Dr. Saidy,
Thanks for this forward. I remember reading this in a philosophy class about 7
years ago as a college freshman. Its great to refresh thoughts on this outstanding
philosophy. Keep them coming!
God Speed!
Pa Mambuna
Madiba Saidy wrote:
> Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
> 1929 -- 1968
>
> Born in Atlanta, Georgia, civil rights leader Martin Luther King was one of
> the world's best-known advocates of nonviolent social change. Educated in
> Pennsylvania at Crozer Theological Seminary and Boston University, King became
> a Baptist Church pastor in 1954 and recieved a Ph.D in theology in 1955.
>
> King was elected president of the newly-formed Montgomery Improvement
> Association in 1955 (formed during the black residents' boycott of the city's
> buses -- a boycott launched by civil rights activist Rosa Parks refusal to
> obey the city's policy mandating segregation on buses.) Despite being slapped
> with criminal charges and his house being bombed during this time of civil
> unrest, King's actions helped result in the 1956 desegregation of Montgomery's
> buses when the Supreme Court declared Alabama's segregation laws
> unconstitutional.
>
> In 1957, King helped to found the Southern Christian Leadership Conference
> (SCLC). As president, he emphasized the goal of black voting rights when he
> spoke at the Lincoln Memorial during the 1957 Prayer Pilgrimage for Freedom.
> At the end of 1959, he resigned from Dexter and returned to Atlanta where the
> SCLC headquarters were located. King did not mobilize mass protest activity
> during SCLC’s first few years but in 1960 southern black college students
> launched a wave of sit-in protests. And, although King sympathized with their
> movement and spoke at the founding meeting of the Student Non-Violent
> Coordinating Committee SNCC in April 1960, he soon became the target of
> criticisms from SNCC activists.
>
> King and his staff initiated a major campaign in Birmingham, Alabama, where
> white police officials were notorious for their anti-black attitudes. In 1963,
> clashes between unarmed black demonstrators and police with attack dogs and
> fire hoses generated newspaper headlines throughout the world. Subsequent mass
> demonstrations in many communities culminated in a march on August 28, 1963,
> attracting more than 250,000 protesters to Washington, D.C. Addressing the
> marchers from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, King delivered his famous I
> Have A Dream speech.
>
> I HAVE A DREAM
>
> Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand
> signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great
> beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been seared in the
> flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long
> night of captivity.
>
> But one hundred years later, we must face the tragic fact that the Negro is
> still not free. One hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly
> crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination. One
> hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the
> midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity. One hundred years later, the
> Negro is still languishing in the corners of American society and finds
> himself an exile in his own land. So we have come here today to dramatize an
> appalling condition.
>
> In a sense we have come to our nation's capital to cash a check. When the
> architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and
> the declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which
> every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men would be
> guaranteed the inalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of
> happiness.
>
> It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note insofar
> as her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred
> obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check which has come back
> marked "insufficient funds." But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice
> is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the
> great vaults of opportunity of this nation. So we have come to cash this check
> -- a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the
> security of justice. We have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America
> of the fierce urgency of now. This is no time to engage in the luxury of
> cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is the time
> to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit
> path of racial justice. Now is the time to open the doors of opportunity to
> all of God's children. Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands
> of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood.
>
> It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment and to
> underestimate the determination of the Negro. This sweltering summer of the
> Negro's legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating
> autumn of freedom and equality. Nineteen sixty-three is not an end, but a
> beginning. Those who hope that the Negro needed to blow off steam and will now
> be content will have a rude awakening if the nation returns to business as
> usual. There will be neither rest nor tranquillity in America until the Negro
> is granted his citizenship rights. The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to
> shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.
>
> But there is something that I must say to my people who stand on the warm
> threshold which leads into the palace of justice. In the process of gaining
> our rightful place we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to
> satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and
> hatred.
>
> We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and
> discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical
> violence. Again and again we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting
> physical force with soul force. The marvelous new militancy which has engulfed
> the Negro community must not lead us to distrust of all white people, for many
> of our white brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to
> realize that their destiny is tied up with our destiny and their freedom is
> inextricably bound to our freedom. We cannot walk alone.
>
> And as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall march ahead. We cannot
> turn back. There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights, "When
> will you be satisfied?" We can never be satisfied as long as our bodies, heavy
> with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways
> and the hotels of the cities. We cannot be satisfied as long as the Negro's
> basic mobility is from a smaller ghetto to a larger one. We can never be
> satisfied as long as a Negro in Mississippi cannot vote and a Negro in New
> York believes he has nothing for which to vote. No, no, we are not satisfied,
> and we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters and
> righteousness like a mighty stream.
>
> I am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great trials and
> tribulations. Some of you have come fresh from narrow cells. Some of you have
> come from areas where your quest for freedom left you battered by the storms
> of persecution and staggered by the winds of police brutality. You have been
> the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that
> unearned suffering is redemptive.
>
> Go back to Mississippi, go back to Alabama, go back to Georgia, go back to
> Louisiana, go back to the slums and ghettos of our northern cities, knowing
> that somehow this situation can and will be changed. Let us not wallow in the
> valley of despair.
>
> I say to you today, my friends, that in spite of the difficulties and
> frustrations of the moment, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted
> in the American dream.
>
> I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true
> meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men
> are created equal."
>
> I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former
> slaves and the sons of former slaveowners will be able to sit down together at
> a table of brotherhood.
>
> I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a desert state,
> sweltering with the heat of injustice and oppression, will be transformed into
> an oasis of freedom and justice.
>
> I have a dream that my four 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 their
> character.
>
> I have a dream today.
>
> I have a dream that one day the state of Alabama, whose governor's lips are
> presently dripping with the words of interposition and nullification, will be
> transformed into a situation where little black boys and black girls will be
> able to join hands with little white boys and white girls and walk together as
> sisters and brothers.
>
> I have a dream today.
>
> I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and
> mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the
> crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be
> revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.
>
> This is our hope. This is the faith with which I return to the South. With
> this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of
> hope. With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of
> our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith we will
> be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to
> jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free
> one day.
>
> This will be the day when all of God's children will be able to sing with a
> new meaning, "My country, 'tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing.
> Land where my fathers died, land of the pilgrim's pride, from every
> mountainside, let freedom ring."
>
> And if America is to be a great nation this must become true. So let freedom
> ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire. Let freedom ring from the
> mighty mountains of New York. Let freedom ring from the heightening
> Alleghenies of Pennsylvania!
>
> Let freedom ring from the snowcapped Rockies of Colorado!
>
> Let freedom ring from the curvaceous peaks of California!
>
> But not only that; let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia!
>
> Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee!
>
> Let freedom ring from every hill and every molehill of Mississippi. From every
> mountainside, let freedom ring.
>
> When we let freedom 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!"
>
> King was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964 and was assassinated April 4,
> 1968. In 1986, his birthday -- January 15 -- was made a federal holiday in the
> United States.
>
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