Okla-homey
8/28/2006, 05:54 AM
http://img300.imageshack.us/img300/4060/normalpassion0mn.jpg
August 28, 1963, King's "I Have a Dream" Speech:
43 years ago today, on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., the modern civil rights movement reached its high-water mark when Martin Luther King, Jr., speaks to more than 200,000 people attending the March on Washington. The demonstrators--black and white, poor and rich--came together in the nation's capital to demand voting rights and equal opportunity for blacks and to appeal for an end to racial segregation and discrimination.
http://img300.imageshack.us/img300/5338/kingmarch7dh.gif
The peaceful rally was the largest assembly for a redress of grievances that the capital had ever seen, and King was the last speaker. With the statue of Abraham Lincoln towering behind him, King evoked the rhetorical talents he had developed as a Baptist preacher to articulate how the "Negro is still not free."
He told of the struggle ahead, stressing the importance of continued action and nonviolent protest. King was unquestionably influenced by the example and and successes of India's Mahatma Gandhi in developing and refining his belief that non-violent protest and civil disobedience were far superior to outright revolt or riot to achieve social and political aims in a democracy.
http://img209.imageshack.us/img209/3173/wwwindexhj6.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
Coming to the end of his prepared text (which, like other speakers that day, he had limited to seven minutes), he was overwhelmed by the moment and launched into an improvised sermon.
He told the hushed crowd, "Go back to Mississippi, go back to Alabama, go back to Georgia, go back to Louisiana, go back to the slums and ghettoes of our northern cities, knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed." Continuing, he began the refrain that made the speech one of the best known in U.S. history, second only to Lincoln's 1863 "Gettysburg Address":
http://img300.imageshack.us/img300/1727/kingspeech2nb.gif
"I have a dream," he boomed over the crowd stretching from the Lincoln Memorial to the Washington Monument, "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."
King had used the "I have a dream" theme before, in a handful of stump speeches, but never with the force and effectiveness of that hot August day in Washington.
He equated the civil rights movement with the highest and noblest ideals of the American tradition, and for many Americans--white and black--the importance of racial equality was seen with a new and blinding clarity. He ended his stirring, 16-minute speech with his vision of the fruit of racial harmony:
"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!'"
http://img300.imageshack.us/img300/494/openimage9fs.jpg
In the year after the March on Washington, the civil rights movement achieved two of its greatest successes: the ratification of the 24th Amendment to the Constitution, which abolished the poll tax and thus a barrier to poor voters in the South; and the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibited racial discrimination in employment and education and outlawed racial segregation in public facilities.
In October 1964, King was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
http://img244.imageshack.us/img244/8579/wwwkingnobelprizepu9.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
Excerpt from King's Nobel acceptance speech: I accept the Nobel Prize for Peace at a moment when twenty-two million Negroes of the United States of America are engaged in a creative battle to end the long night of racial injustice. I accept this award in behalf of a civil rights movement which is moving with determination and a majestic scorn for risk and danger to establish a reign of freedom and a rule of justice…
On April 4, 1968, he was shot to death while standing on a motel balcony in Memphis, Tennessee--he was 39 years old. The site of King's murder is now a historic property administered by a non-profit organization called "The National Civil Rights Museum, Inc." (Personally, I think it should be administered by the National Park Service as a National Historic Site, but that's just me. For whatever reason, that hasn't happened. )
The gunman was escaped convict James Earl Ray.
http://img300.imageshack.us/img300/2930/lorrainemotel1qy.jpg
King lies dying on the second floor walkway of Memphis' "Lorraine Motel."
http://img183.imageshack.us/img183/1945/wwwposter2lghe3.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
http://img206.imageshack.us/img206/875/insane7zoit6.jpg
August 28, 1963, King's "I Have a Dream" Speech:
43 years ago today, on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., the modern civil rights movement reached its high-water mark when Martin Luther King, Jr., speaks to more than 200,000 people attending the March on Washington. The demonstrators--black and white, poor and rich--came together in the nation's capital to demand voting rights and equal opportunity for blacks and to appeal for an end to racial segregation and discrimination.
http://img300.imageshack.us/img300/5338/kingmarch7dh.gif
The peaceful rally was the largest assembly for a redress of grievances that the capital had ever seen, and King was the last speaker. With the statue of Abraham Lincoln towering behind him, King evoked the rhetorical talents he had developed as a Baptist preacher to articulate how the "Negro is still not free."
He told of the struggle ahead, stressing the importance of continued action and nonviolent protest. King was unquestionably influenced by the example and and successes of India's Mahatma Gandhi in developing and refining his belief that non-violent protest and civil disobedience were far superior to outright revolt or riot to achieve social and political aims in a democracy.
http://img209.imageshack.us/img209/3173/wwwindexhj6.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
Coming to the end of his prepared text (which, like other speakers that day, he had limited to seven minutes), he was overwhelmed by the moment and launched into an improvised sermon.
He told the hushed crowd, "Go back to Mississippi, go back to Alabama, go back to Georgia, go back to Louisiana, go back to the slums and ghettoes of our northern cities, knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed." Continuing, he began the refrain that made the speech one of the best known in U.S. history, second only to Lincoln's 1863 "Gettysburg Address":
http://img300.imageshack.us/img300/1727/kingspeech2nb.gif
"I have a dream," he boomed over the crowd stretching from the Lincoln Memorial to the Washington Monument, "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."
King had used the "I have a dream" theme before, in a handful of stump speeches, but never with the force and effectiveness of that hot August day in Washington.
He equated the civil rights movement with the highest and noblest ideals of the American tradition, and for many Americans--white and black--the importance of racial equality was seen with a new and blinding clarity. He ended his stirring, 16-minute speech with his vision of the fruit of racial harmony:
"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!'"
http://img300.imageshack.us/img300/494/openimage9fs.jpg
In the year after the March on Washington, the civil rights movement achieved two of its greatest successes: the ratification of the 24th Amendment to the Constitution, which abolished the poll tax and thus a barrier to poor voters in the South; and the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibited racial discrimination in employment and education and outlawed racial segregation in public facilities.
In October 1964, King was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
http://img244.imageshack.us/img244/8579/wwwkingnobelprizepu9.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
Excerpt from King's Nobel acceptance speech: I accept the Nobel Prize for Peace at a moment when twenty-two million Negroes of the United States of America are engaged in a creative battle to end the long night of racial injustice. I accept this award in behalf of a civil rights movement which is moving with determination and a majestic scorn for risk and danger to establish a reign of freedom and a rule of justice…
On April 4, 1968, he was shot to death while standing on a motel balcony in Memphis, Tennessee--he was 39 years old. The site of King's murder is now a historic property administered by a non-profit organization called "The National Civil Rights Museum, Inc." (Personally, I think it should be administered by the National Park Service as a National Historic Site, but that's just me. For whatever reason, that hasn't happened. )
The gunman was escaped convict James Earl Ray.
http://img300.imageshack.us/img300/2930/lorrainemotel1qy.jpg
King lies dying on the second floor walkway of Memphis' "Lorraine Motel."
http://img183.imageshack.us/img183/1945/wwwposter2lghe3.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
http://img206.imageshack.us/img206/875/insane7zoit6.jpg