In a radio message during his final evening in India, he announces 101 :
“Since I am in India, I am more convinced than ever that the method of nonviolent resistance is the most powerful weapon available to oppressed people in their struggle for justice and human dignity. In a literal sense, Mahatma Gandhi embodied in his life certain universal principles that are inherent in the moral structure of the universe, and these principles are as inescapable as the law of gravitation. ”
Relations with the FBI
FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover in 1961.
The FBI and its director J. Edgar Hoover have antagonistic relationships with Martin Luther King. Written order of the Minister of Justice Robert Francis Kennedy , the FBI began to investigate him and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC, “Conference of the Christian leaders of the South”) in 1961. Investigations are superficial until 1962, when the FBI learns that one of the most important advisors of King, Stanley Levinson, has ties to the Communist Party of the United States . According to one of his affidavits to the House Un-American Activities Committee (Committee business anti-American ), a lieutenant of Martin Luther, Hunter Pitts O’Dell, was also linked to the Communist Party.
The FBI is Martin Luther King and Stanley Levinson under supervision , and installing listening devices in hotel rooms that the pastor uses when he travels across the country. Robert informed the FBI and President John F. Kennedy , who tried unsuccessfully to persuade Martin Luther King to part with Stanley Levinson. For his part, Martin Luther denies having links with the Communists, saying in an interview that “there were many Communists in the movement of the freedoms of Eskimos in Florida “Hoover replied by accusing him of being “the liar’s most famous country” 97 .
This attempt to prove that Martin Luther King’s Communist owes much to what many believe segregationists that blacks in the south were far happy with their lot but they are being manipulated by “communists” and “outside agitators”. Stanley Levinson, a lawyer, had links with the Communist Party during trade negotiations, but the FBI refuses to believe reports indicate that he no longer had any association with them.
As nothing had been found against him politically, objectives and FBI investigations changed in attempts to discredit him through his private life. The agency tried to prove he was an unfaithful husband. Recordings, some made public since, did not bring anything conclusive and no evidence could be provided on supposed infidelities of Martin Luther King, despite the remarks of some officials such as President Johnson who said he was “a preacher hypocrite. ” Books published in the 1980s about this but could not advance any evidence of any infidelity.
The FBI distributed reports on these supposed differences privacy reporters friends, allies or potential funding sources of the SCLC, and even the family of Martin Luther. The agency also sends anonymous letters to Martin Luther King, threatening to reveal more information if it does not cease his activism for civil rights 102 . This letter has often been interpreted as a request to Martin Luther to commit suicide 103 , 104 .
Finally, the FBI stopped its investigation of the privacy of Martin Luther and harassment to focus on the SCLC and the movement of Black Power . But after a peaceful demonstration in Memphis in March 1968 has been overrun by violent elements of black power , Hoover, who had an undercover agent in the hierarchy of the SCLC, launching a new campaign to discredit Martin Luther King. April 2, he obtains a recovery from interception. The day of the assassination of Martin Luther, the FBI office in Mississippi offers two new programs-cons information (COINTELPRO) using rumors and misinformation “to discredit King with poor blacks whose support he seeks” 105 .
The last contact with the FBI Martin Luther King is the time of his assassination. The agency was watching at the Lorraine Motel in a building across the street, not far from where James Earl was located. When Martin Luther King was shot, they are the first to arrive on the scene to administer first aid. For supporters of a conspiracy theory, their presence so close to the crime scene is a confirmation that the FBI is involved in the assassination.
January 31, 1977 , in business “Bernard S. Lee v. Clarence M. Kelley , et al. “and” Southern Christian Leadership Conference v.. Clarence M. Kelley, et al., “Judge John Lewis Smith Jr. ordered that all records and transcripts known manual on espionage and existing Martin Luther King from 1963 to 1968 are kept at the National Archives and Records Administration and banned from public access until 2027.
Martin Luther King was named Person of the Year by Time Magazine in 1963. In the presentation speech made to him by the organizers during the award of Nobel Prize in 1964, Martin Luther King described as “the first person in the Western world has shown that a struggle could be won without violence, the first to have made his message of brotherly love a reality in this fight, and one that brought this message to all men, all nations and all races ” 3 .
In 1965 he received the American Liberties Medallion of the American Jewish Committee “for its outstanding progress on the principles of human freedom.” He said at the ceremony of receiving the award: “Freedom is one thing. You have full or you are not free. ” The same year he received the prize Pacem in Terris (Peace on Earth in Latin ) based on the encyclical Pacem in Terris of Pope John XXIII . In 1966, the Planned Parenthood Federation of America awarded him the prize Margaret Sanger “for his courageous resistance to bigotry and his life of dedication to the advancement of social justice and human dignity” 106 . Martin Luther King received 20 Honorary doctorates from U.S. universities and abroad.
He was posthumously awarded the prize Marcus Garvey Government of Jamaica in 1968 and in 1971 he received the Grammy Award for Best Recording for his speech talked Why I Oppose the War in Vietnam (Why I oppose the war in Vietnam) . President Jimmy Carter awarded him the Presidential Medal of Freedom posthumously in 1977 107 . In 1980, the neighborhood where Martin Luther King spent his youth is declared a historical monument.
November 2, 1983, President Ronald Reagan signed legislation creating a holiday honoring the Martin Luther King Day . The first states to apply in 1986 and 17 January 2000, the holiday is officially observed in all 50 states 108 .
In 1998, the fraternity Alpha Phi Alpha , to which he belonged, was authorized by the U.S. Congress to create a memorial. October 16, 2011, the Martin Luther King memorial was unveiled by President Barack Obama . It is located a few blocks from the Lincoln Memorial , where King delivered his famous speech “ I Have a Dream “, August 28, 1963. The inauguration was scheduled for August 28, but was canceled because of Hurricane Irene . Martin Luther King was the first African-American and the second non-President to be honored by a monument in the National Mall in Washington, DC . The statue faces 24 niches semicircular honoring individuals who have given their lives for the civil rights movement and a wall inscriptions, where excerpts from his speeches 109 .
Martin Luther King is considered the author of the greatest speeches of U.S. history, alongside Abraham Lincoln or John F. Kennedy 110 . More than 730 U.S. cities have a street Martin Luther King in 2006 and many others were baptized in his name throughout the world.
Supporters and influence
President Barack Obama to visit by a group of African-Americans the Oval Office where he placed a bust of Martin Luther King and the Emancipation Proclamation of Abraham Lincoln .
Martin Luther King is one of the most admired of American History 111 . As he was inspired by Gandhi , many personalities on the international stage with Colin Powell and Jesse Jackson have taken as an example for his struggle for human rights and her method of civil disobedience through non- violence to achieve it. He influenced the movements of human rights in South Africa and was cited as inspiration by another Nobel Peace who fought for equality in this country, Albert Luthuli .
Martin Luther’s wife, Coretta Scott King , followed in the footsteps of her husband and was very active on issues of social justice and civil rights until his death in 2006. The year of the assassination of her husband, she founded the King Center 112 in Atlanta, dedicated to preserving his legacy and his work promoting the nonviolent resolution of conflict, and tolerance in the world.
His son, Dexter King, currently the president of the center and her daughter Yolanda founded the Higher Ground Productions, an organization specializing in diversity training.
In 2008, during the U.S. presidential election Barack Obama fulfills his campaign with references to Martin Luther King and paid tribute to him 113 . Once elected, he placed a bust of King in the Oval Office and the program of the March on Washington , telling Oprah Winfrey that “This office, I think, you remember what is at stake, how many hopes and dreams are placed in what happens to the White House 114 . ”
Jesse Jackson , comrade of Martin Luther King said he would have liked that either King witnessed his victory that made the first mixed race black U.S. president in history 115 .
Reviews
Martin Luther King and Malcolm X at a press conference in 1964.
Beyond accusations of infidelity or academic plagiarism, more radical activists of the movement as Black Power and Malcolm X had criticized policies, which have not substantially damaged his image.
Thus, Stokely Carmichael disagrees with the determination of integration of Martin Luther King, which he sees as a means to achieve his ends and not as a principle. Stokely Carmichael therefore saw the struggle of Martin Luther King as an insult to the African American culture 116 .
Omali Yeshitela who will lead the International People’s Democratic Uhuru Movement (UnPDUM) 117 , more radical, also calls Africa to remember that European settlement was made so violent and forced and not fully in African culture. Try to integrate into the culture of “colonizer” is also an insult to the original culture of Africa.
