[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 153 (2007), Part 1]
[Senate]
[Pages 1402-1403]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                        MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR.

  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I rise today to honor Dr. Martin Luther 
King, Jr., a great man who inspired ordinary African Americans to 
demand equal rights as American citizens. This year, we celebrate what 
would have been Dr. King's 78th birthday and his dream for equality and 
justice for all that remains our Nation's moral compass.
  In honoring Dr. King on this particular anniversary of his birth, we 
remember that it has been a year since we lost his wife and 
indispensable partner, Coretta Scott King, who died on January 30, 
2006. Mrs. 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. She had been actively engaged in the civil 
rights movement as a politically and socially conscious young woman and 
continued after her husband's death to lead the country toward greater 
justice and equality for all, traveling the world on behalf of racial 
and economic justice, peace and nonviolence, women's and children's 
rights, gay rights, religious freedom, full employment, health care, 
and education.
  Much has improved since 1966, when Martin Luther King, Jr., and Ralph 
Abernathy organized marches and protests in Chicago. Today, 80 percent 
of African Americans older than 25 have earned their high school 
diploma, and there are 2.3 million African American college students, 
an increase of 1 million from 15 years ago. In addition, there are 1.2 
million African-American businesses across the country that generate 
$88.6 billion in revenues.
  This important day calls us to recognize the challenges that remain 
and the work that still must be done to move closer to Dr. King's 
dream. If he were alive today, Dr. King would undoubtedly be dismayed 
by injustices large and small, including the violence in Iraq, the 
deepening divide between

[[Page 1403]]

those who have and those who do not, and the prohibitive cost of higher 
education, which is now out of reach for many African-American and 
Hispanic families. In the wealthiest Nation on Earth, 37 million people 
live in poverty, 47 million people do not have health insurance, and 
millions more are underinsured.
  Our Nation is a better one thanks to Dr. King and the sacrifices he 
and others made during the 1950s and 1960s. I remembered that as I 
walked in some of those same footsteps when I joined U.S. 
Representative John Lewis' pilgrimage to Selma and Montgomery, Alabama. 
Although there is much of Dr. King's dream that remains to be 
fulfilled, I have faith that we will continue to move toward the 
equality and justice that he sought. As a nation, we must and we shall.
  Mr. KYL. Mr. President, on January 15, our Nation commemorated the 
birthday of the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Every year we pay 
tribute to the life of this great American. But, in honoring Dr. King, 
we celebrate more than his life; we celebrate the legacy of his words 
and deeds, and the virtues that he embodied.
  Today, we remember Dr. King because he represents the best of the 
American spirit: someone who is compassionate, devoted, courageous, and 
hopeful. His compassion drew him to the plights of the poor and 
oppressed, and his devotion led him to champion their cause. His 
courage led him to act on this devotion, countless times placing 
himself in harm's way. Indeed, it was because of his courage that he 
fell to an assassin's bullet in 1968. And, his hope sustained him, even 
in the face of bitter racism.
  All of these virtues--compassion, devotion, courage, and hope--
propelled Dr. King to the esteemed place he occupies today.
  Perhaps Dr. King's most enduring virtue was his hope. It surely was 
on display when he delivered his most famous oration. In 1963, on the 
steps of the Lincoln Memorial, gazing out at the Washington Monument 
and beyond to the Capitol, he delivered his ``I Have a Dream'' speech, 
which is familiar to all Americans.
  As Dr. King looked upon these impressive symbols of America, he 
reflected upon the glaring shortcoming of our democracy. For all its 
successes, America had failed to realize the truth put forth in our 
Declaration of Independence: ``that all men are created equal.'' Amid 
these monuments to the promise of America, he told hundreds of 
thousands of the Nation's greatest injustice: racial inequality. Yet he 
still maintained hope, speaking in terms dreams and freedom.
  In 1964, President Lyndon Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act, and 
the Voting Rights Act became law the following year. Despite these 
legislative gains, Dr. King realized that achieving equality of 
opportunity required something much greater, and far more difficult, 
than mere legislation. It required a change in the hearts and minds of 
citizens.
  Despite this challenge, his optimism did not waver. In 1967, he 
appeared on ``Meet the Press'' where he was asked if he believed ``the 
American racial problem can be solved.''
  ``Yes, I do,'' he replied. ``I refuse to give up. I refuse to despair 
it in this moment. I refuse to allow myself to fall into the dark 
chambers of pessimism, because I think in any social revolution, the 
one thing that keeps it going is hope.''
  King's hope survived him, and today we are closer to the world that 
he envisioned.
  We honor historical figures not merely because they achieved or said 
great things. We honor them because their lives continue to offer 
insight that we might use to improve our world.
  ``[T]he goal of America is freedom,'' he wrote as he sat in a 
Birmingham, AL, jail cell. Only a man with great hope and faith in the 
triumph of good could write those words in those circumstances. It is 
with similar hope that we as Americans should proceed today, whatever 
the challenges that confront us.

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