St. Augustine, Florida, 1964
In March 1964, King and the SCLC joined forces with Robert
Hayling's then-controversial movement in St. Augustine, Florida. Hayling's
group had been affiliated with the NAACP but was forced out of the organization
for advocating armed self-defense alongside nonviolent tactics. However, the
pacifist SCLC accepted them. King and the SCLC worked to bring white Northern
activists to St. Augustine, including a delegation of rabbis and the
72-year-old mother of the governor of Massachusetts, all of whom were arrested.
During June, the movement marched nightly through the city, "often facing counter demonstrations by
the Klan, and provoking violence that garnered national media attention."
Hundreds of the marchers were arrested and jailed. During this movement, the
Civil Rights Act of 1964 was passed.
Biddeford, Maine,
1964
On May 7, 1964, King spoke at Saint Francis College's "The Negro and the Quest for
Identity", in Biddeford, Maine. This was a symposium that brought
together many civil rights leaders. King spoke about how "We must get rid of the idea of superior and inferior races,"
through nonviolent tactics.
New York City, 1964
On February 6, 1964, King delivered the inaugural speech of
a lecture series initiated at the New School called "The American Race Crisis". In his remarks, King referred
to a conversation he had recently had with Jawaharlal Nehru in which he
compared the sad condition of many African Americans to that of India's
untouchables. In his March 18, 1964, interview with Robert Penn Warren, King
compared his activism to his father's, citing his training in non-violence as a
key difference. He also discusses the next phase of the civil rights movement
and integration.
Scripto strike in
Atlanta, 1964
Starting in November 1964, King supported a labor strike by
several hundred workers at the Scripto factory in Atlanta, just a few blocks
from Ebenezer Baptist. Many of the strikers were congregants of his church, and
the strike was supported by other civil rights leaders. King helped elevate the
labor dispute from a local to nationally known event and led the SCLC to
organize a nationwide boycott of Scripto products. However, as the strike
stretched into December, King, who wanted to focus more on a civil rights
campaign in Selma, Alabama, began to negotiate in secret with Scripto's
president Carl Singer and eventually brokered a deal where the SCLC would call
off their boycott in exchange for the company giving the striking employees their
Christmas bonuses. King's involvement in the strike ended on December 24 and a
contract between the company and union was signed on January 9.
Selma voting rights
movement and "Bloody Sunday",
1965
In December 1964, King and the SCLC joined forces with the
Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) in Selma, Alabama, where the
SNCC had been working on voter registration for several months. A local judge
issued an injunction that barred any gathering of three or more people
affiliated with the SNCC, SCLC, DCVL, or any of 41 named civil rights leaders.
This injunction temporarily halted civil rights activity until King defied it
by speaking at Brown Chapel on January 2, 1965. During the 1965 march to
Montgomery, Alabama, violence by state police and others against the peaceful
marchers resulted in much publicity, which made racism in Alabama visible
nationwide.
Acting on James Bevel's call for a march from Selma to
Montgomery, Bevel and other SCLC members, in partial collaboration with SNCC,
attempted to organize a march to the state's capital. The first attempt to
march on March 7, 1965, at which King was not present, was aborted because of
mob and police violence against the demonstrators. This day has become known as
Bloody Sunday and was a major turning point in the effort to gain public
support for the civil rights movement. It was the clearest demonstration up to
that time of the dramatic potential of King and Bevel's nonviolence strategy.
On March 5, King met with officials in the Johnson
Administration to request an injunction against any prosecution of the
demonstrators. He did not attend the march due to church duties, but he later
wrote, "If I had any idea that the
state troopers would use the kind of brutality they did, I would have felt
compelled to give up my church duties altogether to lead the line."
Footage of police brutality against the protesters was broadcast extensively
and aroused national public outrage.
King next attempted to organize a march for March 9. The
SCLC petitioned for an injunction in federal court against Alabama; this was
denied and the judge issued an order blocking the march until after a hearing.
Nonetheless, King led marchers on March 9 to the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma,
and then held a short prayer session before turning the marchers around and
asking them to disperse so as not to violate the court order. The unexpected ending
of this second march aroused the surprise and anger of many within the local
movement. The march finally went ahead fully on March 25, 1965. At the
conclusion of the march on the steps of the state capitol, King delivered a
speech that became known as "How
Long, Not Long". King stated that equal rights for African Americans
could not be far away, "because the
arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice" and "you shall reap what you sow".
Chicago open housing
movement, 1966
In 1966, after several successes in the south, King, Bevel,
and others in the civil rights organizations took the movement to the North.
King and Ralph Abernathy, both from the middle class, moved into a building at
1550 S. Hamlin Avenue, in the slums of North Lawndale on Chicago's West Side,
as an educational experience and to demonstrate their support and empathy for
the poor.
The SCLC formed a coalition with Coordinating Council of
Community Organizations (CCCO), an organization founded by Albert Raby, and the
combined organizations' efforts were fostered under the aegis of the Chicago
Freedom Movement. During that spring, several white couple/black couple tests
of real estate offices uncovered racial steering, discriminatory processing of
housing requests by couples who were exact matches in income and background.
Several larger marches were planned and executed: in Bogan, Belmont Cragin,
Jefferson Park, Evergreen Park, Gage Park, Marquette Park, and others.
King later stated and Abernathy wrote that the movement received
a worse reception in Chicago than in the South. Marches, especially the one
through Marquette Park on August 5, 1966, were met by thrown bottles and
screaming throngs. Rioting seemed very possible. King's beliefs militated
against his staging a violent event, and he negotiated an agreement with Mayor
Richard J. Daley to cancel a march in order to avoid the violence that he
feared would result. King was hit by a brick during one march, but continued to
lead marches in the face of personal danger.
When King and his allies returned to the South, they left
Jesse Jackson, a seminary student who had previously joined the movement in the
South, in charge of their organization. Jackson continued their struggle for
civil rights by organizing the Operation Breadbasket movement that targeted
chain stores that did not deal fairly with blacks.
A 1967 CIA document declassified in 2017 downplayed King's
role in the "black militant situation" in Chicago, with a source
stating that King "sought at least
constructive, positive projects."
Opposition to the
Vietnam War
The black revolution
is much more than a struggle for the rights of Negroes. It is forcing America
to face all its interrelated flaws—racism, poverty, militarism, and
materialism. It is exposing evils that are rooted deeply in the whole structure
of our society. It reveals systemic rather than superficial flaws and suggests
that radical reconstruction of society itself is the real issue to be faced–Martin Luther King Jr.
We must recognize that
we can't solve our problem now until there is a radical redistribution of
economic and political power... this means a revolution of values and other
things. We must see now that the evils of racism, economic exploitation, and
militarism are all tied together… you can't really get rid of one without
getting rid of the others… the whole structure of American life must be
changed. America is a hypocritical nation and [we] must put [our] own house in
order.—Martin Luther King Jr.
King was long opposed to American involvement in the Vietnam
War, but at first avoided the topic in public speeches to avoid the
interference with civil rights goals that criticism of President Johnson's policies
might have created. At the urging of SCLC's former Director of Direct Action
and now the head of the Spring Mobilization Committee to End the War in
Vietnam, James Bevel, and inspired by the outspokenness of Muhammad Ali, King
eventually agreed to publicly oppose the war as opposition was growing among
the American public.
During an April 4, 1967, appearance at the New York City
Riverside Church, King delivered a speech titled "Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence". He spoke
strongly against the U.S.'s role in the war, arguing that the U.S. was in
Vietnam "to occupy it as an American
colony" and calling the U.S. government "the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today".
He connected the war with economic injustice, arguing that the country needed
serious moral change:
A true revolution of
values will soon look uneasily on the glaring contrast of poverty and wealth.
With righteous indignation, it will look across the seas and see individual
capitalists of the West investing huge sums of money in Asia, Africa and South
America, only to take the profits out with no concern for the social betterment
of the countries, and say: "This is not just."
King opposed the Vietnam War because it took money and
resources that could have been spent on social welfare at home. He summed up
this aspect by saying, "A nation
that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on
programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death." He stated
that North Vietnam "did not begin to
send in any large number of supplies or men until American forces had arrived
in the tens of thousands", and accused the U.S. of having killed a
million Vietnamese, "mostly
children". King also criticized American opposition to North Vietnam's
land reforms.
King's opposition cost him significant support among white
allies, including President Johnson, Billy Graham, union leaders and powerful
publishers. "The press is being
stacked against me", King said, complaining of what he described as a
double standard that applauded his nonviolence at home, but deplored it when
applied "toward little brown
Vietnamese children". Life magazine called the speech "demagogic slander that sounded like a
script for Radio Hanoi", and The Washington Post declared that King
had "diminished his usefulness to
his cause, his country, his people."
The "Beyond
Vietnam" speech reflected King's evolving political advocacy in his
later years, which paralleled the teachings of the progressive Highlander
Research and Education Center, with which he was affiliated. King began to
speak of the need for fundamental changes in the American political and
economic situation, and more frequently expressed his opposition to the war and
his desire to see a redistribution of resources to correct injustice. He
guarded his language in public to avoid being linked to communism, but in
private he sometimes spoke of his support for democratic socialism.
King stated in "Beyond
Vietnam" that "true
compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar ... it comes to see that an
edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring." King quoted a
U.S. official who said that from Vietnam to Latin America, the country was "on the wrong side of a world
revolution." King condemned America's "alliance with the landed gentry of Latin America", and
said that the U.S. should support "the
shirtless and barefoot people" in the Third World rather than
suppressing their attempts at revolution.
King's stance on Vietnam encouraged Allard K. Lowenstein,
William Sloane Coffin and Norman Thomas, with the support of anti-war
Democrats, to attempt to persuade King to run against President Johnson in the
1968 presidential election. King contemplated but ultimately decided against
the proposal as he felt uneasy with politics and considered himself better
suited to activism.
On April 15, 1967, King spoke at an anti-war march from
Manhattan's Central Park to the United Nations. The march was organized by the
Spring Mobilization Committee to End the War in Vietnam under Chairman James
Bevel. At the U.N. King brought up issues of civil rights and the draft:
I have not urged a
mechanical fusion of the civil rights and peace movements. There are people who
have come to see the moral imperative of equality, but who cannot yet see the
moral imperative of world brotherhood. I would like to see the fervor of the
civil-rights movement imbued into the peace movement to instill it with greater
strength. And I believe everyone has a duty to be in both the civil-rights and
peace movements. But for those who presently choose but one, I would hope they
will finally come to see the moral roots common to both.
Seeing an opportunity to unite civil rights and anti-war
activists, Bevel convinced King to become even more active in the anti-war
effort. Despite his growing public opposition to the Vietnam War, King was not
fond of the hippie culture which developed from the anti-war movement. In his
1967 Massey Lecture, King stated:
The importance of the
hippies is not in their unconventional behavior, but in the fact that hundreds
of thousands of young people, in turning to a flight from reality, are
expressing a profoundly discrediting view on the society they emerge from.
On January 13, 1968, King called for a large march on
Washington against "one of history's
most cruel and senseless wars":
We need to make clear
in this political year, to congressmen on both sides of the aisle and to the
president of the United States, that we will no longer tolerate, we will no
longer vote for men who continue to see the killings of Vietnamese and
Americans as the best way of advancing the goals of freedom and self-determination
in Southeast Asia.
Correspondence with
Thích Nhất Hạnh
Thích Nhất Hạnh was an influential Vietnamese Buddhist who
wrote a letter to Martin Luther King Jr. in 1965 entitled: "In Search of the Enemy of Man". It was during his 1966
stay in the US that Nhất Hạnh met with King and urged him to publicly denounce
the Vietnam War. In 1967, King gave a famous speech at the Riverside Church in
New York City, his first to publicly question U.S. involvement in Vietnam.
Later that year, King nominated Nhất Hạnh for the Nobel Peace Prize. In his
nomination, King said, "I do not
personally know of anyone more worthy of [this prize] than this gentle monk
from Vietnam. His ideas for peace, if applied, would build a monument to
ecumenism, to world brotherhood, to humanity".
Poor People's
Campaign, 1968
In 1968, King and the SCLC organized the "Poor People's Campaign" to
address issues of economic justice. King traveled the country to assemble "a multiracial army of the poor"
that would march on Washington to engage in nonviolent civil disobedience at
the Capitol until Congress created an "economic
bill of rights".
The campaign was preceded by King's final book, Where Do We
Go from Here: Chaos or Community? Which laid out his view of how to address
social issues and poverty? King quoted from Henry George's book Progress and
Poverty, particularly in support of a guaranteed basic income. The campaign
culminated in a march on Washington, D.C., demanding economic aid to the
poorest communities of the U.S.
King and the SCLC called on the government to invest in
rebuilding America's cities. He felt that Congress had shown "hostility to the poor" by
spending "military funds with
alacrity and generosity". He contrasted this with the situation faced
by poor Americans, claiming that Congress had merely provided "poverty funds with miserliness".
His vision was for change that was more revolutionary than mere reform: he
cited systematic flaws of "racism,
poverty, militarism and materialism", and argued that "reconstruction of society itself is the
real issue to be faced."
The Poor People's Campaign was controversial even within the
civil rights movement. Rustin resigned from the march, stating that the goals
of the campaign were too broad, that its demands were unrealizable, and that he
thought that these campaigns would accelerate repression on the poor and the
black.
Global policy
King was one of the signatories of the agreement to convene
a convention for drafting a world constitution. As a result, in 1968 a World
Constituent Assembly convened to draft and adopt the Constitution for the
Federation of Earth.
Assassination and
aftermath
On March 29, 1968, King went to Memphis, Tennessee, in
support of the black sanitation workers, who were represented by AFSCME Local
1733. The workers had been on strike since March 12 for higher wages and better
treatment. In one incident, black street repairmen received pay for two hours
when they were sent home because of bad weather, but white employees were paid for
the full day.
On April 3, King addressed a rally and delivered his "I've Been to the Mountaintop"
address at Mason Temple. King's flight to Memphis had been delayed by a bomb
threat against his plane. In reference to the bomb threat, King said:
And then I got to
Memphis. And some began to say the threats, or talk about the threats that were
out. What would happen to me from some of our sick white brothers? Well, I
don't know what will happen now. We've got some difficult days ahead. But it
doesn't matter with me now. Because I've been to the mountaintop. And I don't
mind. Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place.
But I'm not concerned about that now. I just want to do God's will. And He's
allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I've looked over. And I've seen the Promised
Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as
a people, will get to the Promised Land. So I'm happy, tonight. I'm not worried
about anything. I'm not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the
coming of the Lord.
King was booked in Room 306 at the Lorraine Motel in
Memphis. Ralph Abernathy, who was present at the assassination, testified to
the United States House Select Committee on Assassinations that King and his
entourage stayed at Room 306 so often that it was known as the "King-Abernathy suite". According
to Jesse Jackson, who was present, King's last words were spoken to musician
Ben Branch, who was scheduled to perform that night at an event King was
attending: "Ben, make sure you play
'Take My Hand, Precious Lord' in the meeting tonight. Play it real
pretty."
King was fatally shot by James Earl Ray at 6:01 p.m.,
Thursday, April 4, 1968, as he stood on the motel's second-floor balcony. The
bullet entered through his right cheek, smashing his jaw, then traveled down
his spinal cord before lodging in his shoulder. Abernathy heard the shot from
inside the motel room and ran to the balcony to find King on the floor.
After emergency surgery, King died at St. Joseph's Hospital
at 7:05 p.m. According to biographer Taylor Branch, King's autopsy revealed
that though only 39 years old, he "had
the heart of a 60 year old", which Branch attributed to stress. King
was initially interred in South View Cemetery in South Atlanta, but in 1977 his
remains were transferred to a tomb on the site of the Martin Luther King Jr.
National Historical Park.
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