Note:
This has become
an annual post. And it will continue to
be. Because we all need to hear this.
If he had lived
the Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. would
have turned 85 years old today. Nothing
would have surprised him more.
Most folks know
and can quote snatches of two or three of his most famous speeches. The TV will play clips today and tomorrow of
the I
Had a Dream speech given at from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial at 1963’s March
on Washington for Jobs and Justice.
Maybe they will also so a tad of his prophetic I Have been to the Mountain Top
speech given to a church audience in Memphis
the night before he was killed.
His more devoted
fans treasure other things, perhaps most notably his Letter From a Birmingham Jail. But that still make liberals uncomfortable.
The quotes most
apt to surface are about non-violence or his blander paeans to
brotherhood. That’s because the largely White establishment media wants to use his birthday and official holiday as a sop to Blacks on one hand and an only thinly
veiled, almost hysterical plea to them “Don’t hurt us!"
Today, I would
like to celebrate with a collection of quotes from Dr. King that illustrate
exactly how radical, even revolutionary, he was. Let him speak for himself.
Freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must
be demanded by the oppressed.
Change does not roll in on the wheels of inevitability, but
comes through continuous struggle. And so we must straighten our backs and work
for our freedom. A man can’t ride you unless your back is bent.
Every man must decide whether he will walk in the light of
creative altruism or in the darkness of destructive selfishness.
Have we not come to such an impasse in the modern world that
we must love our enemies—or else? The chain reaction of evil—hate begetting hate,
wars producing more wars—must be broken, or else we shall be plunged into the
dark abyss of annihilation.
History will have to record that the greatest tragedy of
this period of social transition was not the strident clamor of the bad people,
but the appalling silence of the good people.
Human progress is neither automatic nor inevitable... Every
step toward the goal of justice requires sacrifice, suffering, and struggle;
the tireless exertions and passionate concern of dedicated individuals.
I have decided to stick with love. Hate is too great a
burden to bear.
I submit to you that if a man hasn’t discovered something
that he will die for, he isn’t fit to live.
It may be true that the law cannot make a man love me, but it
can keep him from lynching me, and I think that’s pretty important.
Philanthropy is commendable, but it must not cause the
philanthropist to overlook the circumstances of economic injustice which make
philanthropy necessary.
Property is intended to serve life, and no matter how much
we surround it with rights and respect, it has no personal being. It is part of
the earth man walks on. It is not man.
That old law about “an eye for an eye” leaves everybody
blind. The time is always right to do the right thing.
The hottest place in Hell is reserved for those who remain
neutral in times of great moral conflict.
The past is prophetic in that it asserts loudly that wars
are poor chisels for carving out peaceful tomorrows.
We are not makers of history. We are made by history.
When you are right you cannot be too radical; when you are
wrong, you cannot be too conservative.
No comments:
Post a Comment