[Congressional Record Volume 153, Number 8 (Tuesday, January 16, 2007)]
[House]
[Pages H519-H532]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
OBSERVING THE BIRTHDAY OF MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR.
Mr. CONYERS. Madam Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and agree to
the resolution (H. Res. 61) observing the Birthday of Martin Luther
King, Jr., and encouraging the people of the United States to observe
the Birthday of Martin Luther King, Jr., and the life and legacy of Dr.
Martin Luther King, Jr., and for other purposes.
The Clerk read as follows:
H. Res. 61
Whereas Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King, Junior, was
born January 15, 1929;
Whereas Dr. King attended segregated public schools in
Georgia, and began attending Morehouse College in Atlanta,
Georgia, at the age of 15;
Whereas in February of 1948, Dr. King was ordained in the
Christian ministry at the age of 19 at Ebenezer Baptist
Church, in Atlanta, Georgia, and became Assistant Pastor of
Ebenezer Baptist Church;
Whereas Dr. King was awarded a Bachelor of Arts degree in
1948 from Morehouse College, a Bachelor of Divinity degree in
1951 from Crozer Theological Seminary in Pennsylvania, and a
Doctor of Philosophy degree in theology in 1955 from Boston
University;
Whereas in Boston, Massachusetts, Dr. King met Coretta
Scott, his life partner and fellow civil rights activist;
Whereas on June 18, 1953, Dr. King and Coretta Scott were
married and later had two sons and two daughters;
Whereas in 1954, Dr. King accepted the call of Dexter
Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama, and was pastor
from September 1954 to November 1959, when he resigned to
move back to Atlanta to lead the Southern Christian
Leadership Conference;
Whereas Dr. King led the Montgomery, Alabama, bus boycott
for 381 days to protest the arrest of Rosa Parks and the
segregation of the bus system of Montgomery, during which
time Dr. King was arrested and the home of Dr. King was
bombed;
Whereas Dr. King responded to arrests and violence with
non-violence and courage in the face of hatred;
Whereas the Montgomery bus boycott was the first great
nonviolent civil rights demonstration of contemporary times
in the United States;
Whereas on December 21, 1956, the Supreme Court declared
laws requiring segregation on buses unconstitutional;
Whereas between 1957 and 1968, Dr. King traveled more than
6,000,000 miles, spoke more than 2,500 times, and wrote five
books and numerous articles supporting efforts around the
country to end injustice and bring about social change and
desegregation;
Whereas from 1960 until his death in 1968, Dr. King was co-
pastor with his father at Ebenezer Baptist Church;
Whereas on August 28, 1963, Dr. King led the March on
Washington, D.C., the largest rally of the civil rights
movement, during which, from the steps of the Lincoln
Memorial and before a crowd of more than 200,000 people, Dr.
King delivered his famous ``I Have A Dream'' speech, one of
the classic orations in American history;
Whereas Dr. King was a champion of nonviolence, fervently
advocated nonviolent resistance as the strategy to end
segregation and racial discrimination in America, and in
1964, at age 35, became the youngest man to be awarded the
Nobel Peace Prize in recognition for his efforts;
Whereas through his work and reliance on nonviolent
protest, Dr. King was instrumental in the passage of the
Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965;
Whereas the work of Dr. King created a basis of
understanding and respect and helped communities, and the
United States as a whole, to act cooperatively and
courageously to restore tolerance, justice, and equality
between people;
Whereas on the evening of April 4, 1968, Dr. King was
assassinated while standing on the balcony of his motel room
in Memphis, Tennessee, where he was to lead sanitation
workers in protest against low wages and intolerable working
conditions;
Whereas Dr. King dedicated his life to securing the
fundamental principles of the United States of liberty and
justice for all United States citizens;
Whereas Dr. King was the leading civil rights advocate of
his time, spearheading the civil rights movement in the
United States during the 1950's and 1960's and earning world-
wide recognition as an eloquent and articulate spokesperson
for equality;
Whereas in the face of hatred and violence, Dr. King
preached a doctrine of nonviolence and civil disobedience to
combat segregation, discrimination, and racial injustice, and
believed that people have the moral capacity to care for
other people;
Whereas Dr. King awakened the conscience and consciousness
of the United States and used his message of hope to bring
people together to build the ``Beloved Community'', a
community of justice, at peace with itself;
Whereas in 1968, Representative John Conyers introduced
legislation to establish the Birthday of Martin Luther King,
Jr. as a Federal holiday;
Whereas Coretta Scott King led the massive campaign to
establish Dr. King's birthday as a Federal holiday;
Whereas in 1983, Congress passed and President Ronald
Reagan signed legislation creating the Birthday of Martin
Luther King, Jr. holiday, which is now observed in more than
100 countries;
Whereas Dr. King's wife and indispensable partner, Coretta
Scott King, was a woman of quiet courage and great dignity
who marched alongside her husband and became an international
advocate for peace and human rights;
Whereas Coretta Scott King, who had been actively engaged
in the civil rights movement as a politically and socially
conscious young woman, continued after her husband's death to
lead the United States toward greater justice and equality,
traveling the world on behalf of racial and economic justice,
peace and non-violence, women's and children's rights, gay
rights, religious freedom, full employment, health care, and
education until her death on January 30, 2006;
Whereas the values of faith, compassion, courage, truth,
justice, and non-violence that guided Dr. and Mrs. King's
dream for America will be celebrated and preserved by the
Martin Luther King, Jr., National Memorial on the National
Mall between the Lincoln Memorial and the Jefferson Memorial
and in the new National Museum of African American History
and Culture that will be located in the shadow of the
Washington Monument; and
Whereas Dr. King's actions and leadership made the United
States a better place and the American people a better
people: Now, therefore, be it
Resolved, That the House of Representatives--
(1) observes the Birthday of Martin Luther King, Jr.;
(2) pledges to advance the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther
King, Jr.; and
(3) encourages the people of the United States to--
(A) observe the Birthday of Martin Luther King, Jr., and
the life of Dr. King;
(B) commemorate the legacy of Dr. King, so that, as Dr.
King hoped, ``one day this Nation will rise up and live out
the true meaning of its creed: `We hold these truths to be
[[Page H520]]
self-evident; that all men are created equal;' ''; and
(C) remember the message of Dr. King and rededicate
themselves to Dr. King's goal of a free and just United
States.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from
Michigan (Mr. Conyers) and the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Chabot) each
will control 20 minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Michigan.
General Leave
Mr. CONYERS. Madam Speaker and ladies and gentlemen of the House, I
ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative days in which
to insert additional material concerning House Resolution 61 into the
Congressional Record.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the
gentleman from Michigan?
There was no objection.
Mr. CONYERS. I also want everyone to know that the gentleman from
Georgia's resolution, John Lewis, Members will be able to join on it up
until the time that we have a recorded vote in case there are Members
coming back that may not be aware of this.
Today we have joined so many others in the Nation in honoring, in my
judgment, our greatest American, Martin Luther King, Jr.
{time} 1415
As the original author of the bill 4 days after his assassination,
and one who worked on it for 15 years until it was passed in 1983, I am
delighted to support and endorse the resolution of another supporter
and one who worked closely with Dr. King, the gentleman from Georgia,
John Lewis.
It was an interesting time for me yesterday. Not only did City Year,
a national service movement that has young people pledging to work in
schools, parks, and neighborhoods full-time for 10 months, headed by
their president, Penny Bailey, in which I delivered my remarks about
Dr. King, but I was also at Central Methodist Church in downtown
Detroit, where Dr. King frequently came for his Easter or the Friday
before Easter addresses, and where I was honored on his last visit to
be supported by his actual endorsement.
And so I come here doubly proud of the fact that I was able to work
with Dr. King as a young lawyer, but also to enjoy his support. Much of
it came, of course, from Rosa Parks, who left Alabama and came to
Detroit when she couldn't get work anymore. And she was a seamstress.
And I was very happy to welcome her to my congressional office, where
she worked for more than two decades. And her and Dr. King's fame and
recognition kept growing and growing as she was called around the world
to receive tributes.
And I remember Dr. King's very important receiving of the Nobel
Prize. And it was about the question of peace. And it was not just
racial discrimination. Dr. King was not a one-note person. He was a
visionary. Jobs, justice, economic justice, political justice, and
peace.
And we find ourselves wrapped up in these same considerations even
today as we begin the third week of the 110th Congress. We need voter
integrity. We need protection for those who seek the ballot. But more
than anything else, I am reminded of the fact that we need to find a
way out of the war in Iraq, an unnecessary, sad occasion in our
history.
And you keep thinking, what would King have said? And I remember that
one thing he said is that those who fail to talk about what is
important really miss their chance in history to do something that is
significant.
Madam Speaker, because we have so many speakers, I reserve the
balance of my time.
Mr. CHABOT. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I might
consume.
Madam Speaker, I rise in strong support of House Resolution 61, which
observes and celebrates the birthday of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.,
and invites all Americans to join in this commemoration.
Dr. King's pursuit of social change and making this country worthy of
its heritage was evident in all of his work. He was a member of the
Executive Committee of the National Association for the Advancement of
Colored People, the NAACP. He became the leader of the Montgomery
Improvement Association which, of course, was the organization
responsible for one of the most important nonviolent demonstrations of
modern times in the United States, the 382-day bus boycott.
In 1957, Dr. King was elected President of the Southern Christian
Leadership Conference. Between 1957 and 1968, Dr. King appeared
wherever he saw injustice. The injustice he saw took him many miles,
and the speeches that he made are still taught in schools. They were
taught yesterday. They are taught all over the country. They are things
which we really do need to listen to and learn from and still have many
things to learn from the things that Dr. King said.
Dr. King led a massive protest in Birmingham, Alabama, that drew the
attention of the world, sparking what he called a ``coalition of
conscience.''
Dr. King later directed a peaceful march here in Washington, DC, a
march that a quarter of a million people attended, where he delivered
his now famous ``I Have a Dream'' speech.
At the age of 35, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., was the youngest man
to receive the Nobel Peace Prize. When notified of his selection, he
announced that he would turn over all of the prize money to further the
civil rights movement.
On the evening of April 4, 1968, while standing on the balcony of his
motel room in Memphis, Tennessee, where he was to lead a protest march
in sympathy with striking sanitation workers in that city, he was
gunned down.
Dr. King's name is synonymous with the civil rights movement. His
life was devoted to changing the conscience of this Nation. His
experiences shaped his character, and through them, one of the greatest
nonviolent leaders of our country has ever known was created.
Today, we honor the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King for his service
and strength and devotion to the principle that all Americans are
entitled to equal treatment under the law in this great Nation. We are
a greater Nation because Dr. King lived.
Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. CONYERS. Madam Speaker, I yield now to the one person in the
House and the United States Senate who now presently knows and knew Dr.
King and his family, and the civil rights movement more than any other
person among us, and that is, of course, the Honorable John Lewis from
Georgia, and I recognize him for 3 minutes.
Mr. LEWIS of Georgia. Madam Speaker, I want to thank my friend, my
colleague, the chairman, for yielding.
Madam Speaker, it is only fitting and appropriate that we salute and
commemorate Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., as we celebrate his 78th
birthday.
Martin Luther King, Jr., was a man of peace, a man of love, a man of
nonviolence. He must be considered one of the founding fathers of the
new America.
Because of his dedication to the cause of injustice and his fight for
human dignity, he wrestled with the very soul of this Nation and pushed
it to reach for its greater destiny.
Dr. King had the ability to produce light in dark places; the ability
to bring the dirt and the filth out from under the American rug, out of
the cracks and the corner into the open light in order for us to deal
with it.
He injected a new meaning into the very veins of our society and gave
his life to make our democracy real. What he did and what he said and
what he sacrificed inspired an entire generation and his power still
rings today throughout the Nation and around the world.
We are a different country. We are a better people today. Martin
Luther King, Jr., believed in the power of love over hate, the power of
nonviolence over violence, the power of peace over war. He liberated
all of us, black and white, Hispanic, Asian American and Native
American.
If Dr. King could speak to us today, right now, he would say we must
stop the madness of the war and bring our young people home. He would
say that war is an ineffective tool of our foreign policy.
We must struggle against injustice and stand up for our goals. If
peace is our goal, then peaceful ends must take peaceful means.
Dr. King would say, means and ends are inseparable. He would say we
must
[[Page H521]]
find a way to live together as brothers and sisters or we will perish
as fools.
39 years later, we must rededicate ourselves to the struggle that was
his struggle, and continue to see the goals that were his goals.
We know that his dream has not been fulfilled. It must be our task,
our obligation, our mission, our mandate to renew our commitment to his
dream.
Mr. CHABOT. Madam Speaker, I yield such time as he might consume to
the gentleman from California (Mr. Daniel E. Lungren).
Mr. DANIEL E. LUNGREN of California. Madam Speaker, I rise in support
of this resolution and in support of the honoring of the birthday of
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
I can recall, two decades ago, being on this floor with the gentleman
from Michigan (Mr. Conyers), and fighting to make sure that we
established this holiday. Some may have forgotten that it took more
than one time for this to occur. The resolution was defeated on two
previous occasions. And I recall that some of us on our side of the
aisle voted against it for fiscal reasons at that time.
And I also recall, after having that vote, going home and talking
with my wife and saying, you know, I think I did the wrong thing; and
her giving me the great advice that she gave me, she said, well, if you
did, you'd better do something about it.
And at that time I had the opportunity to approach Congressman Jack
Kemp, who had voted against it as well for ``fiscal reasons,'' and
working with Ed Bethune and Newt Gingrich and others, attempting to
garner enough support from some on our side of the aisle to ensure that
the vote would go forward and that we would honor Dr. Martin Luther
King.
And the argument that was made at that time that I think was
successful was that we have many different points of view, as we do
today on the war, as we did at that time in how we appropriately deal
with the then existing threat of the Soviet Union, many different
issues that divided us in terms of our approach. But it seemed
important for us to come together from all these different points of
view to recognize Dr. Martin Luther King's contribution to this country
where he brought people who had differences of opinion together in a
united effort that reminded us very vividly that we are one people
dedicated to the proposition that all men and women are created equal.
And it was cutting through the differences that we had at that time on
a number of different issues that allowed us to come together.
And I can recall going to visit Mr. Conyers in his office and asking
him whether it would be of any benefit for those of us who had
initially opposed the resolution to come forward in support of it. And
I can recall the gentleman from Michigan's statement at that time,
suggesting that we all ought to come together.
So today, as we are again in a period of time in which there are
sincere, passionate differences of opinion on issues such as the war
and how we approach it, when we have some differences on how we deal
with certain economic matters, when we have differences of opinion with
respect to the extent and the definition of certain applications of
affirmative action, isn't it good for us to at least step back and
recognize that there is a commonality of purpose, a commonality of
dedication, a commonality of the essence of America; that we recognize
that we will never be perfect, but as we are moving to make real the
promise of the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, that we
actually have more that joins us together than breaks us apart. Because
had we not had that belief, and had we not had that as our base
decision some two decades ago, we would not now have, as a recognition
of the life of Dr. Martin Luther King, the national holiday.
It is not an African American holiday. It is not a Hispanic holiday,
it is not an Irish American holiday. It is an American holiday that
recognizes that Dr. King spoke to the essence of America.
{time} 1430
There could be nothing greater in the annals of American history, in
my judgment, than his magnificent statement contained in the letter
from the Birmingham jail, where he said that we, as the people,
understand the difference between a just and an unjust law. He didn't
say let us look at this legal book and tell us where it is. He said an
unjust law is a law which violates God's law; an unjust law is that
which we know is wrong. I can also remember his great words in there
when people said, Well, aren't you a radical? He said, What was Jesus
but a radical for love.
He asked that we come together and look in our hearts, as much as our
heads, and remember that as imperfect as we are, we do all share in
this tremendous legacy of America, and we honor America by trying to be
more true to that promise.
I thank the gentleman for this resolution. I thank the manager of
this bill for his work today and other days, and I thank the gentleman
from Ohio for giving me this time.
Mr. CONYERS. I thank the previous speaker, who is one of the few here
on the floor that was around back then when these debates and this long
15-year period took place. I thank him for his contribution.
Madam Speaker, I now turn to the able gentlelady from the District of
Columbia (Ms. Norton), and I recognize her for 2\1/2\ minutes.
Ms. NORTON. I thank the gentleman for yielding to me. I particularly
thank him for his remarks, because what I am going to talk about, the
link I am going to try to make, he knows very well. I appreciate his
linking Dr. King to the broad swath of issues for which he stood. How
can you honor King without, in fact, talking about his issues.
Madam Speaker, recall the poor people's campaign on the Mall, and the
gap between the rich and the poor that is greater today than when King
lived, and recall the Vietnam war when his opposition was at high risk.
Here we have a President attempting to escalate yet another war. But
King's signature issue, my friends, was civil rights.
The House of Representatives must confront a civil rights issue that
is 200 years old, the failure of the Congress of the United States for
200 years to grant equal rights to the citizens of the District of
Columbia. Most recently, this has been a Republican failure. But
Democrats are just as responsible. I would say more responsible in some
ways, historically, than Republicans, because race was at the center of
the denial. It was Democrats who stood in the way of home rule and a
delegate for the District of Columbia. It was Democrats, however, who
faced their racial failings 40 years ago, and, to their credit, became
leaders in the fight for civil rights.
Yet, the majority African American District of Columbia remains
without a vote despite Democratic Party platforms and countless
statements, especially on this floor. Now is the time for Democrats to
act to deliver. It is the last hope for years to come, a D.C.-Utah bill
that delivers party parity, with great credit to my Republican
cosponsor, who tried to deliver, great credit to my cosponsor, no
partisan advantage.
Nonpartisan research reveals that a possible advantage occasionally
raised is so de minimis that no credible argument can be made for
further delay in failing to correct one of the most odious injustices
in American history, 200,000 men and women in the District of Columbia
sent to America's war since the creation of the Republic, second per
capita of taxation without representation.
Dr. King held public officials on both sides of the aisle
accountable. The only risk to Democratics on this issue is paying only
lip service to his principles.
Mr. CHABOT. Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
We have no further speakers at this time. However, I would note in
the spirit of bipartisan cooperation, the gentleman from Michigan
indicated he may have more speakers than he has time for. I would be
happy to yield time to accommodate him if it comes to that.
Mr. CONYERS. I thank the gentleman.
Madam Speaker, I yield to the distinguished gentleman from North
Carolina (Mr. Butterfield) 2\1/4\ minutes.
Mr. BUTTERFIELD. I want to thank the gentleman from Georgia, my
friend, John Lewis, for introducing this resolution. I thank the
gentleman
[[Page H522]]
from Michigan (Mr. Conyers) for allowing time for me to speak today.
Madam Speaker, Dr. King was a visionary leader. He understood that
America could never be a moral leader in the world when citizens within
its own borders were treated legally as second-class citizens. I recall
so vividly attending a standing-room only speech that Dr. King gave at
the Booker T. Washington High School gymnasium in Rocky Mountain, North
Carolina, on November 27, 1962.
Dr. King's speech included the ``I Have a Dream'' passage that he
used in the historic march-on-Washington speech the following year.
After the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, we were having
difficulty in the south persuading black voters that it was really
uncomplicated to register the vote. The act had removed the literacy
test, and the process was easier. But black citizens were reluctant to
step forward to register to vote for fear of intimidation and reprisal.
At the urging of local leaders in my community, Dr. King accepted our
invitation to lead a voter registration march on April 4, 1968.
But as fate would have it, he canceled his promised trip to our
community so that he could go to Memphis to assist the garbage workers
of that city, and we know the rest. Despite the absence of Dr. King
from the registration march, we launched a massive voter registration
drive and later filed and won a voting rights lawsuit in my district
resulting in electoral opportunities.
Now, Madam Speaker, we have 301 elected black officials in my
congressional district. In addition to having an African American
Member of this body in the first district, African Americans hold the
following office: 48 county commissioners, 7 sheriffs, 20 mayors, 129
municipal officials, 5 at our General Assembly, 6 superior court
judges, 9 district court judges, 69 on boards of education, 4
registrars of deeds and 3 clerks of court.
Madam Speaker, much of this electoral progress that we have made in
the South can be directly attributable to the life and work of Martin
Luther King, Jr.
Mr. CONYERS. Madam Speaker, I would like now to call upon David Scott
of Georgia and to yield to him 2 minutes.
Mr. SCOTT of Georgia. Thank you to the gentleman from Michigan. It is
a pleasure to be on the floor with you.
Madam Speaker, more than anything else, Dr. King was a man of God.
You know, when I think of Dr. King, I think of three people. The first
one was the great prophet Isaiah. As you recall, Isaiah cried out in
the year that King Uzziah died, was the year that I also saw the Lord.
He went on to say that there was a voice that came to him that said,
who will go for us, and whom shall we send?
Like the prophet Isaiah, in 1956, as a young 26-year-old person down
in Alabama, it was Martin Luther King, Jr., who said, Here am I, Lord,
send me. Just like the prophet Isaiah. The second person is David the
shepherd boy, who climbed up to go see about his brethren, and there
was Goliath, issuing all kinds of threats.
They told him to go back, much as they did with Martin Luther King,
Jr., but he didn't go back. Instead, he stood there and Martin Luther
King, Jr., like David said, Is there not a cause. There is a cause for
me, and there is a cause for you, and that is to beat down the Goliaths
of racism, of prejudice and discrimination.
The third one is Jesus Christ, for when the Pharisees asked Jesus
Christ what was the greatest commandment of all, Jesus said to love thy
neighbor as thyself. At the bottom of it all, Dr. King's essence was
love. As Jesus said, There is no greater love than that you would give
your life for another. Dr. King paid that price and gave his life,
love.
As the song writer said: Them's that got shall get and them's that
not shall not lose cause the Bible says, and it still is news. Your
mama may have and your poppa may have, but God bless this child. Martin
Luther King, more than anything else, was a child of God, and we thank
God for sending Martin Luther King, Jr., our way.
Mr. CONYERS. Madam Speaker, I am now pleased to yield to my good
friend, Dennis Kucinich of Ohio, 2 minutes.
Mr. KUCINICH. Thank you, Mr. Conyers, Mr. Lewis and all Members of
Congress.
Madam Speaker, as we honor Dr. King's legacy, let's remember it is a
living legacy. We are not talking about cold prose and someone who is
so distant from this moment. His ideas are so alive today and so needed
today; that is why a month from now, I will be introducing legislation
to create a Cabinet level Department of Peace, which takes Dr. King's
vision of an America which organizes around principles of nonviolence
and brings it to life in addressing the issues of domestic violence,
spousal abuse, child abuse, violence in the schools, racial violence,
violence against gays, police, community relations conflicts, and
provides the resources so that we can deal with these as a living
testimony to the love that we are showing today for Dr. King.
But he also was a visionary on the matter of war. He spoke many times
warning this country about the danger of what happened in Vietnam. He
spoke about the price that was being paid for the people of two nations
in a speech at Riverside Church nearly 40 years ago. At Ebenezer
Baptist Church he spoke about the interrelationship of all people, but
how all people are one. It was that understanding of oneness that drove
him to take a stand for peace.
Let us celebrate not only his life, but let the principles of his
life continue to guide us as Americans. This is the moment to take a
stand as we grapple with the question of Iraq.
I met with representatives of over 1,000 soldiers today who say it is
time to get out of Iraq. Let us protect Dr. King's memory by standing
for peace.
Madam Speaker, I would like to put into the Record Dr. King's speech
from Ebenezer Baptist Church and part of his speech from Riverside
Church, which need to be read today. I would also like to put in the
Record a speech that I gave recently called ``Out of Iraq and Back to
the American City,'' which shows that only when we take a stand for
peace are we able to get the resources that we need to provide jobs and
health care and education and retirement security and housing for the
American people.
Make Dr. King's legacy a living legacy.
A Christmas Sermon on Peace
Dr. King first delivered this sermon at Ebenezer Baptist
Church, where he served as co-pastor. On Christmas Eve, 1967,
the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation aired this sermon as
part of the seventh annual Massey Lectures.
Peace on Earth. . . .
This Christmas season finds us a rather bewildered human
race. We have neither peace within nor peace without.
Everywhere paralyzing fears harrow people by day and haunt
them by night. Our world is sick with war; everywhere we turn
we see its ominous possibilities. And yet, my friends, the
Christmas hope for peace and good will toward all men can no
longer be dismissed as a kind of pious dream of some utopian.
If we don't have good will toward men in this world, we will
destroy ourselves by the misuse of our own instruments and
our own power. Wisdom born of experience should tell us that
war is obsolete. There may have been a time when war served
as a negative good by preventing the spread and growth of an
evil force, but the very destructive power of modern weapons
of warfare eliminates even the possibility that war may any
longer serve as a negative good. And so, if we assume that
life is worth living, if we assume that mankind has a right
to survive, then we must find an alternative to war--and so
let us this morning explore the conditions for peace. Let us
this morning think anew on the meaning of that Christmas
hope: ``Peace on Earth, Good Will toward Men.'' And as we
explore these conditions, I would like to suggest that modern
man really go all out to study the meaning of nonviolence,
its philosophy and its strategy.
We have experimented with the meaning of nonviolence in our
struggle for racial justice in the United States, but now the
time has come for man to experiment with nonviolence in all
areas of human conflict, and that means nonviolence on an
international scale.
Now let me suggest first that if we are to have peace on
earth, our loyalties must become ecumenical rather than
sectional. Our loyalties must transcend our race, our tribe,
our class, and our nation; and this means we must develop a
world perspective. No individual can live alone; no nation
can live alone, and as long as we try, the more we are going
to have war in this world. Now the judgment of God is upon
us, and we must either learn to live together as brothers or
we are all going to perish together as fools.
Yes, as nations and individuals, we are interdependent. I
have spoken to you before of our visit to India some years
ago. It was a marvelous experience; but I say to you this
morning that there were those depressing moments. How can one
avoid being depressed
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when one sees with one's own eyes evidences of millions of
people going to bed hungry at night? How can one avoid being
depressed when one sees with one's own eyes thousands of
people sleeping on the sidewalks at night? More than a
million people sleep on the sidewalks of Bombay every night;
more than half a million sleep on the sidewalks of Calcutta
every night. They have no houses to go into. They have no
beds to sleep in. As I beheld these conditions, something
within me cried out: ``Can we in America stand idly by and
not be concerned?'' And an answer came: ``Oh, no!'' And I
started thinking about the fact that right here in our
country we spend millions of dollars every day to store
surplus food; and I said to myself: ``I know where we can
store that food free of charge--in the wrinkled stomachs of
the millions of God's children in Asia, Africa, Latin
America, and even in our own nation, who go to bed hungry at
night.''
It really boils down to this: that all life is
interrelated. We are all caught in an inescapable network of
mutuality, tied into a single garment of destiny. Whatever
affects one directly, affects all indirectly. We are made to
live together because of the interrelated structure of
reality. Did you ever stop to think that you can't leave for
your job in the morning without being dependent on most of
the world? You get up in the morning and go to the bathroom
and reach over for the sponge, and that's handed to you by a
Pacific islander. You reach for a bar of soap, and that's
given to you at the hands of a Frenchman. And then you go
into the kitchen to drink your coffee for the morning, and
that's poured into your cup by a South American. And maybe
you want tea: That's poured into your cup by a Chinese. Or
maybe you're desirous of having cocoa for breakfast, and
that's poured into your cup by a West African. And then you
reach over for your toast, and that's given to you at the
hands of an English-speaking farmer, not to mention the
baker. And before you finish eating breakfast in the morning,
you've depended on more than half of the world. This is the
way our universe is structured, this is its interrelated
quality. We aren't going to have peace on earth until we
recognize this basic fact of the interrelated structure of
all reality.
Now let me say, secondly, that if we are to have peace in
the world, men and nations must embrace the nonviolent
affirmation that ends and means must cohere. One of the great
philosophical debates of history has been over the whole
question of means and ends. And there have always been those
who argued that the end justifies the means, that the means
really aren't important. The important thing is to get to the
end, you see.
So, if you're seeking to develop a just society, they say,
the important thing is to get there, and the means are really
unimportant; any means will do so long as they get you
there--they may be violent, they may be untruthful means;
they may even be unjust means to a just end. There have been
those who have argued this throughout history. But we will
never have peace in the world until men everywhere recognize
that ends are not cut off from means, because the means
represent the ideal in the making, and the end in process,
and ultimately you can't reach good ends through evil means,
because the means represent the seed and the end represents
the tree.
It's one of the strangest things that all the great
military geniuses of the world have talked about peace. The
conquerors of old who came killing in pursuit of peace,
Alexander, Julius Caesar, Charlemagne, and Napoleon, were
akin in seeking a peaceful world order. If you will read Mein
Kampf closely enough, you will discover that Hitler contended
that everything he did in Germany was for peace. And the
leaders of the world today talk eloquently about peace. Every
time we drop our bombs in North Vietnam, President Johnson
talks eloquently about peace. What is the problem? They are
talking about peace as a distant goal, as an end we seek, but
one day we must come to see that peace is not merely a
distant goal we seek, but that it is a means by which we
arrive at that goal. We must pursue peaceful ends through
peaceful means. All of this is saying that, in the final
analysis, means and ends must cohere because the end is
preexistent in the means, and ultimately destructive means
cannot bring about constructive ends.
Now let me say that the next thing we must be concerned
about if we are to have peace on earth and good will toward
men is the nonviolent affirmation of the sacredness of all
human life. Every man is somebody because he is a child of
God. And so when we say ``Thou shalt not kill,'' we're really
saying that human life is too sacred to be taken on the
battlefields of the world. Man is more than a tiny vagary of
whirling electrons or a wisp of smoke from a limitless
smoldering. Man is a child of God, made in His image, and
therefore must be respected as such. Until men see this
everywhere, until nations see this everywhere, we will be
fighting wars. One day somebody should remind us that, even
though there may be political and ideological differences
between us, the Vietnamese are our brothers, the Russians are
our brothers, the Chinese are our brothers; and one day we've
got to sit down together at the table of brotherhood. But in
Christ there is neither Jew nor Gentile. In Christ there is
neither male nor female. In Christ there is neither Communist
nor capitalist. In Christ, somehow, there is neither bound
nor free. We are all one in Christ Jesus. And when we truly
believe in the sacredness of human personality, we won't
exploit people, we won't trample over people with the iron
feet of oppression, we won't kill anybody.
There are three words for ``love'' in the Greek New
Testament; one is the word ``eros.'' Eros is a sort of
esthetic, romantic love. Plato used to talk about it a
great deal in his dialogues, the yearning of the soul for
the realm of the divine. And there is and can always be
something beautiful about eros, even in its expressions of
romance. Some of the most beautiful love in all of the
world has been expressed this way.
Then the Greek language talks about ``philia,'' which is
another word for love, and philia is a kind of intimate love
between personal friends. This is the kind of love you have
for those people that you get along with well, and those whom
you like on this level you love because you are loved.
Then the Greek language has another word for love, and that
is the word ``agape.'' Agape is more than romantic love, it
is more than friendship. Agape is understanding, creative,
redemptive good will toward all men. Agape is an overflowing
love which seeks nothing in return. Theologians would say
that it is the love of God operating in the human heart. When
you rise to love on this level, you love all men not because
you like them, not because their ways appeal to you, but you
love them because God loves them. This is what Jesus meant
when he said, ``Love your enemies.'' And I'm happy that he
didn't say, ``Like your enemies,'' because there are some
people that I find it pretty difficult to like. Liking is an
affectionate emotion, and. I can't like anybody who would
bomb my home. I can't like anybody who would exploit me. I
can't like anybody who would trample over me with injustices.
I can't like them. I can't like anybody who threatens to kill
me day in and day out. But Jesus reminds us that love is
greater than liking. Love is understanding, creative,
redemptive good will toward all men. And I think this is
where we are, as a people, in our struggle for racial
justice. We can't ever give up. We must work passionately and
unrelentingly for first-class citizenship. We must never let
up in our determination to remove every vestige of
segregation and discrimination from our nation, but we shall
not in the process relinquish our privilege to love.
I've seen too much hate to want to hate, myself, and I've
seen hate on the faces of too many sheriffs, too many white
citizens' councilors, and too many Klansmen of the South to
want to hate, myself; and every time I see it, I say to
myself, hate is too great a burden to bear. Somehow we must
be able to stand up before our most bitter opponents and say:
``We shall match your capacity to inflict suffering by our
capacity to endure suffering. We will meet your physical
force with soul force. Do to us what you will and we will
still love you. We cannot in all good conscience obey your
unjust laws and abide by the unjust system, because
noncooperation with evil is as much a moral obligation as is
cooperation with good, and so throw us in jail and we will
still love you. Bomb our homes and threaten our children,
and, as difficult as it is, we will still love you. Send your
hooded perpetrators of violence into our communities at the
midnight hour and drag us out on some wayside road and leave
us half-dead as you beat us, and we will still love you. Send
your propaganda agents around the country, and make it
appear that we are not fit, culturally and otherwise, for
integration, and we'll still love you. But be assured that
we'll wear you down by our capacity to suffer, and one day
we will win our freedom. We will not only win freedom for
ourselves; we will so appeal to your heart and conscience
that we will win you in the process, and our victory will
be a double victory.''
If there is to be peace on earth and good will toward men,
we must finally believe in the ultimate morality of the
universe, and believe that all reality hinges on moral
foundations. Something must remind us of this as we once
again stand in the Christmas season and think of the Easter
season simultaneously, for the two somehow go together.
Christ came to show us the way. Men love darkness rather than
the light, and they crucified him, and there on Good Friday
on the cross it was still dark, but then Easter came, and
Easter is an eternal reminder of the fact that the truth-
crushed earth will rise again. Easter justifies Carlyle in
saying, ``No lie can live forever.'' And so this is our
faith, as we continue to hope for peace on earth and good
will toward men: let us know that in the process we have
cosmic companionship.
In 1963, on a sweltering August afternoon, we stood in
Washington, D.C., and talked to the nation about many things.
Toward the end of that afternoon, I tried to talk to the
nation about a dream that I had had, and I must confess to
you today that not long after talking about that dream I
started seeing it turn into a nightmare. I remember the first
time I saw that dream turn into a nightmare, just a few weeks
after I had talked about it. It was when four beautiful,
unoffending, innocent Negro girls were murdered in a church
in Birmingham, Alabama. I watched that dream turn into a
nightmare as I moved through the ghettos of the nation and
saw my black brothers and sisters perishing on a lonely
island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material
prosperity, and saw the nation doing nothing to grapple with
the Negroes' problem of poverty. I saw that dream turn into a
nightmare as I watched my black brothers and sisters in the
midst of anger and understandable outrage,
[[Page H524]]
in the midst of their hurt, in the midst of their
disappointment, turn to misguided riots to try to solve that
problem. I saw that dream turn into a nightmare as I watched
the war in Vietnam escalating, and as I saw so-called
military advisors, sixteen thousand strong, turn into
fighting soldiers until today over five hundred thousand
American boys are fighting on Asian soil. Yes, I am
personally the victim of deferred dreams, of blasted hopes,
but in spite of that I close today by saying I still have a
dream, because, you know, you can't give up in life. If you
lose hope, somehow you lose that vitality that keeps life
moving, you lose that courage to be, that quality that helps
you go on in spite of all. And so today I still have a dream.
I have a dream that one day men will rise up and come to
see that they are made to live together as brothers. I still
have a dream this morning that one day every Negro in this
country, every colored person in the world, will be judged
on the basis of the content of his character rather than
the color of his skin, and every man will respect the
dignity and worth of human personality. I still have a
dream that one day the idle industries of Appalachia will
be revitalized, and the empty stomachs of Mississippi will
be filled, and brotherhood will be more than a few words
at the end of a prayer, but rather the first order of
business on every legislative agenda. I still have a dream
today that one day justice will roll down like water, and
righteousness like a mighty stream. I still have a dream
today that in all of our state houses and city halls men
will be elected to go there who will do justly and love
mercy and walk humbly with their God. I still have a dream
today that one day war will come to an end, that men will
beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into
pruning hooks, that nations will no longer rise up against
nations, neither will they study war any more. I still
have a dream today that one day the lamb and the lion will
lie down together and every man will sit under his own
vine and fig tree and none shall be afraid. I still have a
dream today that one day every valley shall be exalted and
every mountain and hill will be made low, the rough places
will be made smooth and the crooked places straight, and
the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh
shall see it together. I still have a dream that with this
faith we will be able to adjourn the councils of despair
and bring new light into the dark chambers of pessimism.
With this faith we will be able to speed up the day when
there will be peace on earth and good will toward men. It
will be a glorious day, the morning stars will sing
together, and the sons of God will shout for joy.
____
Martin Luther King: Beyond Vietnam--A Time To Break Silence
I come to this magnificent house of worship tonight because
my conscience leaves me no other choice. I join you in this
meeting because I am in deepest agreement with the aims and
work of the organization which has brought us together:
Clergy and Laymen Concerned about Vietnam. The recent
statements of your executive committee are the sentiments of
my own heart, and I found myself in full accord when I read
its opening lines: ``A time comes when silence is betrayal.''
And that time has come for us in relation to Vietnam.
The truth of these words is beyond doubt, but the mission
to which they call us is a most difficult one. Even when
pressed by the demands of inner truth, men do not easily
assume the task of opposing their government's policy,
especially in time of war. Nor does the human spirit move
without great difficulty against all the apathy of conformist
thought within one's own bosom and in the surrounding world.
Moreover, when the issues at hand seem as perplexed as they
often do in the case of this dreadful conflict, we are always
on the verge of being mesmerized by uncertainty; but we must
move on.
And some of us who have already begun to break the silence
of the night have found that the calling to speak is often a
vocation of agony, but we must speak. We must speak with all
the humility that is appropriate to our limited vision, but
we must speak. And we must rejoice as well, for surely this
is the first time in our nation's history that a significant
number of its religious leaders have chosen to move beyond
the prophesying of smooth patriotism to the high grounds of a
firm dissent based upon the mandates of conscience and the
reading of history. Perhaps a new spirit is rising among us.
If it is, let us trace its movements and pray that our own
inner being may be sensitive to its guidance, for we are
deeply in need of a new way beyond the darkness that seems so
close around us.
Now let us begin. Now let us rededicate ourselves to the
long and bitter, but beautiful, struggle for a new world.
This is the calling of the sons of God, and our brothers wait
eagerly for our response. Shall we say the odds are too
great? Shall we tell them the struggle is too hard? Will our
message be that the forces of American life militate against
their arrival as full men, and we send our deepest regrets?
Or will there be another message--of longing, of hope, of
solidarity with their yearnings, of commitment to their
cause, whatever the cost? The choice is ours, and though we
might prefer it otherwise, we must choose in this crucial
moment of human history.
As that noble bard of yesterday, James Russell Lowell,
eloquently stated:
Once to every man and nation comes a moment to decide,
In the strife of Truth and Falsehood, for the good or evil
side;
Some great cause, God's new Messiah offering each the bloom
or blight,
And the choice goes by forever `twixt that darkness and that
light.
Though the cause of evil prosper, yet 'tis truth alone is
strong
Though her portions be the scaffold, and upon the throne be
wrong
Yet that scaffold sways the future, and behind the dim
unknown
Standeth God within the shadow, keeping watch above his own.
And if we will only make the right choice, we will be able
to transform this pending cosmic elegy into a creative psalm
of peace.
If we will make the right choice, we will be able to
transform the jangling discords of our world into a beautiful
symphony of brotherhood.
If we will but make the right choice, we will be able to
speed up the day, all over America and all over the world,
when justice will roll down like waters, and righteousness
like a mighty stream.
____
Out of Iraq and Back to the American City
(By Dennis Kucinich)
We are losing our nation to a philosophy of war and
destruction. It is time for policies of peace and
construction. It is time for the philosophy of peace,
nonviolence and economic justice. This was the philosophy of
Dr. King, Gandhi, Jesus, Fredrick Douglas, A. Philip
Randolph, Bayard Rustin, Fannie Lou Hamer, Sojourner Truth,
Cesar Chavez, and Jesse Jackson.
We are all united with the philosophy which birthed the New
Deal, the New Frontier, the Great Society, the dreams of
social and economic justice which could be called forth by
those who were ready to stand up, to speak out, to march, to
demand, to testify about the good news:
The world is interconnected. The world is interdependent.
We are not just our brother and sisters keeper, on a deeper
spiritual level we are our brothers and sisters. This is the
meaning of the Golden Rule, Do unto others as you would have
them do unto you. This is the meaning of Love Thy neighbor as
thy self. This is why policies of unilateralism, first
strike, and preemption are dead ends. This is why nuclear
proliferation is a threat to every person on the planet. This
is why the very idea that war should be an instrument of
policy needs to be challenged. War is not inevitable. Peace
is inevitable if we are prepared to work for it.
Dr. King understood this. In his speech ``Beyond Vietnam: A
time to break silence'' in New York City nearly forty years
ago, he created a synthesis of peace and civil rights.
``Somehow this madness must cease,'' Dr. King told those
assembled at Riverside Church about the annihilation of the
Vietnamese people and their nation. ``I speak as a child of
God and brother to the suffering poor of Vietnam. I speak for
those whose land is being laid waste, whose homes are
destroyed, whose culture is being subverted. . . . I speak as
a citizen of the world, for the world, as it stands aghast at
the path we have taken. I speak as one who loves America, to
the leaders of our nation: The great initiative in this war
is ours. The initiative to stop it must be ours too.''
That is why tomorrow I will present Congress with a plan to
get out of Iraq. We must end the occupation, close the bases,
and use the money that is there now to bring the troops home
while we prepare Iraq for an international security force. I
led the effort in the House of Representatives challenging
the Bush Administration's march toward war in Iraq. I
organized 125 Democrats to vote against the war.
There were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. But
there are plenty of weapons of mass destruction here in the
United States which need to be removed. Poverty is a weapon
of mass destruction, homelessness is a weapon of mass
destruction, joblessness is a weapon of mass destruction,
poor health care is a weapon of mass destruction, theft of
pensions, a weapon of mass destruction, hopelessness is a
weapon of mass destruction.
Let's deal with the WMD's in our cities. It is time to get
out of Iraq, which did not have weapons of mass destruction
and into our American cities, which are loaded with weapons
of mass destruction.
This then is a call for a politics of unity where human
unity becomes an imperative. This is a call for a politics of
economic justice, where wealth creation is available to
everyone, where the government becomes an engine to create
wealth for all, where it functions to equitably redistribute
the wealth.
We know the challenges. The war in Iraq is the product of
the same type of thinking which underlies racism. Us vs.
them. The minute there is a they or a them it creates
separation. Separation is the basis for discrimination.
Separation is the basis for subjugation. Separation is the
basis for insularity. Separation is the basis for conflict.
Separation is the basis for war. Separation is the basis for
the destruction of our environment. Separation is the basis
for the destruction of the planet.
We are at a moment where our survival instinct causes us to
declare the imperative of human unity. A unity of states is a
superficial unity if it does not embrace policies which
promote human unity, human equality, human striving, the
practical aspirations of people.
[[Page H525]]
There has been a massive redistribution of wealth in our
society. Government has been turned into an engine to
redistribute the wealth upwards. Our whole monetary system is
based on debt creation for the masses and wealth creation for
the few. War has become an engine of wealth for military
contractors. Health care has become an engine of wealth for
the pharmaceutical companies and the insurance companies. The
tax system is used to accelerate wealth to the top. Our
banking and credit systems accelerate wealth to the top. Our
electric utilities, our gas companies, our oil companies
accelerate wealth to the top. Our energy systems accelerate
wealth to the top. Our transportation systems accelerate
wealth to the top. Our information systems accelerate wealth
to the top.
The concentration of wealth in our society has jeopardized
our democracy. It has created a two class society. And in
doing so jeopardizes the very institutions of wealth
creation. Franklin Roosevelt recognized this in the creation
of the New Deal which saved not only economic opportunities
for the masses, but also saved capitalism itself.
There is an unlimited amount of wealth that can be created
in our society. We need to teach our children wealth
creation. But we need to challenge the fundamental
assumptions that guide our society, assumptions such as ``a
certain amount of unemployment is necessary to the
functioning of the economy.'' or ``let the market decide
access to health care.'' We need to perfect our union. This
then is the perfect opportunity for us to perfect our union,
to perfect the purpose of government, to perfect our mutual
pledge to each other. It is time for a declaration of human
economic rights of citizens of an urban society, and tie that
declaration to legislation and use that legislation to create
wealth and harmony and peace.
Langston Hughes wrote: ``Life for me ain't been no crystal
stair.'' We know that experience, we also know that we can
teach people to create wealth if we can help them find a way
to get access to wealth.
I am a product of the city. My parents never owned a home.
I grew up in 21 different places by the time I was 17,
including a few cars. I've learned about opportunities. I've
learned that if you believe it you can conceive it. I've
learned about pulling oneself up by bootstraps. I've also
seen the cynicism which comes when you tell people to pull
themselves up by their bootstraps and then you steal their
shoes. I've seen people dreaming the dreams and stuck singing
Sixteen Tons.
We are not going back to the days of Sixteen Tons.
So let it be said here:
We have a right to a job.
We have a right to a living wage.
We have a right to an education.
We have a right to health care.
We have a right to decent and affordable housing.
We have a right to a secure pension.
We have a right to air fit to breathe.
We have a right to water fit to drink.
We have a right to be free of the paralyzing fear of crime.
We have a right to be free of a government tapping our
phones, opening our mail, checking out our library reading
lists, snooping into our medical records, and our credit
records.
We have a right to fair, open, and verifiable elections
where every vote counts and every vote is counted.
We have a right to peace.
We have a right to prosperity.
This means ending the war in Iraq.
This means bringing the money home to our cities.
This means a full employment economy.
This means good paying jobs.
This means a living wage.
This means a federal infrastructure bill to put millions to
work rebuilding our schools, our bridges, our libraries, our
universities our hospitals, our city halls, our recreation
centers, our sidewalks, our street lights, our parks, our
water systems, our sewer systems, our neighborhoods.
This means a more perfect union.
This means every child goes to a prekindergarten and every
young person goes to a junior or a four year college.
This means universal health care.
This means a new housing initiative where everyone has
access to affordable housing.
This means full protection of social security and no
privatization.
This means protection of private pension funds.
This means giving workers access to the power of their
pension funds to invest in job creation.
This means cleaner energy, greener energy.
This means programs for safer neighborhoods.
This means initiatives which bring people out of prison and
into the mainstream of society.
This means a Department of Peace and nonviolence.
I don't just talk the talk. I walk the walk.
The universal health care bill is called Conyers-Kucinich.
It calls for a universal single payer not-for-profit health
care system to lift everyone up. To give everyone access to
health care.
I wrote the federal infrastructure bill.
I wrote the universal pre-kindergarten bill.
I wrote the bill for a Department of Peace and non-violence
to make Dr. King's dream of non-violence a reality. That bill
will deal with the realities of violence in our society and
take a path towards more peaceful relationships. It will help
families who suffer from domestic violence, spousal abuse,
child abuse; it will meet the challenge of violence in the
schools, racial violence, violence against gays, police
community conflicts, using the principles for which Dr. King
lived. And it will create a context where a peaceful America
can help to create a peaceful world. Imagine. Peace as an
organizing principle. Prosperity as an organizing principle.
And when I am elected President of the United States, in my
first day in office I will be ready to push. I will send to
the Congress a bill for universal single payer not-for-profit
health care.
I will send to the Congress legislation for creating
millions of jobs through rebuilding America's infrastructure,
I will send congress legislation to create a summer jobs
program.
I will send Congress legislation to create affordable
housing.
I will send congress a bill to establish a cabinet level
Department of Peace and Non Violence.
I can do this because I have already written many of these
bills. They are ready and so am I. I will move to restore the
Constitution, restore habeas corpus, and repeal the Patriot
Act. If you are ready, I am ready for a new America. And I am
ready to unite this country in the cause of peace, justice
and prosperity.
Our unity extends to all people everywhere. The Bible tells
us to make peace with our brother because we are all one. We
are told whatever we do for the least of our brothers and
sisters, we do for the Lord, because we are all one in
spirit. We are told that we have an obligation to feed the
hungry, shelter the homeless, clothe the naked not simply
because we are our brother and sisters keeper, not just
because there but for the grace of God go I, but because
wherever there is a hungry person, there I am. Wherever there
is someone who is homeless, there I am.
Wherever someone is walking the streets looking for a job.
That person is my brother and that person is me. Wherever a
child goes to bed hungry, I am there. We connect with each
other in our profound, human experience. We connect with each
other through the imperative to love one another. We bind to
each other in all of our hopes, in all of our dreams, and in
all of our sufferings. The awareness which bids us to pursue
a more perfect union make us aware of the perfectibility of
our social systems, our economic systems and our own lives.
We are meant for higher things. We are meant for better
things. We are meant for peace, for prosperity, for
enlightenment, for health, for love, for a more perfect union
with ourselves, with each other, with our nation and with the
world. Human unity is the great path that we all can walk
upon. The world is interconnected. The world is
interdependent.
I know that we are on the threshold of greatness because
the people are great and we just need to call forth that
awareness, call forth that ability, give people the
resources, show people the money, show them their power, show
them their beauty, show them that we can all be more than we
are, better than we are. It's about reaching up and reaching
out. It's about Push. It's about the Rainbow Coalition. It's
about Human Unity. It's about a new America. It's about a new
world. Let us begin.
Mr. CONYERS. Madam Speaker, I am pleased now to yield to my old
friend, the delegate from American Samoa (Mr. Faleomavaega) 2 minutes.
Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. Madam Speaker, I am honored to be here this morning
and certainly want to thank my good friends, the gentleman from
Michigan and the gentleman from Georgia, for allowing me to participate
in this proposed legislation to honor the memory and legacy of one of
the great spiritual giants, not only as a native son of our Nation, but
certainly of the world, that of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Dr. King was not a political leader, nor was he a military leader,
nor was he a noted writer or author. Nor was he a philosopher. He was a
Christian minister who understood thoroughly the real spiritual and the
moral force of the principles taught by the Savior some 20 centuries
ago, that of loving our neighbors as ourselves, showing tolerance and
respect for our fellow human beings.
Dr. King was well aware of the social, economic and political
inequalities that existed in our Nation, that his own people, the
African Americans for some 200 years, have been treated as second-class
citizens despite the hundreds of thousands of their sons and daughters
who fought and bled and died defending our Nation against its enemies.
{time} 1445
Dr. King's statement and speeches are well noted throughout the
world. One of the statements that I like best is, ``At the end, we will
not remember the words of our enemies, but the silence of our
friends.'' And, yes, we all
[[Page H526]]
remember one of his most memorable speeches in that August during the
summer of 1963 at the Lincoln Memorial, where he spoke before some
250,000 people and hundreds of millions more around the world, when he
echoed the words, ``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.''
Madam Speaker, this is what America is all about, and I thank Dr.
Martin Luther King, Jr., for reminding us what our Nation should stand
for, the real meaning of freedom under the provisions of our national
Constitution.
Mr. CHABOT. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Madam Speaker, we have heard a number of very moving tributes to Dr.
Martin Luther King and I think it is important that we continue to
remember what he said. I think what Mr. Faleomavaega quoted sums it up
better than anything else, and that is that a person should be judged
by the content of their character and not by the color of their skin. I
think that is something we should always strive for in this Nation.
Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. CONYERS. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may
consume.
Madam Speaker, I thank the Members that have participated in this
activity. We will have 5 days to continue to introduce our comments
into the Congressional Record, and I also remind those that would like
to join in the cosponsorship of Congressman Lewis' resolution, they
still have an opportunity to do so.
Madam Speaker, I will introduce into the Record five articles dealing
with Dr. King. One is from the Washington Post entitled, ``From Dr.
King, a reminder on Iraq.'' Another from the same source, ``The quest
to keep King's legacy alive.'' Another, ``Walking just like King did.''
Another, ``Democrats hail civil rights leader King.'' Finally, the last
one, ``Martin Luther King papers go on display.''
Madam Speaker, what I would conclude with is the pleasure that I have
in seeing this holiday increasingly observed from year-to-year. Martin
Luther King's birthday is not a shopping day. It is not a day off. It
is not a day that you worry about getting some things done around the
house. There are untold thousands of celebrations, some large, some
small, some in churches, some signified by marches. There are so many
different ways that he is being observed.
I was so pleased yesterday to be at the church that Dr. Martin Luther
King had the privilege of addressing on numerous occasions. Then
earlier I was with some very young people who were just learning about
Dr. King, and they were taking a day on instead of a day off. They are
working with schools and other youngsters in parks and recreation, in
the City Year agency led by Penny Bailey.
So, Madam Speaker, I am pleased that the Congress under the
leadership of the gentleman from Georgia would have this resolution
brought to the floor today.
[From the Washington Post, Jan. 13, 2007]
The Quest To Keep King's Legacy Alive
(By Hamil R. Harris)
On Monday, the country honors the Rev. Martin Luther King
Jr., who would have been 78 years old. The civil rights
leader, who was assassinated in 1968 at the age of 39,
launched many of his efforts from the pulpit. To mark his
birthday, religious leaders were asked: Is King's legacy of
social activism still alive in the faith community today?
The Rev. Jesse Jackson, founder of the Rainbow/Push
Coalition: ``The activist black churches are still the
conscience of our nation. . . . I was with Dr. King on his
last birthday. We must remember that a lot of churches didn't
support King then. He was expelled from the National Baptist
Convention. Our mission today is to green line a red-lined
America. It is good to talk about raising the minimum wage in
Congress, but for those who don't have jobs, the issue
doesn't touch them. We need to continue to work on an urban
agenda.''
Rabbi Marla J. Feldman, director of the Commission on
Social Action of Reform Judaism: ``Dr. King's legacy is very
much still alive and his legacy continues to inspire the
faith community across the country. I know that . . .
reformed congregations around the country will do something
special for the King holiday to honor his legacy. . . . There
will be congregations all over the country involved in social
activist enterprises, including in the Washington, D.C.,
area. All of the rabbis that I know will be preaching about
Dr. King and the issues that we are wrestling with today,
such as economic justice and the war in Iraq.''
The Rev. Artie L. Polk, assistant pastor of Mount Gilead
Baptist Church in the District and founder of the Martin
Luther King memorial breakfast celebration in Prince George's
County: ``It is a real challenge to keep the King legacy
alive, especially in light of this new prosperity gospel
where preachers are talking about name it and claim it. Too
many people are focused today on themselves instead of
keeping alive King's legacy of service and commitment to the
least of these.''
Mohammed Shameem, a broadcast engineer from Bowie who
volunteers at the Prince George's Muslim Association in
Lanham: ``More so than ever before, people of the faith
community should adhere to Dr. King's principles in terms of
equality and unity in the community because our civil rights
are being eroded today, and the civil rights of Muslims are
being trampled upon. Social activism calls for pointing out
injustice. Hardworking and innocent Muslims are being
profiled just because of their faith. A group of imams were
stopped in the airport because they were being profiled.''
Bishop Adam Jefferson Richardson, prelate of the 2nd
Episcopal District of the African Methodist Episcopal Church:
``The movement is still regarded as effective for that time,
but that style has changed. The frightful part is that in the
old days, there was a theological mandate to do social
activism, now among Generation Next, there is an emphasis on
acquisition and materialism, much to the exclusion as to what
is good for the whole community. There is nothing wrong with
a prosperity message, but you have to guide people to
understand the whole gospel, which also includes helping
others; it can't be selfcentered, it has to be others-
oriented.''
Rabbi Douglas Heifetz of the Oseh Shalom Congregation in
Laurel: ``Yes! King's legacy is alive today. It needs to be
spread far and near. For example, the Jewish community has
been extremely active in working with a coalition of other
groups to call for an end to the genocide in Darfur because
this is massive human rights abuse on a wide scale. We are
called to follow King's legacy because the Hebrew Bible calls
for ongoing social transformation to affect the lives of
people, paying special attention to the lives of those who
are most in need.''
Auxiliary Bishop Martin D. Holley of the Archdiocese of
Washington: ``King's dream is very much alive today. It is
very prophetic, especially his letter from the Birmingham
jail. Here was a man who believed so much in the dignity of
the human person that he was willing to go to jail for it He
led by example. He went beyond making statements. He paid a
heavy price. He gave his life for all people.''
Cain Hope Felder, professor at the Howard University School
of Divinity and founder of the Biblical Institute for Social
Change: ``I am sick and tired of hearing Dr. King's 'I Have a
Dream' speech when the daily reality is that for an
increasing number of Americans, and the African American poor
in particular, living is a nightmare. Dr. King's legacy is
barely alive today. There needs to be a vigorous effort for
religious leaders to be far more proactive than they have
been in the past two decades of co-optation.''
____
[From the Washington Post, Jan. 13, 2007]
From Dr. King, A Reminder on Iraq
(By Colbert I. King)
Forty years ago, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., whom the
nation will honor on Monday, took to the pulpit of Riverside
Church in New York City at a meeting organized by Clergy and
Laymen Concerned About Vietnam. The date was April 4, 1967,
one year before his assassination in Memphis.
King said he was in New York because his conscience had
left him no choice. In his speech, ``Beyond Vietnam: A Time
to Break Silence,'' King declared: ``That time has come for
us in relation to Vietnam.''
King acknowledged the reluctance of some people to speak
out on Vietnam--the same hesitation some Americans may have
today over voicing their concerns about Iraq. People, he
explained, ``do not easily assume the task of opposing their
government's policy, especially in time of war.''
But King concluded that too much was at stake. He and the
other religious and lay leaders were moved by what the
conflict in Vietnam was doing to the United States. Vietnam,
King said, was consuming American troops and money like
``some demonic, destructive suction tube'' even as that war
was laying waste to the Vietnamese people and to America's
standing in the world.
And on this Martin Luther King Jr. Day, in 2007.
More than 3,000 Americans have been killed in Iraq, while
22,000 others have been wounded. Billions of dollars that
could have been invested here at home have been spent there,
a lot of it wasted, some of it stolen, plenty of it
unaccounted for. And Iraqis in Baghdad, who cowered for
decades under a brutal dictator, have been living in the
midst of violence almost continuously since Saddam Hussein
was deposed.
``We are creating enemies faster than we can kill them''
read a bumper sticker in Washington this week.
Now enter George W. Bush--the president who got America
into this debacle through a series of misjudgments that would
make Alfred E. Neuman look brilliant. This week
[[Page H527]]
Bush announced plans to plop down thousands of additional
troops in the middle of a sectarian war and to shell out
billions of additional dollars to pacify a war-weary Iraqi
population that, truth be told, wants America gone.
Why trust this administration?
Contrary to what Bush and his allies said:
There were no weapons of mass destruction poised to strike
America and her allies.
A quick defeat of Hussein did not lead to chocolates and
flowers in the streets of Baghdad.
An American invasion did not produce a unified,
nonsectarian and Western-oriented Iraq or spark a desire for
U.S.-style governance throughout the Arab world.
De-Baathification and the imposition of a market economy at
gunpoint did not usher in a period of tranquility or the
flowering of capitalism.
The Bush administration struck first because it had the
power to strike and the arrogance to think, foolishly, that
it could win and dominate the conquered on the cheap.
King spoke in '67 about ``the Western arrogance of feeling
that it has everything to teach others and nothing to learn
from them.'' Witness the Bush team in Iraq.
Today they have a bloodbath on their hands to show for
their labors, and Iran is on the verge of getting an Iraqi
neighbor beyond its wildest dreams.
Yet even now, neoconservatives inside and outside of
government are counseling Bush to remain in Iraq for years to
prevent the Shiite-dominated regime from collapsing. They
also are encouraging him to prepare for battle with Iran and
Syria if those countries start meddling in Iraq--as if they
aren't now. With what exactly and for how long we are
supposed to do battle with Tehran and Damascus, the
militaristic neocon noncombatants in Washington don't say.
But then again, they have a tolerance for risk and cost that
exceeds that of those who actually do the fighting and dying.
Forty years ago at Riverside Church, people of conscience
declared that ``a time comes when silence is betrayal.'' They
went beyond using their voices and votes when they agreed to
break their silence. They responded, as King had urged, by
matching their words with actions. ``We are at the moment
when our lives must be placed on the line if our nation is to
survive its own folly. Every man of humane convictions must
decide on the protest that best suits his convictions, but we
must all protest,'' King preached that day.
Yes, this is a different time and a different world. Global
terrorism is a sobering reality. And America is on the right
side in that war. To not fight back is tantamount to
indulging a death wish.
But the first blow in Iraq, which was not a battleground
for terrorism, was struck by Bush. He now, stubbornly and in
the face of legitimate opposition, proposes to make matters
worse.
Remember King and the words: ``A time comes when silence is
betrayal.''
____
[From the Washington Post, Jan. 15, 2007]
Martin Luther King Papers Go on Display
(By Errin Haines)
Atlanta.--The legacy of Coretta Scott King loomed large
Monday over the first observance of Martin Luther King Jr.
Day since her death, with tributes at the church where her
husband preached and visits to the tomb where both civil
rights activists are now buried.
``It is in her memory and her honor that we must carry this
program on,'' said her sister-in-law, Christine King Farris,
at the historic Ebenezer Baptist Church. ``This is as she
would have it.''
Mayor Shirley Franklin urged the congregation not to pay
tribute to King's message of peace and justice on his
birthday and then contradict it the next.
``Millions can't find jobs, have no health insurance and
struggle to make ends meet, working minimum-wage jobs. What's
going on?'' Franklin said, repeating a refrain from soul
singer Marvin Gaye.
As King condemned the war in Vietnam 40 years ago,
Ebenezer's senior pastor, the Rev. Raphael G. Warnock,
denounced the war in Iraq.
``The real danger is not that America may lose the war,''
Warnock said. ``The real danger is that America may well lose
its soul.''
Not far from the church, visitors also paid homage to the
Kings at their tomb.
``They're together at last,'' said Daphne Johnson, who was
baptized by King at Ebenezer.
Coretta Scott King died last year on Jan. 31 at age 78. An
activist in her own right, she also fought to shape and
preserve her husband's legacy after his death, and founded
what would become the Martin Luther King Jr. Center for
Nonviolent Social Change.
Crowds lined up early at the Atlanta History Center to see
the first exhibition of King's collected papers since they
were returned to his hometown. The papers brought back
difficult memories for some.
``I remember a lot that I don't care to say,'' said Bertis
Post, 70, of Atlanta, who marched with King in Alabama and
Atlanta. ``I always wanted to see the papers in person--just
to be here and be around what you believe.''
The exhibit includes King's letter from the Birmingham
jail, an early draft of his famous ``I Have a Dream'' speech,
his acceptance speech for the Nobel Prize and more than 600
other personal documents.
In California, Stanford University released some of King's
earliest sermons and other writings Monday, a decade after
the documents were discovered in a moldy cardboard box in an
Atlanta basement.
The texts include sermons written when King was a 19-year-
old seminary student in 1948 until 1963.
In a 1949 sermon, King asked God to ``help us work with
renewed vigor for a warless world, a better distribution of
wealth and a brotherhood that transcends race or color.''
Elsewhere, thousands observed the holiday by volunteering.
Organizers expected about 50,000 people to participate in
about 600 projects, said Todd Bernstein of the group MLK Day
of Service.
President Bush, in an unannounced stop at a high school
near the White House, said people should honor King by
finding ways to give back to their communities. Classes were
not in session but volunteers were sprucing up the school.
``I encourage people all around the country to seize any
opportunity they can to help somebody in need,'' Bush said.
``And by helping somebody in need you're honoring the legacy
of Martin Luther King.''
A historical marker was unveiled commemorating the site in
Rocky Mount, N.C., where Martin Luther King Jr. delivered one
of the earliest versions of his ``I Have A Dream'' speech.
Hundreds of people attended a ceremony and march held near
the high school where King spoke in November 1962.
Several hundred people gathered in West Columbia, S.C., for
a breakfast prayer service, where the Rev. Brenda Kneece said
King set the standard for sacrifice and vision.
King's ``vision became even more powerful because he
understood the risks he was taking,'' said Kneece, executive
minister of the South Carolina Christian Action Council.
``It's very important for our children to know that his
sacrifice didn't win the war. We still have to keep at it''
At Michigan State University, officials presented a one-day
civil rights exhibit that displayed slave shackles, a
document from King's voting rights march in Alabama and a
fingerprint card for Rosa Parks made after her 1955 arrest
for refusing to give up her bus seat to a white man.
Marchers commemorating King Day in Troy, Ohio, were heckled
by a group of seven neo-Nazi protesters shouting white power
slogans and carrying signs, police said. There were no
arrests.
And in North Carolina, 400 workers walked off the job or
refused to show up at a huge Smithfield Foods Inc. hog
slaughtering plant in Tar Heel after managers refused to
grant the King holiday as a paid day off.
The company said a union request last week for the day off
came too late for a change of work plans.
King, who would have turned 78 this year, was assassinated
April 4, 1968, while standing on the balcony of a hotel in
Memphis, Tenn. His confessed killer, James Earl Ray, was
arrested two months later in London.
____
[From the Washington Post, Jan. 16, 2007]
Walking Just Like King Did
(By Michael E. Ruane and Hamil R. Harris)
The opening song was No. 540 in the hymnal, but most people
at the Covenant Baptist Church tribute to the Rev. Martin
Luther King Jr. yesterday already knew the words well.
Lift ev'ry voice and sing, Til earth and heaven ring. . . .
Stony the road we trod, Bitter the chast'ning rod. . .
.
Inside the venerable Washington church, which was the
destination for hundreds participating in the city's Martin
Luther King Peace Walk, the throng sang the verses to James
Weldon Johnson's civil rights anthem with gusto.
Yet with a steady beat, Have not our weary feet come to the
place for which our fathers sighed?
It seemed a fitting climax to the 18-block walk honoring
King's birthday, which was led by DC Mayor Adrian M. Fenty
and wound along Martin Luther King Jr. Avenue SE to the
church on South Capitol Street.
It was one of numerous tributes across the region to the
slain civil rights leader, who would have turned 78
yesterday. King was assassinated in Memphis on April 4, 1968.
The peace walk began about 10 a.m. at V Street SE in
Anacostia after speeches by the mayor and other officials,
clergy members and civic leaders. Crowding the sidewalk for
blocks, the marchers enjoyed balmy January weather as they
strode south on the avenue, chanting slogans and carrying
banners.
``Today we're blessed. The weather is not a problem,'' said
Denise Rolark Barnes, one of the walk's organizers. Over the
years, King birthday commemorations have been affected by
harsh winter weather, she noted.
While an official King Day parade in the District is
scheduled for April 7, Barnes said many people believed
King's birthday needed to be observed, too. ``Many of us who
work and live along the avenue just felt as though there was
something that we should do. . . . We said, `Rain, snow,
sleet or hail, we would be out here,' and fortunately it
doesn't look like we're going to get any of that.''
Fenty (D) said the walk would be a simple statement ``We're
going to just go out and put one foot in front of the other,
and tell people that, although we made a lot of progress,
we've got a long way to go.''
He said it could be especially instructive for the children
participating.
``It won't be hard to explain to the kids how Martin Luther
King was able to make so much progress just by walking when
they're
[[Page H528]]
going to do it themselves,'' Fenty said. ``I think they'll
appreciate the hours and hours and months and months [spent
walking] in the South to get civil rights advancements if we
do a little bit of walking here ourselves.''
Residents watched from front porches and windows as the
march proceeded and a recording of one of King's speeches
drifted from a passing car, along with the thump of pop music
from another.
Past the avenue's multitude of churches the marchers went,
past the nail salons and convenience stores. One house on the
route was adorned with the images of King and fellow civil
rights champion Malcolm X arrayed on its front steps. There
were black marchers and white marchers, people in sneakers
and others wearing cuff links.
One marcher, Keith Day, 45, who works at a drug addiction
prevention agency, said: ``I came down here to keep the
legacy of Dr. King alive. If it wasn't for him, none of this
would be happening. It took a man like him to stand up for
peace.''
Elsewhere yesterday, more than 300 people gathered at the
La Fontaine Bleu banquet facility in Lanham for the 13th
Annual Martin Luther King memorial breakfast sponsored by the
Ebony Scholarship Society. There, Bishop Adam Jefferson
Richardson Jr. of the Second Episcopal District of the
African Methodist Episcopal Church challenged those gathered
to go beyond just remembering King.
``From memorial to movement, let the movement begin anew,''
Richardson said. ``It is right for us to be told Dr. King's
words, to hear what the words mean in the context of 2007. At
a time when we are waging war like swatting flies, it would
be refreshing to hear King's words that violence is a poor
teacher.''
Maryland Del. Carolyn J.B. Howard (D-Prince George's), who
attended the event, said that although such programs have
become common since King's death, ``we still need to remember
what he did.''
``It is easy to stay away, but we need to come out,'' she
said. ``There needs to be a new sense of activism today.''
____
[From the Associated Press, Jan. 16, 2007]
Democrats Hail Civil Rights Leader King
(By Jim Davenport)
Columbia, S.C.--Democratic presidential hopeful Joseph
Biden said Monday he thinks the Confederate flag should be
kept off South Carolina's Statehouse grounds.
The comments by the U.S. senator from Delaware on a day of
events celebrating Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s legacy came
as a potential Democratic presidential candidate, Sen. Barack
Obama, evoked the memory of the slain civil rights leader.
``As I recall, Dr. King wasn't hanging out in Manhattan,
Dr. King wasn't hanging out in Beverly Hills,'' Obama, D-
Ill., told a King remembrance service in an economically
depressed south Chicago suburb.
Introducing Obama, the Rev. Jesse Jackson told a crowd at
the annual King scholarship breakfast, ``it's a long, nonstop
line between the march in Selma in 1965 and the inauguration
in Washington in 2009.''
Screaming admirers managed to get Obama's autograph after
he advocated removing troops from Iraq, rebuilding struggling
areas such as the suburb of Harvey where he was speaking and
increasing civic activism and calling on people, especially
fathers, to be better parents.
In San Francisco, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi reminded more
than 1,000 people attending a union-sponsored breakfast
honoring King that the slain civil rights leader spoke out
against the Vietnam War because he saw domestic and national
security issues as inexorably intertwined.
Pelosi, D-Calif., said Democrats would counter President
Bush's proposal to send more troops to Iraq with a plan
changing the U.S. mission there ``from combat to training, to
fighting terrorism, to protecting our forces.
``The nation is spending ``two billion a week in Iraq--
think of what we could do a week, a month, a day with that
money,'' Pelosi said, adding that the nation also has paid
too great a cost in casualties, its international reputation
and military readiness at home.
In Columbia, S.C., more than six years after the
Confederate flag was taken down from the Capitol dome, its
location in front of the Statehouse remains an issue.
``If I were a state legislator, I'd vote for it to move off
the grounds--out of the state,'' Biden said at an NAACP march
and rally at the Statehouse.
Jim Hanks stood across from the South Carolina Statehouse
with about 35 Confederate flag supporters. ``We love this
flag. We love our heritage,'' said Hanks, of Lexington.
Some carried signs saying, ``South Carolina does not want
Chris Dodd,'' referring to the Connecticut senator who, along
with Biden, attended the National Association for the
Advancement of Colored People rally at the Statehouse.
On Sunday, Dodd told The Associated Press at a King
remembrance service in Greenville that the Confederate flag
belongs in a museum.
``I don't think it belongs on the Capitol grounds,'' Dodd
said.
In 2000, as the NAACP began a South Carolina tourism
boycott, the flag was flying on the Capitol dome and in House
and Senate chambers. Legislators agreed to take the flag down
that year, but raised the banner outside the Statehouse
beside a Confederate soldiers monument.
Biden expects legislators here will eventually move the
flag. Pointing to his heart, he said, ``as people become more
and more aware of what it means to African-Americans here,
this is only a matter of time.''
____
[From the Washington Post, Jan. 15, 2007]
Martin Luther King, Jr. Day
On April 4, 1968, the day of the Rev. Martin Luther King
Jr.'s assassination, the doctor who examined his body
estimated that, after years of sit-ins, marches, long nights
and inspiring speeches, Dr. King, 39, had the heart of a 60-
year-old. On Martin Luther King Jr. Day, America honors not
only Dr. King's accomplishments, though they are profound;
his oration, though it is lyrical; and his dream, though it
lives on; but also the tireless devotion with which he
pursued them.
For too many Americans, however, the holiday has become
little more than an excuse to skip work and sleep in.
Enter the Corporation for National and Community Service,
the government agency that administers the AmeriCorps
program. It wants to make the King holiday a time of service
rather than sloth, and it is organizing community projects
and events across the country to do it The agency is
particularly eager to make the Washington area a model of
civic participation and service on Dr. King's birthday. Its
spokesmen boast that it has assembled an event schedule
including a kickoff at Howard University and 80 community
service projects around the District. Organizers from the
Corporation for National and Community Service expect 10,000
volunteers to contribute time and effort across the region
today.
We hope even more show up. We can think of little more
fitting than celebrating the values of service and self-
sacrifice on Martin Luther King Jr. Day. Though ground has
been broken on a long-awaited memorial to Dr. King on the
Mall, words etched in stone, however grand, cannot honor his
legacy as emulating his example can. Visit http://
www.mlkday.gov. find a project in your area, and paint a
school or clean up a sidewalk today.
Mr. BACA. Madam Speaker, I ask for unanimous consent to revise and
extend my remarks.
All of us here, representing Congress have the distinct honor and
privilege of working in the one place where America's history meets the
law of our land, the one place that displays the many historic
monuments, memorials, and permanent images of our Nation.
One of the most powerful images in Washington for me is the image of
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., conveying his dream during his 1963
``March on Washington'' on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. Dr. King
dedicated his life to achieving equal rights for all Americans and had
a clear vision on that day in 1963 for what America should look like
today.
Dr. King understood government has a fundamental responsibility to
meet the needs of all Americans regardless of race or economic class.
His vision was for true equal economic opportunity for all. In his ``I
Have a Dream'' speech, Dr. King spoke of the ``fierce urgency of now.''
He said, ``This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to
take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism.'' Those words were true in
1963 and continue to remain true today.
My Democratic colleagues and I are working hard to ensure that
Congress fulfills its responsibility to realizing Dr. King's dream.
Within these first 100 hours of this Congress, we have already passed
legislation to make the American people safer, make our Congress more
honest and open, make life better for our seniors, and to give a living
wage to all Americans.
As our Nation celebrates Martin Luther King Day, we remember him as a
beacon of change. Dr. King helped change America by leading the civil
rights movement. He gave people the faith and courage to work
peacefully for change to stop racial discrimination, and promote
equality and opportunity across America. So on this day, and everyday,
let us recommit to changing and working to bring about opportunity for
all Americans.
Madam Speaker, as we celebrate Dr. King's birthday, let us carry out
his vision for social justice, equality, and peace. Let us continue to
work together for the common cause, in the effort of humanity and
brotherhood, so all people may enjoy a better way of life and a higher
dignity.
Mr. HOLT. Madam Speaker, I rise today to recognize and honor the
extraordinary life of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Few individuals have
left such an indelible mark on society through their selfless and
tireless actions to improve the lives of those around them. Dr. King
was a powerful voice for justice and equality, and we must remember his
legacy, not simply by reading aloud his works, but by heeding his call
for action.
After receiving his doctorate from Boston University, Dr. King worked
to confront the civil rights abuses that targeted the Black residents
of Montgomery, Alabama. After the Montgomery bus boycott earned him
national attention, Dr. King used his platform to highlight other forms
of racial segregation in the South. His actions, including nonviolent
civil
[[Page H529]]
disobedience, laid the foundation for passage of both the Civil Rights
Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Despite his myriad
accomplishments, Dr. King continued to work day and night until his
death, often delivering rousing speeches even when physically and
mentally exhausted.
These later speeches included powerful denunciations of the Vietnam
war, and calls for a more just and peaceful society. Dr. King
recognized that resources that could have been used to fight racial and
economic inequalities at home were being squandered on an unnecessary
war half a world away. Dr. King demanded that people sacrifice their
energy to fight for causes larger than themselves. I am glad to see
that the Corporation for National and Community Service has asked
Americans to honor that call by volunteering their time on Martin
Luther King, Jr., Day. We must all actively work to achieve peace, both
in our communities and abroad, and I am proud to stand before this body
today to celebrate the life of Dr. King.
Ms. EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON of Texas. Madam Speaker, today we are here
to recognize Dr. King's legacy and the millions of men and women who
have fought for freedom and justice for all Americans.
It is rare that one person can change the fate of our Nation; however
Dr. King was able to do just that. Dr. King relied on his relationship
with God and his faith in justice to articulate his vision for America
in a way that touched the hearts and minds of the American public.
Dr. King called on all of us to no longer stand alone in silence, but
to stand up together as a voice against injustice. He inspired us to
fight for change through nonviolent means, and paved the road for us to
continue that fight even after his death.
Dr. King once said ``All progress is precarious, and the solution of
one problem brings us face to face with another problem.'' This
statement was not meant to be a deterrent, but rather to remind us that
we need to remain diligent, and prepare for the long road ahead. If we
become apathetic we will regress. We have not, and must not forget the
fight is not over.
This is the first year that we'll recognize Martin Luther King Day
since the death of Mrs. Coretta Scott King. Mrs. King and I were
friends and confidants for many years. She was an incredible woman--
graceful and dignified--who showed strength in the face of indignation
and tragedy.
Following Dr. King's assassination, she continued his legacy
promoting social and economic justice for all. Mrs. King was determined
to make his dream a reality. And we would not be celebrating the legacy
of Dr. King today without her contributions.
There are many young people who may not have experienced Dr. King's
battle towards equality. That is why it is so important to familiarize
them with our history and struggles. It is imperative we recognize the
history of our nation, because we cannot look towards the future
without applying the lessons we have learned from the past.
Today's Martin Luther King Day is as much about the past as it is
about the future. Dr. King's dream is truly timeless, and I hope that
all the young people will find inspiration in his faith and vision.
Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas. Madam Speaker, I rise in strong support of
H. Res. 61, and thank my friend from Georgia, John Lewis, for authoring
this important resolution.
Madam Speaker, yesterday the Nation observed for the 21st time the
Martin Luther King, Jr., holiday. Each year this day is set aside for
Americans to celebrate the life and legacy of a man who brought hope
and healing to America. The Martin Luther King holiday reminds us that
nothing is impossible when we are guided by the better angels of our
nature.
Dr. King's inspiring words filled a great void in our Nation, and
answered our collective longing to become a country that truly lived by
its noblest principles. Yet, Dr. King knew that it wasn't enough just
to talk the talk; he knew he had to walk the walk for his words to be
credible. And so we commemorate on this holiday the man of action, who
put his life on the line for freedom and justice every day.
We honor the courage of a man who endured harassment, threats and
beatings, and even bombings. We commemorate the man who went to jail 29
times to achieve freedom for others, and who knew he would pay the
ultimate price for his leadership, but kept on marching and protesting
and organizing anyway.
Dr. King once said that we all have to decide whether we ``will walk
in the light of creative altruism or the darkness of destructive
selfishness. Life's most persistent and nagging question, he said, is
`what are you doing for others?' ''
And when Martin talked about the end of his mortal life in one of his
last sermons, on February 4, 1968, in the pulpit of Ebenezer Baptist
Church, even then he lifted up the value of service as the hallmark of
a full life. ``I'd like somebody to mention on that day Martin Luther
King, Jr. tried to give his life serving others,'' he said. ``I want
you to say on that day, that I did try in my life . . . to love and
serve humanity.
Madam Speaker, during these difficult days when the United States is
bogged down in a misguided and mismanaged war in Iraq, which has
claimed the lives of too many of our brave young service men and women,
we should also remember that the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., was,
above all, a person who was always willing to speak truth to power.
There is perhaps no better example of Dr. King's moral integrity and
consistency than his criticism of the Vietnam war being waged by the
Johnson administration, an administration that was otherwise a friend
and champion of civil and human rights.
Speaking at the historic Riverside Church in New York City on April
4, 1967, Dr. King stated:
I am as deeply concerned about our own troops there as
anything else. For it occurs to me that what we are
submitting them to in Vietnam is not simply the brutalizing
process that goes on in any war where armies face each other
and seek to destroy. We are adding cynicism to the process of
death, for they must know after a short period there that
none of the things we claim to be fighting for are really
involved. Before long they must know that their government
has sent them into a struggle among Vietnamese, and the more
sophisticated surely realize that we are on the side of the
wealthy, and the secure, while we create a hell for the poor.
Somehow this madness must cease. We must stop now. I speak
as a child of God and brother to the suffering poor of
Vietnam. . . . I speak as a citizen of the world, for the
world as it stands aghast at the path we have taken. I speak
as one who loves America, to the leaders of our own nation:
The great initiative in this war is ours; the initiative to
stop it must be ours.
Madam Speaker, these words were spoken by Dr. King 1 year to the day
before his death. Thus it is that nearly 40 years after his death, Dr.
King continues to teach us all.
Madam Speaker, the death of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.,
will never overshadow his life. He was both a dreamer and a man of
action. He leaves a legacy of hope, tempered with peace. It is a legacy
not quite yet fulfilled.
Madam Speaker, Dr. King's dream of equality under the law will never
die so long as there are those like us in the Congress, and millions of
people in this country and around the world, who are willing to
continue the fight to make it real for all persons.
Mr. MEEK of Florida. Madam Speaker, Dr. King brought the civil rights
movement to every living room in this country. He marched for freedom
in the face of unspeakable racial prejudice, yet preached a message of
nonviolence, civility, and tolerance. It took Dr. King's forceful
movement and powerful words to bring about real and lasting change to
this country.
This will be the first Martin Luther King, Jr. Day since the passing
of Dr. King's wife, Mrs. Coretta Scott King, a legendary civil rights
advocate whose memory we honored at a community-wide march last year in
Miami. During a time of national grief and unrest following Dr. King's
assassination, she became a symbol of her husband's struggle for peace
and unity. On this day, we also honor this wonderful matriarchal
figure, a role model who helped lead the struggle for equality.
Minority communities face obstacles every day--poverty, unemployment,
lack of healthcare, and access to housing. It is a tragic waste that 1
in 5 children live in poverty, including more than one-third of African
American children.
Dr. King paved the way for so many people, including me, to assume
roles of influence in this country. And for all this work, he created a
more just society and made this country an even better place to live.
On this day of remembrance, let us work even harder toward fulfilling
Dr. King's legacy of public service.
Ms. WOOLSEY. Madam Speaker, the fabric of our lives and the lives of
all Americans has been shaped indelibly by the work of Dr. Martin
Luther King, Jr. Dr. King had just 39 years to teach our country the
way to achieve racial and economic justice through peace and
nonviolence. Although his life was short, his legacy--the rich vision
of social justice he inspired--is alive and well 40 years after his
death. It is with great pride that I take part in this celebration
today, to pay homage to his memory.
Dr. King was a leader who focused his efforts on improving the lives
of the disadvantaged in our society. He knew that we must be forever
attentive to the least privileged, for they are the measure--the only
measure that matters--of the depth of our compassion and the strength
of our laws.
We still have much to learn from Dr. King, as the dreams he
envisioned for our grandchildren still resonate in today's America:
equal opportunity, freedom from oppression, justice for all. The
eloquent cadences of his ``I
[[Page H530]]
Have A Dream'' speech left a lasting impression on America, and we
cannot afford to forget his words. For Dr. King's dream, his concrete
vision for the future, has yet to be realized. I look forward to
working with my colleagues in this Congress to further the realization
of his goals and his strong vision.
Mr. MARKEY. Madam Speaker I rise in strong support of House
Resolution 61, a resolution which honors the great Dr. Martin Luther
King, Jr., for his outstanding contributions to our country in the past
and the continuing impact of his life and legacy.
Born on January 15, 1929, Martin Luther King, Jr., was destined to
follow in his grandfather's and father's footsteps as a Baptist
minister, but no one could have known he would play such an important
role in this history of our Nation. After graduating from high school
at the age of 15, Martin Luther King, Jr., attended Morehouse College
in Atlanta, GA., just as his grandfather and father had done before. He
became a pastor in Ebenezer Baptist Church, and quickly rose to become
the leader of the Civil Rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s,
inspiring first the Montgomery bus boycott in 1955, and subsequently a
nationwide battle to bring an end to racial discrimination in our
Nation's laws and public accommodations, and to ensure full voting
rights for African Americans. Though bus boycotts had been attempted
before, none lasted as long, drew as much attention or were as
successful. The Montgomery Bus boycott lasted for almost an entire year
and had a profound effect on the businesses in Montgomery.
In recognition of his great leadership, Reverend King was the
youngest person ever to win a Nobel Peace Prize at the age of 35. He
donated all of the prize money to the Civil Rights Movement.
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., was a spiritual giant who possessed a
keen intellect and remarkable insights on the human condition. In
Massachusetts, we feel a sense of privilege knowing that this
extraordinary historic figure lived and learned among us during his
lifetime. In 1955, he received a Doctorate of Philosophy in Systematic
Theology from Boston University. He also studied at Harvard University.
But most important, it was in Boston that he met Coretta Scott, who
became his wife, the mother of his four children, and his indispensable
partner in a destiny of struggle, transformation and remarkable
achievement.
Many of the words of Dr. King speak greatly to the adversities that
we still face today. As we work to change the direction of our country,
those of us in government must repeatedly seek out those with whom we
may sometimes disagree to accomplish those great things that are most
worth doing. ``Like an unchecked cancer,'' said Dr. King, ``hate
corrodes the personality and eats away its vital unity. Hate destroys a
man's sense of values and his objectivity. It causes him to describe
the beautiful as ugly and the ugly as beautiful, and to confuse the
true with the false and the false with the true.''
As Dr. King so eloquently put it, ``In the end, we will remember not
the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.''
I urge adoption of the resolution.
Mr. HOYER. Mr. Speaker, I join my colleagues today in honoring the
legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.--a man who answered humanity's
highest calling and profoundly transformed the world in which we live.
Yesterday, like many of our colleagues here, I had the privilege of
joining with my constituents in rejoicing, remembering and giving
thanks to God for the wisdom that Dr. King imparted and the enduring
spirit he shared with all mankind.
And at an event at St. Mary's College in southern Maryland, I
encountered a man who told me that the third Monday of every January
isn't just a national holiday--it's a national holy day--and he was
exactly right.
The commemoration of Dr. King's birthday and the ideals for which he
stood represent a sacred trust--an opportunity to take note of the
heights we have reached as a Nation and celebrate the hard-earned
triumphs of African Americans, while also demonstrating the courage to
accept that we are sill far from perfect and much good work remains
undone.
Coretta Scott King, who provided a shining example of strength and
determination in her own right, once said, ``Struggle is a never ending
process and freedom is never really won. You earn it and win it in
every generation.''
I would take that statement a step further and say that it is up to
us to win it and earn it in every day, hour, minute and second of our
lives.
If we take nothing else from the life and work of Dr. King, it should
be that each of us shares the responsibility of preserving the legacies
of peace, equality and understanding that were left in our hands.
And if we take nothing else from yesterday's commemoration, it should
be that our work is never done, and our mission is never completed.
In his letter from a Birmingham City Jail in April of 1963, Dr. King
reminds us all that, ``Human progress never rolls on the wheels of
inevitability--it comes through the tireless efforts of men willing to
be co-workers with God.''
One of those co-workers is a distinguished Member of this body, an
inspiration to all of those who continue to fight for social justice
and equality, and the sponsor of this legislation. I, of course, am
referring to our colleague and my very good friend, Congressman Lewis
of Georgia, who I regard as nothing less than a national hero for
demonstrating the courage to confront centuries of prejudice and racism
and helping to move us toward a day where men and women are judged by
the content of their character not the color of their skin.
As we continue to be co-workers with both the American people and the
divine spirit that guides them, we should never forget Dr. King's
immortal words from that Birmingham jail or the lessons he taught.
We are indebted to men and women like Dr. King and Coretta Scott King
and John Lewis. Through their courage and their fortitude, we are a
better Nation today.
While this important day is indeed a day of remembrance, it also is a
day of reaffirmation--reaffirmation of the principles that guided Dr.
King's life.
Mr. SMITH of Texas. Madam Speaker, I strongly support H. Res. 61,
which observes and celebrates the birthday of Martin Luther King, Jr.,
and encourages the people of the United States to celebrate his life
and legacy.
We should all thank Dr. King not only for his role in helping to end
discrimination, but also for his role in helping to remove a stain on
American history that had lingered far too long.
Dr. King's commitment to nonviolent change never wavered. Between the
time he assumed leadership of the Montgomery, AL, bus boycott in 1955,
until his tragic assassination years later, Dr. King faced hundreds of
death threats and a firebombing of his home with his wife and children
inside. Still, he remained an unblinking beacon to all those who sought
peaceful change. He grew from a person taught in segregated schools to
a world leader who was awarded the Nobel Prize.
Dr. King delivered his now famous speech entitled ``I Have a Dream''
following a march of 250,000 people in Washington, DC. Twenty years
ago, the City of San Antonio's Martin Luther King, Jr., Commission
began honoring Dr. King with a march that furthers his legacy and
serves to educate local citizens regarding his deep, rich legacy. That
march has become one of the largest in the country and this march
marked its own 20th anniversary yesterday, the day Dr. King would have
turned 78.
Despite near freezing temperatures, the San Antonio march attracted
thousands of people of diverse backgrounds, which in the past has
featured Rosa Parks, the woman who sparked the modern civil rights
movement by refusing to sit at the back of the bus. Those in the march
knew that no matter what the weather, it paled in comparison to the
slings and arrows--the death threats and beatings, and the repeated
arrests--Dr. King faced during his too-short but immensely inspiring
life.
Such peaceful marches are possible today in large part because of Dr.
King's abiding courage. The San Antonio march serves as a powerful
reminder that if one person finds the strength to keep walking forward,
determined to reach what Dr. King called the ``Promised Land,'' he or
she can leave in their wake a lasting legacy of marches--stretching
from generation to generation--that celebrate and encourage changes in
both laws and attitudes that will continue to make America a better
place.
Mr. REYES. Madam Speaker, I rise today in support of H. Res. 61, a
resolution observing and celebrating the birthday of Martin Luther
King, Jr., and encouraging the people of the United States to celebrate
the birthday of Martin Luther King, Jr., and his life and legacy.
When Martin Luther King, Jr., articulated his dream on the steps of
the Lincoln Memorial before 200,000 people in the tumultuous August of
1963, I was living and working on my father's farm in Canutillo, Texas,
not yet a high school graduate. Though instilled with the values of
hard work and education by my parents and grandparents, I first
encountered Dr. King's hopeful and empowering words with an unfortunate
understanding, one borne from the prejudice of the times. As a Mexican-
American, I knew, I would be limited in my pursuit of the celebrated
American dream. Dr. King's dream contradicted that understanding.
Although Dr. King's ``I Have a Dream'' speech addressed the plight of
the African American, his commitment to civil rights, equality, and
empowerment through education lifted all people. With Dr. King's
leadership, through the sheer force of his will and the strength of his
arguments, men and women of my generation, Black, White, and Brown,
were able to rise and prosper in society on the basis of our hard work
and God-given talents.
Dr. King's work and influence on society opened doors for me that, as
a teenager, I
[[Page H531]]
thought would always be closed. I had a long and successful career in
the U.S. Border Patrol, rising from agent to be the agency's first
Hispanic sector chief. In 1996, I ran for Congress and became the first
Latino to represent El Paso, a city that is 80 percent Hispanic. And
just this past year, I was selected as chairman of this body's
Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, completing a journey from
the farm in Canutillo that I would never have been able to imagine
during that August of 1963.
I thank my colleagues and urge adoption of the resolution.
Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas. Madam Speaker, this Monday the Nation
observed for the 21st time the Martin Luther King, Jr., holiday On
Monday, we celebrated the life and legacy of a man who brought hope and
healing to America. The Martin Luther King holiday reminds us that
nothing is impossible when we are guided by the better angels of our
nature.
Dr. King's inspiring words filled a great void in our Nation, and
answered our collective longing to become a country that truly lived by
its noblest principles. Yet, Dr. King knew that it wasn't enough just
to talk the talk, that he had to walk the walk for his words to be
credible. And so we commemorate on this holiday the man of action, who
put his life on the line for freedom and justice every day.
We honor the courage of a man who endured harassment, threats and
beatings, and even bombings. We commemorate the man who went to jail 29
times to achieve freedom for others, and who knew he would pay the
ultimate price for his leadership, but kept on marching and protesting
and organizing anyway.
Dr. King once said that we all have to decide whether we ``will walk
in the light of creative altruism or the darkness of destructive
selfishness. Life's most persistent and nagging question,'' he said, is
``what are you doing for others?''
And when Martin talked about the end of his mortal life in one of his
last sermons, on February 4, 1968, in the pulpit of Ebenezer Baptist
Church, even then he lifted up the value of service as the hallmark of
a full life. ``I'd like somebody to mention on that day Martin Luther
King, Jr. tried to give his life serving others,'' he said. ``I want
you to say on that day, that I did try in my life . . . to love and
serve humanity.''
Madam Speaker, during these difficult days when the United States is
bogged down in a misguided and mismanaged war in Iraq, which has
claimed the lives of too many of our brave young service men and women,
we should also remember that the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., was,
above all, a person who was always willing to speak truth to power.
There is perhaps no better example of Dr. King's moral integrity and
consistency than his criticism of the Vietnam War being waged by the
Johnson Administration, an administration that was otherwise a friend
and champion of civil and human rights.
Speaking at the historic Riverside Church in New York City on April
4, 1967, Dr. King stated:
I am as deeply concerned about our own troops there as
anything else. For it occurs to me that what we are
submitting them to in Vietnam is not simply the brutalizing
process that goes on in any war where armies face each other
and seek to destroy. We are adding cynicism to the process of
death, for they must know after a short period there that
none of the things we claim to be fighting for are really
involved. Before long they must know that their government
has sent them into a struggle among Vietnamese, and the more
sophisticated surely realize that we are on the side of the
wealthy, and the secure, while we create a hell for the poor.
Somehow this madness must cease. We must stop now. I speak
as a child of God and brother to the suffering poor of
Vietnam. I speak for those whose land is being laid waste,
whose homes are being destroyed, whose culture is being
subverted. I speak for the poor of America who are paying the
double price of smashed hopes at home, and death and
corruption in Vietnam. I speak as a citizen of the world, for
the world as it stands aghast at the path we have taken. I
speak as one who loves America, to the leaders of our own
nation: The great initiative in this war is ours; the
initiative to stop it must be ours.
Madam Speaker, these words were spoken by Dr. King 1 year to the day
before his death. Thus it is that nearly 40 years after his death, Dr.
King continues to teach us all.
The Life of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Martin Luther King, Jr. was born in Atlanta, Georgia, on January 15,
1929.
Martin's youth was spent in our country's Deep South, then run by Jim
Crow and the Klu Klux Klan. For a young African-American, it was an
environment even more dangerous than the one they face today.
A young Martin managed to find a dream, one that he pieced together
from his readings--in the Bible, and literature, and just about any
other book he could get his hands on. And not only did those books help
him educate himself, but they also allowed him to work through the
destructive and traumatic experiences of blatant discrimination, and
the discriminatory abuse inflicted on himself, his family, and his
people.
The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., that we celebrate here today
could have turned out to be just another African American who would
have had to learn to be happy with what he had, and what he was
allowed. But he learned to use his imagination and his dreams to see
right through those ``White Only'' signs--to see the reality that all
men, and women, regardless of their place of origin, their gender, or
their creed, are created equal.
Through his studies, Dr. King learned that training his mind and
broadening his intellect effectively shielded him from the demoralizing
effects of segregation and discrimination.
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., was a dreamer. His dreams were a tool
through which he was able to lift his mind beyond the reality of his
segregated society, and into a realm where it was possible that white
and black, red and brown, and all others live and work alongside each
other and prosper.
But Martin Luther King, Jr., was not just an idle daydreamer. He
shared his visions through speeches that motivated others to join in
his nonviolent effort to lift themselves from poverty and isolation by
creating a new America where equal justice and institutions were facts
of life.
In the Declaration of Independence in 1776, Thomas Jefferson wrote,
``We hold these truths to be self evident, that all Men are Created
Equal.'' At that time and for centuries to come, African Americans were
historically, culturally, and legally excluded from inclusion in that
declaration.
Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King's ``I Have a Dream'' Speech,
delivered on August 28, 1963, was a clarion call to each citizen of
this great Nation that we still hear today. His request was simply and
eloquently conveyed--he asked America to allow of its citizens to live
out the words written in its Declaration of Independence and to have a
place in this Nation's Bill of Rights.
The sixties were a time of great crisis and conflict. The dreams of
the people of this country were filled with troubling images that arose
like lava from the nightmares of violence and the dissension that they
had to face, both domestically and internationally.
It was the decade of the Cuban missile crisis, the Vietnam war, and
the assassinations of President John Fitzgerald Kennedy, Malcolm X,
Presidential Candidate Robert Kennedy, and the man we honor here today.
Dr. Martin Luther King's dream helped us turn the corner on civil
rights. It started with a peaceful march for suffrage that started in
Selma, Alabama, on March 7, 1965--a march that ended with violence at
the hands of law enforcement officers as the marchers crossed the
Edmund Pettus Bridge. But the dream did not die there.
Dr. King led the Montgomery bus boycott, often with Rosa Parks. The
boycott lasted for 381 days, as an end result, the United States
Supreme Court outlawed racial segregation on all public transportation.
Dr. King used several nonviolent tactics to protest against Jim Crow
laws in the South. Furthermore, he organized and led demonstrations for
desegregation, labor and voting rights.
On April 4, 1967, at Riverside Church in New York City, he spoke out
against the Vietnam War, when he saw the devastation that his nation
was causing abroad and the effect that it had on the American men and
women sent overseas. I quote:
. . . it became clear to me that the war was doing far more
than devastating the hopes of the poor at home. It was
sending their sons and their brothers and their husbands to
fight and to die in extraordinarily high proportions relative
to the rest of the population. We were taking the black young
men who had been crippled by our society and sending them
eight thousand miles away to guarantee liberties in Southeast
Asia which they had not found in southwest Georgia and East
Harlem.
When the life of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., was stolen from us, he
was a very young 39 years old. People remember that Dr. King died in
Memphis, but few can remember why he was there.
On that fateful day in 1968 Dr. King came to Memphis to support a
strike by the city's sanitation workers. The garbage men there had
recently formed a chapter of the American Federation of State, County
and Municipal Employees to demand better wages and working conditions.
But the city refused to recognize their union, and when the 1,300
employees walked off their jobs the police broke up the rally with mace
and billy clubs. It was then that union leaders invited Dr. King to
Memphis. Despite the danger he might face entering such a volatile
situation, it was an invitation he could not refuse. Not because he
longed for danger, but because the labor movement was intertwined with
the civil rights movement for which he had given up so many years of
his life.
[[Page H532]]
The death of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., will never
overshadow his life. That is his legacy as a dreamer and a man of
action. It is a legacy of hope, tempered with peace. It is a legacy not
quite yet fulfilled.
I hope that Dr. King's vision of equality under the law is never lost
to us, who in the present, toil in times of unevenness in our equality.
For without that vision--without that dream--we can never continue to
improve on the human condition.
For those who have already forgotten, or whose vision is already
clouded with the fog of complacency, I would like to recite the words
of the good Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., himself:
I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the
sons of former slaves and the sons of former shareholders
will be able to sit down together at the table of
brotherhood.
I have a dream that one day even the State of Mississippi,
a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering
with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an
oasis of freedom and justice. I have a dream that my four
little children will one day live in a nation where they will
not be judged by the color of their skin, but for the content
of their character. I have a dream today.
I have a dream that one day down in Alabama with its
vicious racists, with its Governor having his lips dripping
with words of interposition and nullification--one day right
there in Alabama, little black boys and black girls will be
able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as
sisters and brothers.
I have a dream today.
I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted,
every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough place
will be made plain and the crooked places will be made
straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and
all flesh shall see it together.
Dr. King's dream did not stop at racial equality, his ultimate dream
was one of human equality. There is no doubt that Dr. King supported
freedom and justice for every individual in America. We continue that
fight today and forever, in the great spirit that inspired the Rev. Dr.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Madam Speaker, I thank all my colleagues for being here and
remembering Dr. King's dream and for all that has been done to keep his
dream alive.
Mr. CONYERS. Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Ms. Solis). The question is on the motion
offered by the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Conyers) that the House
suspend the rules and agree to the resolution, H. Res. 61.
The question was taken.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. In the opinion of the Chair, two-thirds of
those voting have responded in the affirmative.
Mr. CONYERS. Madam Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.
The yeas and nays were ordered.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 8 of rule XX and the
Chair's prior announcement, further proceedings on this question will
be postponed.
____________________