MARTIN LUTHER KING 1929 – 1968

            Martin Luther King Jr. was born on 15 Jan­uary 1929. His father was the pastor at the Ebenetzer Baptist* Church, who took his duties beyond simply serving his church, and was involved with the National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People.

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*Baptist — a member of a Christian church that believes in. baptizing by dipping the whole person into water. Baptists belong to the Protestant denominations which assert that baptism can be administrated only upon a personal profes­sion of Christian faith (thus not to infants).

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         King first met racism at the age of six, when a white friend’s father said that they could no longer play together because King was “coloured”. His own parents explained about slavery and made an important point: “Don’t let it make you feel you are not as good as white people”.

          King’s progress through school was fast. At 15 he went to a theological college in Connecticut. Here, he expressed doubt about the value of religion, but was eventually convinced of its relevance to the civil-rights struggle. At 19 he was ordained. With a degree in sociology, he went to Crozer The­ological Seminary in Chester, Pennsylvania, to study for a degree in divinity. He came top of his class and graduated in 1951. He went on to study for a doctorate in system­atic theology at Boston University.

          After completing his studies, he felt that he should return home. He began work at Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Mont­gomery, Alabama. The church was attend­ed makes by the educated black middle clans. Once installed, he set about organizing his congregation. His interest in the communi­ty and his effective oratory made him a pop­ular and respected figure.

           Montgomery had strict segregation laws, for example, rules about what black passengers could and couldn’t do on buses. Resentment at these rules ran high. On 1 December 1955, Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat to a white and was taken to jail. On 5 Decem­ber the local black ministers met to discuss organizing a boycott. King at only 26 was elected their spokesman.

           Out of this meeting came the Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA) King had twenty minutes to prepare an address to be given to about 5,000 people. His speech had two major trusts democracy and overthrow­ing oppression. He urged blacks to stand up for themselves also appealed to their self- discipline.

           The bus company and the city refused to agree to their demands, so the MIA organized a car pool, which the police harassed, arresting black drivers, including King. On 1 February the MIA’s lawyer challenged the Alabama segregation laws in a federal court. At the end of February a grand jury charged the MIA’s leadership with breaking a 1921 anti­-boycott law. Rather than wait to be arrested, all 89 leaders presented themselves at the court-house in front of a cheering crowd.

          The boycott ran for 381 days, attracting national and international interest. The Su­preme Court* banned segregation, serving an order on Montgomery’s white officials on 20 December 1956.

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*Supreme Court — heads the judicial system of each state.

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                 King received world wide acclaim — and its approval of white liberal American.

               King believed in democratic change and that it was vital for blacks to use the right to vote. His world-wide reputation was grow­ing. He deliberately kept the race issue to the fore, not clouding his message by associ­ating with other radical political movements.

               In 1960, King became involved in the “sit-tin” movement; black students would go to cafes and such and demand service. King participated in Atlanta were he and 51 oth­ers were arrested in October. He had to ap­pear before an ultra-bigoted white judge, who sentenced him to four months’ hard labour. King was clearly being victimized. Two days later, he was granted bail after the intervention of Senator Robert Kennedy, future Attorney General* and brother of the then Presidential candidate, John Kennedy.

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*Kennedy, Robert Francis (1925-1968) — served as attorney general (the chief law officer in the governments of English- speaking countries) of the USA from 1961 to 1964 and U.S. Senator from New York from 1965 to 1968. He was assassi­nated in Los Angeles in June 1968, while campaigning for the Democratic nomination for President.

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            Once in power, the President’s support for civil rights was tepid. He did not want to alienate Democrat voters in the South. Black students took the initiative, form­ing the Student. Non-Violent Coordinating Committee to try to spend up federal adop­tion of civil rights. They protested in some of the most reactionary parts of the South. They were beaten up, arrested, jailed and shot, but they did not give up. The Con­gress of Racial Equality started Freedom Rides, travelling with whites and trying to use all the facilities en route, a protest that was greeted with white mob violence. As a result of the Freedom Rides, the In­terstate Commerce Commission finally out­lawed segregation in 1961.

         The next confrontation took place in the town of Albany, Georgia. Chief of Police, Laurie Pritchett, had made plans to deflate the protest. He realized that brutal handling of the demonstrations would lead to federal intervention, a grave threat to Southern segregationists. Anticipating King’s arriv­al and tactics, he drilled his men for months so that they would handle the demonstra­tors effectively without violence. The Alba­ny movement faded out, without gaining of its demands.

          To avoid the mistakes of Albany, a cam­paign in Birmingham, Alabama, was planned. Birmingham was a town renowned for its racism and a fertile recruiting ground for the Ku-Klux-Klan*.

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*Ku-Klux-Klan — a group of white secret societies who op­pose the advancement of blacks, Jews, and other minority groups.

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              King was jailed. While in solitary confinement he read an attack on the arms of the protest by white clergymen. In response he wrote the “Let­ter from Birmingham City Jail”. This did much to persuade the Northern churches over a million copies were printed-to fol­low their consciences and to urge demonstrations against racism.

               King was tried locally, and convinced of crim­inal contempt. When he came out of jail, he found out that the protest was receiving less support than he had hoped. It was suggested recruiting children. Thousands of black schoolchildren converged on the starting point for the demonstration. King achieved the sort of publicity that the campaign craved. But hundreds of children were ar­rested. The dogs were set on demonstration. This was fully reported in the world’s media and seen on TV in the U.S. and overseas. President Kennedy went on television on 11 June and declared civil rights to be a moral issue. On 19 June a new Civil Rights Bill was submitted to Congress. King seemed to be getting the commitment he wanted from the white government.

             To maintain pressure, it was decided to hold aMarch for Freedom in Washington. On 28 August 1963, 250,000 demonstration turned up in the nation and capital. By the Lincoln Memorial, King reminded his audience of Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation* and then delivered his most famous speech, “I have a dream”.

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*Emancipation Proclamation — a historic document that led to the end of slavery in the USA. President Abraham Lincoln is­sued the proclamation on January 1, 1860, during the Civil War.

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              The crowd responded ecstatically, but South­ern whites did not easily surrender a sys­tem that favoured them. Black leaders were worried about lack of support from North­ern whites. Meanwhile, as civil-rights lead­ers were affected and jailed, the FBI looked on. King accused the FBI* of supporting Southern segregationists.

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*FBI (Federal Bureau of Investigation) — the chief investigat­ing bureau of the U.S. Department of Justice.

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                 Throughout 1963 and 1964 the FBI pur­sued King, and tried to prevent him receiv­ing the honours and awards being showered on him, one of which was the Nobel Prize for Peace in 1964.

                 The 1964 Civil Rights Act had not enfran­chised all Southern blacks and King made this his next aim. He turned his attention to Selma. On 7 March 1965, 600 demon­strators began a march from Selma to Mont­gomery. They were assaulted with batons, whips and tear-gas. This was seen on tele­vision and America was disgusted. Presi­dent Johnson* called in federal troopers to project the marchers, showing the first Government support for the campaign.

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* Johnson, Lyndon Baines (1908-1973) — 36^lh President of the USA 1963-1969.

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                  He had been considering a voting rights bill and the nation’s reaction spurred him on. The bill was presented to Congress on and August 1965. It seemed as if the struggle was over.

                   The Vietnam War* was absorbing the gov­ernment’s attention at this time.

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* Vietnam War — the longest war in which the US took part (1957-1975).

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                  King had not spoken out against it became it would have lost him Johnson’s support but the escalating cost of the war as the expense of the War on Poverty, initiative at home de­stroyed King’s faith in the American dream. He denounced the war outside the United Nations building in New York. Johnson was furious, as was most of the media. Riots broke out in Detroit and elsewhere, in which 83 people, mostly black, were killed.

                  King decided that his real target should be economic injustice and began the Poor Peo­ple’s Campaign. On 18 March 1968 he went to Memphis to support dustmen striking for union recognition and a wage rise. Ten days later, he led a protest to City Hall, which quickly degenerated into violence. King’s supporters persuaded him to organize a more successful march.

                    On 4 April, he learnt that a federal judge had rejected the city’s request that the planned march should be banned. But King never made it to the event: that evening, standing on his motel balcony, he was shot. We may never know who conspired to as­sassinate him it has been suggested that the FBI was involved, as it feared his becoming a black Messiah.

                In 1983, Congress recognized King’s stat­ure as a human rights campaigner by mak­ing his birthday a national holiday, just as are those of George Washington and Abra­ham Lincoln.