[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 153 (2007), Part 1] [House] [Pages 1294-1309] [From the U.S. 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 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 [[Page 1295]] 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 find a way to live together as brothers and sisters or we will perish as fools. Thirty-nine 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. [[Page 1296]] 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 DC-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 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. [[Page 1297]] 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 when one sees with one's own eyes evidences [[Page 1298]] 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. [[Page 1299]] 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, 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. [[Page 1300]] 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. 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 [[Page 1301]] 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 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. [[Page 1302]] 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 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. . . . [[Page 1303]] 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 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 [[Page 1304]] 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 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. [[Page 1305]] 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 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. [[Page 1306]] 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 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, [[Page 1307]] 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. 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. EMANUEL. Madam Speaker, I rise today to honor the life and memory of the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Today we celebrate Martin Luther King, Jr. Day to remember a great American and civil rights leader, a man committed to uniting people and healing the wounds inflicted by injustice and segregation. Dr. King embodied the spirit of the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 60s. As a teacher, a preacher, and a leader, he tuned his membership of the board of directors of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and his role with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) to help shape the nonviolent philosophy of the movement. The 1956 Supreme Court decision declaring Alabama's segregation laws unconstitutional was one early victory in his fight for equality and justice. This victory had a tremendous personal cost for Dr. King, as he was arrested, threatened, and his house was bombed. Throughout these arduous times, Dr. King remained strong. In 1957, Dr. King helped found and became the leader of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. This organization was formed to provide new leadership to the growing civil rights movement. Like Dr. King, the SCLC was committed to achieving its goals through nonviolent means. He further refined his philosophy of nonviolence during a journey to India in 1959. He saw nonviolent protest as the key to achieving his goals of racial equality and social justice in the face of a sometimes violent opposition. Despite the obstacles, Dr. King continued his struggle and spoke at the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. It was during this event that he delivered his famous ``I Have A Dream'' speech at the Lincoln Memorial, proclaiming: ``I have a dream, that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: `We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.''' The following year, Dr. King saw his hard work come to fruition with passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. That same year, Dr. King was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, becoming the youngest person awarded the Peace Prize at that time. He chose to donate the prize money he received to further the cause of the civil rights movement. Tragically, Dr. King's life was cut short on April 4, 1968 by a sniper's bullet. His stirring words from his speech at the Lincoln Memorial still echo today and provide us with a goal we all share, that our ``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, I urge everyone to remember and reflect on his words as we commemorate Dr. King's birthday and honor his tireless work in making America a country where the rights of all people are respected and protected. Mr. RANGEL. Madam Speaker, I rise today to enter into the Record my strong support for H.R. 61, in observation and celebration of the birthday, life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.; his life of service in promoting peace and justice for all people of every nation, and the preservation of his legacy in our continued efforts to ensure peace and justice to every man, woman, and child. In celebrating the birthday of Dr. King, we are reminded of his sacrifice and leadership in ensuring that this great nation live up to its highest potential by acknowledging and practicing the self-evident truth ``that all men are created equal, that they are endowed, by their Creator, with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.'' As we are engaged in a war that has taken the lives of thousands of American soldiers and hundreds of thousands of Iraqi lives, we must revisit Dr. King's stance of nonviolence and his opposition to the Vietnam war; a war that oppressed the poor and voiceless, a war that obstructed the rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Dr. King would have us on the frontlines of the anti-war movement, questioning whether [[Page 1308]] our actions in Iraq and around the world are doing more than just creating more chaos and violence. He would ask us to attack the root causes of poverty, building bridges between the private sector and non- profits to provide educational and work opportunities to everyone. He would challenge us to put the fate of our brothers and sisters ahead of property and profit, to invest in people and ideas, not guns and violence. On April 4, 1967, a year to the date of his death, Dr. King addressed the Clergy and Laity Concerned at Riverside Church in New York City, condemning the Vietnam war and urging his fellow citizens to break their silence. His message echoes the plight that we face today in Iraq; his words, etched in history, serve as a guide that we must heed. Dr. King stated that ``. . . 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 an American to the leaders of my own nation. The great initiative in this war is ours. The initiative to stop it must be ours.'' One need only substitute the word Vietnam with Iraq to recognize the analogous gravity that our Nation is engaged in. We must embrace Dr. King's legacy to achieve equality for the poor and to promote peace. The invasion of Iraq has led the poor in our country to bear the brunt of military responsibility, while the children of government officials and the wealthy make no sacrifice. Dr. King's remarks serve as a mirror to this country's unwillingness for all to make a sacrifice in engaging in war. He said ``perhaps the more tragic recognition of reality took place when 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.'' We must take this day to get our national priorities back in order. We must recognize our obligation to the citizens of this country, and our responsibility to promote peace around the world. Now is the time to grab a comfortable pair of shoes for a new journey of activism. If we truly want to honor our king, we must renew our commitment to the world congregation that he loved. To follow footsteps as large as his is definitely difficult, but not beyond our hearts and minds. The task may well prove to be easier if more of us can take them together. I want to especially thank the Baptist Ministers Conference, the National Action Network, and the 16th Council District's Annual MLK Memorial for allowing me to honor the life of Dr. King with them, and to follow in his footsteps. Mr. CLYBURN. Madam Speaker, every year at this time I read the ``Letter from Birmingham Jail,'' written by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and after these many decades, it still brings new inspiration and insight with every read. As I consider the challenges we face nationally and internationally, I am struck by Dr. King's words, ``More and more I feel that the people of ill will have used time much more effectively than have the people of good will. We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the hateful words and actions of the bad people but for the appalling silence of the good people.'' Let us break our silence in Congress and across this country on the issues of poverty, education, health care, and Iraq among other things. The people of good will must join together to provide for the common good. I would like to submit a truncated version of Dr. Martin Luther King's ``Letter from a Birmingham Jail'' to the Record in the hopes that we can all move forward with the social consciousness Dr. King preached of. Excerpts From Letter From Birmingham Jail* April 16, 1963 My Dear Fellow Clergymen: While confined here in the Birmingham city jail, I came across your recent statement calling my present activities ``unwise and untimely.'' Seldom do I pause to answer criticism of my work and ideas. If I sought to answer all the criticisms that cross my desk, my secretaries would have little time for anything other than such correspondence in the course of the day, and I would have no time for constructive work. But since I feel that you are men of genuine good will and that your criticisms are sincerely set forth, I want to try to answer your statements in what I hope will be patient and reasonable terms . . . Author's Note: This response to a published statement by eight fellow clergymen from Alabama (Bishop C. C. J. Carpenter, Bishop Joseph A. Durick, Rabbi Hilton L. Grafman, Bishop Paul Hardin, Bishop Holan B. Harmon, the Reverend George M. Murray, the Reverend Edward V. Ramage and the Reverend Earl Stallings) was composed under somewhat constricting circumstance. Begun on the margins of the newspaper in which the statement appeared while I was in jail, the letter was continued on scraps of writing paper supplied by a friendly Negro trusty, and concluded on a pad my attorneys were eventually permitted to leave me. Although the text remains in substance unaltered, I have indulged in the author's prerogative of polishing it for publication. But more basically, I am in Birmingham because injustice is here. Just as the prophets of the eighth century B.C. left their villages and carried their ``thus saith the Lord'' far beyond the boundaries of their home towns, and just as the Apostle Paul left his village of Tarsus and carried the gospel of Jesus Christ to the far corners of the Greco-Roman world, so am I compelled to carry the gospel of freedom beyond my own home town. Like Paul, I must constantly respond to the Macedonian call for aid . . . Moreover, I am cognizant of the interrelatedness of all communities and states. I cannot sit idly by in Atlanta and not be concerned about what happens in Birmingham. Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. Never again can we afford to live with the narrow, provincial ``outside agitator'' idea. Anyone who lives inside the United States can never be considered an outsider anywhere within its bounds . . . You deplore the demonstrations taking place in Birmingham. But your statement, I am sorry to say, fails to express a similar concern for the conditions that brought about the demonstrations. I am sure that none of you would want to rest content with the superficial kind of social analysis that deals merely with effects and does not grapple with underlying causes. It is unfortunate that demonstrations are taking place in Birmingham, but it is even more unfortunate that the city's white power structure left the Negro community with no alternative . . . As in so many past experiences, our hopes had been blasted, and the shadow of deep disappointment settled upon us. We had no alternative except to prepare for direct action, whereby we would present our very bodies as a means of laying our case before the conscience of the local and the national community. Mindful of the difficulties involved, we decided to undertake a process of self-purification. We began a series of workshops on nonviolence, and we repeatedly asked ourselves: ``Are you able to accept blows without retaliating?'' ``Are you able to endure the ordeal of jail?'' We decided to schedule our direct-action program for the Easter season, realizing that except for Christmas, this is the main shopping period of the year. Knowing that a strong economic with with-drawl program would be the by-product of direct action, we felt that this would be the best time to bring pressure to bear on the merchants for the needed change . . . We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed. Frankly, I have yet to engage in a direct- action campaign that was ``well timed'' in the view of those who have not suffered unduly from the disease of segregation. For years now I have heard the word ``Wait!'' It rings in the ear of every Negro with piercing familiarity. This ``Wait'' has almost always meant `Never.''' We must come to see, with one of our distinguished jurists, that ``justice too long delayed is justice denied . . . We have waited for more than 340 years for our constitutional and God-given rights. The nations of Asia and Africa are moving with jetlike speed toward gaining political independence, but we still creep at horse-and-buggy pace toward gaining a cup of coffee at a lunch counter. Perhaps it is easy for those who have never felt the stinging dark of segregation to say, ``Wait.'' But when you have seen vicious mobs lynch your mothers and fathers at will and drown your sisters and brothers at whim; when you have seen hate-filled policemen curse, kick and even kill your black brothers and sisters; when you see the vast majority of your twenty million Negro brothers smothering in an airtight cage of poverty in the midst of an affluent society; when you suddenly find your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you seek to explain to your six-year-old daughter why she can't go to the public amusement park that has just been advertised on television, and see tears welling up in her eyes when she is told that Funtown is closed to colored children, and see ominous clouds of inferiority beginning to form in her little mental sky, and see her beginning to distort her personality by developing an unconscious bitterness toward white people; when you have to concoct an answer for a five- [[Page 1309]] year-old son who is asking: ``Daddy, why do white people treat colored people so mean?''; when you take a cross- country drive and find it necessary to sleep night after night in the uncomfortable corners of your automobile because no motel will accept you; when you are humiliated day in and day out by nagging signs reading ``white'' and ``colored''; when your first name becomes ``nigger,'' your middle name becomes ``boy'' (however old you are) and your last name becomes ``John,'' and your wife and mother are never given the respected title ``Mrs.''; when you are harried by day and haunted by night by the fact that you are a Negro, living constantly at tiptoe stance, never quite knowing what to expect next, and are plagued with inner fears and outer resentments; when you know forever fighting a degenerating sense of ``nobodiness'' then you will understand why we find it difficult to wait. There comes a time when the cup of endurance runs over, and men are no longer willing to be plunged into the abyss of despair. I hope, sirs, you can understand our legitimate and unavoidable impatience . . . I must make two honest confessions to you, my Christian and Jewish brothers. First, I must confess that over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro's great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen's Councilor or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to ``order'' than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: ``I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action''; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man's freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a ``more convenient season.'' Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection . . . Oppressed people cannot remain oppressed forever. The yearning for freedom eventually manifests itself, and that is what has happened to the American Negro. Something within has reminded him of his birthright of freedom, and something without has reminded him that it can be gained. Consciously or unconsciously, he has been caught up by the Zeitgeist, and with his black brothers of Africa and his brown and yellow brothers of Asia, South America and the Caribbean, the United States Negro is moving with a sense of great urgency toward the promised land of racial justice. If one recognizes this vital urge that has engulfed the Negro community, one should readily understand why public demonstrations are taking place. The Negro has many pent-up resentments and latent frustrations, and he must release them. So let him march; let him make prayer pilgrimages to the city hall; let him go on freedom rides--and try to understand why he must do so. If his repressed emotions are not released in nonviolent ways, they will seek expression through violence; this is not a threat but a fact of history. So I have not said to my people: ``Get rid of your discontent.'' Rather, I have tried to say that this normal and healthy discontent can be channeled into the creative outlet of nonviolent direct action. And now this approach is being termed extremist . . . But though I was initially disappointed at being categorized as an extremist, as I continued to think about the matter I gradually gained a measure of satisfaction from the label. Was not Jesus an extremist for love: ``Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you.'' Was not Amos an extremist for justice: ``Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like an ever- flowing stream.'' Was not Paul an extremist for the Christian gospel: ``I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus.'' Was not Martin Luther an extremist: ``Here I stand; I cannot do otherwise, so help me God.'' And John Bunyan: ``I will stay in jail to the end of my days before I make a butchery of my conscience.'' And Abraham Lincoln: ``This nation cannot survive half slave and half free.'' And Thomas Jefferson: ``We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal . . .'' So the question is not whether we will be extremists, but what kind of extremists we will be. We be extremists for hate or for love? Will we be extremist for the preservation of injustice or for the extension of justice? In that dramatic scene on Calvary's hill three men were crucified. We must never forget that all three were crucified for the same crime--the crime of extremism. Two were extremists for immorality, and thus fell below their environment. The other, Jeans Christ, was an extremist for love, truth and goodness, and thereby rose above his environment. Perhaps the South, the nation and the world are in dire need of creative extremists . . . But the judgment of God is upon the church as never before. If today's church does not recapture the sacrificial spirit of the early church, it vi lose its authenticity, forfeit the loyalty of millions, and be dismissed as an irrelevant social club with no meaning for the twentieth century. Every day I meet young people whose disappointment with the church has turned into outright disgust . . . I wish you had commended the Negro sit-inners and demonstrators of Birmingham for their sublime courage, their willingness to suffer and their amazing discipline in the midst of great provocation. One day the South will recognize its real heroes. They will be the James Merediths, with the noble sense of purpose that enables them to face Jeering, and hostile mobs, and with the agonizing loneliness that characterizes the life of the pioneer. They will be old, oppressed, battered Negro women, symbolized in a seventy-two- year-old woman in Montgomery, Alabama, who rose up with a sense of dignity and with her people decided not to ride segregated buses, and who responded with ungrammatical profundity to one who inquired about her weariness: ``My fleets is tired, but my soul is at rest.'' They be the young high school and college students, the young ministers of the gospel and a host of their elders, courageously and nonviolently sitting in at lunch counters and willingly going to jail for conscience' sake. One day the South will know that when these disinherited children of God sat down at lunch counters, they were in reality standing up for what is best in the American dream and for the most sacred values in our Judaeo-Christian heritage, thereby bringing our nation back to those great wells of democracy which were dug deep by the founding fathers in their formulation of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence . . . I hope this letter finds you strong in the faith. I also hope that circumstances will soon make it possible for me to meet each of you, not as an integrationist or a civil rights leader but as a fellow clergyman and a Christian brother. Let us. all hope that the dark clouds of racial prejudice will soon pass away and the deep fog of misunderstanding will be lifted from our fear-drenched communities, and in some not too distant tomorrow the radiant stars of love and brotherhood will shine over our great nation with all their scintillating beauty . . . Yours for the cause of Peace and Brotherhood, Martin Luther King, Jr. 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. ____________________