by Bert Williams

 Martin Luther King, Jr. was born on January 15, 1929. Americans celebrate Martin Luther King, Jr. Day every third Monday of January as a national holiday, but it has now been more than 40 years since an assassin’s bullet cut King’s life short. As his life recedes into history, fewer Americans have a clear understanding of why the holiday exists. We should not forget.

A Leader Takes the Stage
     The son and grandson of Baptist preachers, King first came to the national stage shortly after completing his Ph.D. in theology at Boston University. He had just taken up duties as pastor of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama when Rosa Parks, a black seamstress on her way home from work, refused to give up her seat one evening on a Montgomery bus. The person demanding the seat was a white male. It was December 1, 1955.

 Authorities enforced the city’s bus segregation law. It relegated African American riders to the back seats of buses, and required an African American rider to give up a seat anywhere on the bus if a white rider didn’t have a seat.

 For her refusal to follow the law, Parks was arrested and fined $10 plus $4 in court fees. She appealed the ruling, and the city’s black residents launched a boycott of the city’s buses. The Montgomery Improvement Association was formed to get the boycott organized, and the city’s new 26-year-old Baptist pastor was elected the organization’s president.

 The city of Montgomery could not afford to run its buses profitably if the city’s thousands of African Americans were not fare-paying riders. With tensions running high, whites attempted with increasing intensity to get the black boycotters to give up. One evening the front porch of King’s home was bombed while his wife and baby were inside. But the boycotters were resolute and King did not flinch.

 On June 4, the federal district court ruled that Alabama’s bus segregation laws were unconstitutional. The city appealed the ruling and held its ground. The boycotters also refused to back down. Months passed.

 Then on November 13, the United States Supreme Court struck down Alabama’s bus segregation law as unconstitutional. The city was forced to write a new ordinance desegregating the buses. More than a month later, 381 days after Rosa Parks had kept her seat, the city’s buses finally rolled with seats accessible to all passengers.

 In January 1957, energized by the success in Montgomery, King and other African American leaders formed the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). The guiding principle of the organization was the use of non-violent resistance in the cause of civil rights. King was the SCLC’s first president.

Momentum Builds
      In 1960, King and many other non-violent demonstrators were arrested at “sit-ins” staged at segregated department store dining counters. The effectiveness of the strategy would grow with time as county jails overflowed with hundreds of non-violent demonstrators.

 In 1961, “freedom rides” were organized to force integration of interstate buses. Violence ensued, but again the non-violent demonstrators did not back down. On September 23, U.S. Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy insisted that the Interstate Commerce Commission take legal steps to end discrimination in interstate travel. Nevertheless, hundreds of freedom riders were arrested in the months to follow.

 On September 20, 1962, James Meredith was barred from becoming the first black student to enroll at the University of Mississippi.

 Then came 1963:
• On April 16, while in prison, King wrote his “Letter from Birmingham Jail.”
• On May 10, the nation was horrified when images of fire hoses and police dogs turned on non-violent protesters were aired on national television.
• On June 11, in an attempt to deny admission to two black students, Alabama Governor George Wallace took his famous “stand at the schoolhouse door” at the University of Alabama. Wallace backed down only when confronted by federal marshals, U.S. Deputy Attorney General Nicholas Katzenbach, and the Alabama National Guard.
• On June 12, Medgar Evers, a worker for the NAACP (the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People), was murdered in Jackson, Mississippi.
• On June 19, President John F. Kennedy sent his proposed Civil Rights Act to Congress.
• On August 28, the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom filled the US Capitol mall. It was on this occasion that King, from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, delivered his “I Have a Dream” speech.
• On September 15, four young black girls were killed in the bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama.
• On November 22, President Kennedy was assassinated.

Solid and Lasting Gains
      If 1963 was a year of activism and tragedy, 1964 was a year of solid and lasting gains:
• On January 23, the Twenty-fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution abolished the poll tax for federal elections, dismantling a major barrier to voting for African Americans.
• On July 2, President Lyndon Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The landmark legislation outlawed racial segregation in schools, public places, and employment. The act foreshadowed the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, which prohibits discrimination based on disability.
• On December 10, King was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. He was the youngest person ever to receive the award.

     In March 1965, King and other SCLC leaders planned a march from Selma, Alabama to the courthouse in Montgomery in support of voters’ rights. Their first attempt, on March 5, met with police brutality at the Edmund Pettus Bridge, just outside of Selma. Again, much of the nation was appalled by television images of violence. Two days later the leaders intended to march again, but King chose instead to observe a restraining order issued by a judge who had previously shown sympathy for the movement.

 Finally, beginning March 21, King and other leaders led hundreds of demonstrators in a non-violent, five-day, 54-mile-long march along U.S. Route 80 from Selma to Montgomery. Upon reaching Montgomery, the marchers set up camp at the City of St. Jude, a Roman Catholic hospital. That night, a "Stars for Freedom" rally included performances by Harry Belafonte, Tony Bennett, Frankie Laine, Peter Paul and Mary, Sammy Davis Jr. and Nina Simone. The next day, King delivered his "How Long, Not Long" speech beside the State Capitol Building. Within five months, President Lyndon Johnson had used the words “we shall overcome” in a speech and signed the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
 
     In November 1966, Edward Brooke was elected to the U.S. Senate from Massachusetts. He was the first black U.S. senator since 1881. On June 13, 1967, Thurgood Marshall became the first African American appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court.  

Tragedy and Triumph
 Less than a year after Marshall’s appointment, on April 4, 1968, when King was only 39 years old, an assassin’s bullet ripped through his neck. At the moment of impact, King was standing on a balcony at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee. The shot was fatal. 
    
      The 1950s and ’60s were the most momentous years for the U.S. Civil Rights Movement, and King had been the movement’s most prominent leader. The years following King’s assassination were marked by both success and disappointment. Though whites and blacks learned to live together with more tolerance and understanding, racism did not disappear. Crime and poverty continued disproportionately in black neighborhoods. But it was also true that the universities, the sports and entertainment industries, and most professions continued to knock down barriers that had prevented blacks and other minorities from advancing.  

 Forty years after King’s assassination, it still seemed impossible to many that a black man could be elected U.S. president. Nevertheless, on August 28, 2008, Illinois Senator Barack Obama became the presidential nominee of the Democratic Party. Then on November 4, 2008 he was elected the 44th president of the United States. His inauguration takes place on January 20, 2009, the day following Martin Luther King, Jr. Day.      

Two King Landmarks
Excerpts from “Letter from Birmingham Jail”
April 16, 1963

     Oppressed people cannot remain oppressed forever. The yearning for freedom eventually manifests itself, and that is what has happened to the American Negro. Something within has reminded him of his birthright of freedom, and something without has reminded him that it can be gained…. If one recognizes this vital urge that has engulfed the Negro community, one should readily understand why public demonstrations are taking place. The Negro has many pent-up resentments and latent frustrations, and he must release them. So let him march; let him make prayer pilgrimages to the city hall; let him go on freedom rides, and try to understand why he must do so. If his repressed emotions are not released in nonviolent ways, they will seek expression through violence; this is not a threat but a fact of history. So I have not said to my people: "Get rid of your discontent." Rather, I have tried to say that this normal and healthy discontent can be channeled into the creative outlet of nonviolent direct action. And now this approach is being termed extremist. 

But though I was initially disappointed at being categorized as an extremist, as I continued to think about the matter I gradually gained a measure of satisfaction from the label. Was not Jesus an extremist for love…? Was not Amos an extremist for justice…? Was not Paul an extremist for the Christian gospel…? Was not Martin Luther an extremist…and John Bunyan…and Abraham Lincoln…and Thomas Jefferson?

So the question is not whether we will be extremists, but what kind of extremists we will be. Will we be extremists for hate or for love? Will we be extremists for the preservation of injustice or for the extension of justice?… Perhaps the South, the nation and the world are in dire need of creative extremists….

There was a time when the church was very powerful—in the time when the early Christians rejoiced at being deemed worthy to suffer for what they believed. In those days the church was not merely a thermometer that recorded the ideas and principles of popular opinion; it was a thermostat that transformed the mores of society. Whenever the early Christians entered a town, the people in power became disturbed and immediately sought to convict the Christians for being "disturbers of the peace" and "outside agitators." But the Christians pressed on, in the conviction that they were "a colony of heaven," called to obey God rather than man. Small in number, they were big in commitment…. By their effort and example they brought an end to such ancient evils as infanticide and gladiatorial contests.

Things are different now. So often the contemporary church is a weak, ineffectual voice with an uncertain sound. So often it is an arch defender of the status quo. Far from being disturbed by the presence of the church, the power structure of the average community is consoled by the church’s silent and often even vocal sanction of things as they are. But the judgment of God is upon the church as never before. If today’s church does not recapture the sacrificial spirit of the early church, it will lose its authenticity, forfeit the loyalty of millions, and be dismissed as an irrelevant social club with no meaning.

Excerpts from the “I Have a Dream” Speech
August 28, 1963

 We have come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of now…. 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 quick sands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood….

But there is something that I must say to my people who stand on the warm threshold which leads into the palace of justice…. 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….

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 slave owners will be able to sit down together at a table of brotherhood…. 
  
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….

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!"