Each year around the time of Martin Luther King, Jr., Day, a familiar pattern seems to play out. First, the president issues a grandiose statement honoring King as a courageous hero who symbolized the heart of the American spirit, in the process identifying that presidential administration as the modern-day embodiment of King’s work. The statement exhorts US citizens to follow King’s example “by performing acts of kindness through service to others.”[1] Second, both Republicans and Democrats praise King’s tireless struggle against segregation and often, like the president, try to position themselves as the faithful heirs to his legacy.[2] Not surprisingly, the pattern seems to have held for this year as well: throughout January the president, the leading presidential candidates, and most of the mainstream press applauded King as a civil rights hero, making abundant references to his 1963 “I Have a Dream” speech and his struggle for racial equality.
Usually absent from the politicians’ speeches and newspaper editorials, though, are the more radical aspects of King’s life and thought—in particular, his fierce criticisms of economic inequality and military imperialism. Most descriptions of his life end around the time of the 1965 Voting Rights Act, saying little of the three years from 1966 to 1968 before King was assassinated.[3] There is an interesting reason for this omission: King’s last three years were in fact the most radical part of his life, the time when he increasingly began to see racism as one symptom of the capitalist system in the
The solution, he argued, must involve attacking poverty and economic exploitation at home and abroad, and even working toward a system of quasi-socialism including, among other measures, “a guaranteed national income.”[5] Rather than simply dishing out charity, though, King insisted on fundamental changes to the capitalist system, saying on many occasions that “an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring.”[6] During his final three years King devoted much of his time to organizing for economic justice in US slums and ghettoes, and was planning a large anti-poverty march on
Starting in early 1967, King also became a very vocal opponent of the
Such words are rarely remembered in connection with Dr. King, however; more commonly they are associated with hippies, Communists, and other “extremists” and fringe elements in
The reason why these details are omitted from news accounts and history textbooks is clear, and is particularly interesting in the case of Dr. King. Prior to 1966, King’s efforts had certainly helped defeat segregation and legal racism, but had stopped short of the type of message that would have posed a fundamental threat to the capitalist power structure in the
Politicians and the press certainly behaved as expected on MLK Day this year. A Washington Post editorial from January 21 is a case in point. The piece praises only King’s antiracism, saying nothing of his critiques of capitalism and imperialism. It even quotes several lines from the conclusion of King’s last speech on
Conspicuously absent from the speeches and editorials were those elements of King’s thought which would be truly dangerous to the centers of economic and political power in this country. Instead, we are told, MLK Day is a time “to give others a hand.”[15] Following King’s legacy means simply attending a commemorative march, doing community service, and performing “acts of kindness.”[16] The message is clear: King’s peaceful struggle for racial equality is an “acceptable” form of protest (at least in retrospect); agitating against military imperialism and economic inequality is not. King’s message of nonviolence was fine when it was urging peaceful marches for racial equality, but it will not do to apply the principle of nonviolence to international relations or to criticize those responsible for the structural violence that inflicts poverty, malnutrition, and early death on billions of people around the world.
On the other hand, recovering and promoting the totality of King’s vision could inspire people to get involved in activism aimed at the real power centers in this country. King’s speeches and sermons from 1966-68 could hardly be more relevant to the current day. In an era of unprecedented corporate power, increasing global and domestic inequality, and savage militarism on the part of the world’s most powerful government, recovering King’s message is more important than ever.
At the same time that we look to Dr. King’s words, however, one additional lesson of the 1960s is equally important. Behind King and every other well-known popular leader whose words are recorded in speeches and books were literally hundreds of thousands of unsung heroes who gave strength to the civil rights, antiwar, and other movements. Ultimately it was not King himself but these people who were responsible for the successes of these movements, as Barbara Ehrenreich reminded us recently.[17] In the coming years peace and justice, if they are to be achieved, will come not from extraordinary leaders but from the committed efforts of working people around this country, who will remain largely uncelebrated but whose participation and leadership will be vital to the future achievements of any progressive social movement. But don’t expect to hear that message in the morning newspaper, either.
[1] White House, Office of the Press Secretary, “Martin Luther King, Jr., Federal Holiday, 2008: A Proclamation by the President of the
[2] See, for example, Raymond Hernández, “At King Event, Mrs. Clinton Denounces G.O.P. Leadership,”
[3] See Note 14 below for an example from January 2008.
[4] “Where Do We Go From Here?” (1967), reprinted in A Testament of Hope: The Essential Writings and Speeches of Martin Luther King, Jr., ed. James M. Washington (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 1986), 250.
[5] “Where Do We Go From Here?”, 247.
[6] “Where Do We Go From Here?”, 250; “A Time to Break Silence,”
[7] “Remaining Awake Through a Great Revolution,”
[8] “A Time to Break Silence,” 233.
[9] Ibid., 233.
[10] Ibid., 240.
[11] “A Christmas Sermon on Peace,”
[12] The same happened to Malcolm X: as long as he was rejecting collaboration with white activists he was relatively powerless to effect any large-scale redistribution of power in US society; when he started welcoming the help of sympathetic whites—and seeing the similarities in the struggles of working people of all colors—he was taken out. My thanks to Professor Alex Dupuy of
[13] “Martin Luther King Jr.,”
[14] “The Multifaceted King” (editorial),
[15] “King Day” (editorial), Philadelphia Inquirer,
[16] For examples of newspaper editorials from 2007 which fit this theme, see “King Day of Service; No Gift is Too Small,” Philadelphia Inquirer, 15 Jan. 2007; Rob McCord, “Pursuing the Dream” (guest editorial), Philadelphia Inquirer, 15 Jan. 2007; “Martin Luther King Jr. Day; More Than Just a Day Off,” Washington Post, 15 Jan. 2007; Valerie Strauss, “Despite Lessons on King, Some Unaware of His Dream,” Washington Post, 15 Jan. 2007. Among the most hypocritical, of course, are those who invoke King’s legacy despite having supported—or even rabidly promoted—the
[17] “Hillary’s Real MLK Problem,” Huffington Post (online),