Martin Luther King Jr.

“ Martin Luther King, Jr., dedicated his life to a vision: that all Americans would live free from injustice and enjoy equal opportunity as children of God. His strong, peaceful, and lifelong crusade against segregation and discrimination brought our Nation closer to the founding ideals set forth in the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. ”

“ His unparalleled commitment to justice and nonviolence challenged us to look deeply within ourselves to find the roots of racism.
Throughout his all too brief life, Martin Luther King, Jr., often confronted powerful and even violent opposition, sacrificing his liberty, his personal safety, and, ultimately, his life for the cause of freedom. Though an assassin's bullet silenced him forever at the young age of 39, Dr. King's words and deeds continue to live on within each of us. ”

“ King's dream of equality will one day be fully realized by all in our great Nation. On Martin Luther King Jr. Day, as we celebrate the life and legacy of a great American hero and international symbol of justice and equality, we must not forget that there is still tremendous work to be done. ”

“ Martin Luther King, Jr., delivered his "I Have a Dream" speech, challenging America to take up the worthy task of perfecting our Union. Today, we celebrate a man whose clarion call stirred our Nation to bridge our differences, and whose legacy still drives us to bend the arc of the moral universe toward justice. ”

“ 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. ”

“ The work of justice and freedom continues, but its goal is less distant, its hardships more tolerable, and its triumph more sure. For these gifts to our Nation, during his lifetime and in the decades past and to come, all Americans join in fitting celebration of the birth of Martin Luther King, Jr. ”

“ We can move in that direction as a country, in greater polarization—black people amongst blacks, and white amongst whites, filled with hatred toward one another. Or we can make an effort, as Martin Luther King did, to understand and to comprehend, and replace that violence, that stain of bloodshed that has spread across our land, with an effort to understand, compassion and love. ”

“ It is up to each of us to continue that march. The gallant freedom riders and freedom fighters of the civil rights era are growing older, and many, like Martin Luther King, Jr., are no longer among us. ”

“ We honor Martin Luther King, Jr., and remember his strength of character and his leadership. We also remember the work that still remains. America has come a long way since Dr. King's time, yet our journey to justice is not complete. ”

“ Too many of our cities are still racially segregated, and remaining barriers to education and opportunity have caused an array of social problems that disproportionately affect African Americans. As a result, blacks and whites often see the world in strikingly different ways and too often view each other through a lens of mistrust or fear.
Today we face a choice between the dream of racial harmony that Martin Luther King, Jr., described and a deepening of the rift that divides the races in America. ”

“ For African Americans, this landmark legislation meant that the opportunity for a quality education would no longer be impossible, the levers of the voting booth would no longer be out of reach, and the purchase of a dream home would no longer be unattainable. Millions of Americans-of every race and background and culture-live brighter lives today because of Martin Luther King, Jr. ”

“ Let us make this year's observance the beginning of a broader effort to improve our communities and the lives of our fellow Americans, to make the personal choices and take the personal actions that will bridge the gaps-racial and otherwise-that keep us from becoming the people we were meant to be. Working together, joining our hearts and our hands, we will succeed in building One America for the 21st century and in fulfilling the dream of Martin Luther King, Jr. ”

“ Martin Luther King, Jr., was the leading civil rights advocate of the time, spearheading the civil rights movement in the United States during the 1950s and 1960s with the goal of nonviolent social change and full civil rights for African Americans. ”

“ That's what patriotism is. Now, we may hope that our leaders and our government stand up for our ideals, stand up for what's right, and there are many times in our history when that's occurred. But when our laws, when our leaders or our government are out of alignment with those ideals, then the dissent of ordinary Americans may prove to be one of the truest expressions of patriotism. The young preacher from Georgia, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., who led a movement to help America confront our tragic history of racial injustice and live up to the meaning of our creed, he was a patriot. ”

“ Many of us aspire to live the teachings of Martin Luther King, Jr. The youth of today might find strength in the courage of Vaclav Havel or Nelson Mandela. Regardless of the visionary, regardless of the generation, the content of the vision endures: a commitment to freedom, an expectation of justice, and a belief in the infinite value of humanity.
From a jail cell in Birmingham, Alabama, Dr. King penned some of the most eloquent words of the United States civil rights movement: "Any law that uplifts human personality is just. Any law that degrades human personality is unjust." ”

“ Through the efforts of heroes like Martin Luther King, Jr., and other brave men and women of the civil rights movement, our Nation has made progress in battling racism and building a society that more fully lives up to its democratic ideals. ”

“ King’s life mission through and denounce racism, inhumanity, and all those things that seek to divide us.
It is not government that will achieve Dr. King’s ideals, but rather the people of this great country who will see to it that our Nation represents all that is good and true, and embodies unity, peace, and justice. We must actively aspire to secure the dream of living together as one people with a common purpose. ”

“ King recognized that along with freedom comes a strong measure of responsibility and accountability from all Americans. He showed us that civil rights is not just a struggle for the rights of black Americans, but a struggle to ensure the rights of all Americans. His gospel often proclaimed that injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.
Dr. King's mission is still unfinished. Racism and inequality, distrust and misunderstanding continue to divide us as a Nation. ”

“ At the close of the Civil War, in a time of intense idealistic emotion, some three-quarters of a million of Negroes, the mass of them densely ignorant and just out of slavery, with the iron of slavery still in their souls, were suddenly given the political rights of free citizens. A great many people, and not in the South alone, thought then, and still think, that it was a mistake to bestow the high powers and privileges of a wholly unrestricted ballot—a ballot which is the symbol of intelligent self-government—upon the Negro. ”

“ It is more important than ever that all Americans, especially our young people, are reminded of his significant contributions and his message.
Regrettably, many Americans view Martin Luther King Day as a holiday just for African Americans. Rev. King would have been the first person to repudiate that attitude, for his message was for ALL people, of all races, creeds, colors and backgrounds. His message of equality in both government and economic opportunity is universal and should be heeded by all citizens of America and, in fact, all citizens of the world. ”

“ Nor can we afford to endure the moral blight which the existence of a degraded and hated class must necessarily inflict upon any people among whom such a class may exist. Exclude the negroes as a class from political rights,—teach them that the high and manly privilege of suffrage is to be enjoyed by white citizens only,—that they may bear the burdens of the state, but that they are to have no part in its direction or its honors,—and you at once deprive them of one of the main incentives to manly character and patriotic devotion to the interests of the government ”

“ It was rather a choice between suffrage and slavery, after endless blood and gold had flowed to sweep human bondage away. Not a single Southern legislature stood ready to admit a Negro, under any conditions, to the polls; not a single Southern legislature believed free Negro labor was possible without a system of restrictions that took all its freedom away; there was scarcely a white man in the South who did not honestly regard emancipation as a crime, and its practical nullification as a duty. ”

“ What we need in the United States is not division; what we need in the United States is not hatred; what we need in the United States is not violence and lawlessness, but is love, and wisdom, and compassion toward one another, and a feeling of justice toward those who still suffer within our country, whether they be white or whether they be black. ”

“ As a leader in non-violent resistance, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. strongly advanced human rights with hope to end racial prejudice in the United States. In 1986, Martin Luther King Day was established as a U.S. national holiday in honor of Dr. ”

“ Will America be poorer if she replace her brutal, dyspeptic blundering with the light-hearted but determined Negro humility; or her coarse, cruel wit with loving, jovial good humor; or her Annie Rooney with Steal Away?
Merely a stern concrete test of the underlying principles of the great republic is the Negro problem, and the spiritual striving of the freedmen's sons is the travail of souls whose burden is almost beyond the measure of their strength, but who bear it in the name of an historic race, in the name of this land of their fathers' fathers, and in the name of human opportunity. ”

“ Too many young people still grow up in forgotten neighborhoods with persistent violence, underfunded schools, and inadequate health care, holding little hope and few prospects for the future. Too many Americans are denied the full equality and opportunity guaranteed by our founding documents. Today, Dr. King's struggle reminds us that while change can sometimes seem impossible, if we maintain our faith in ourselves and in the possibilities of this Nation, there is no challenge we cannot surmount. ”

“ 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 Counciler 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 ”

“ It is no less a crime against the manhood of a man, to declare that he shall not share in the making and directing of the government under which he lives, than to say that he shall not acquire property and education. The fundamental and unanswerable argument in favor of the enfranchisement of the negro is found in the undisputed fact of his manhood. He is a man, and by every fact and argument by which any man can sustain his right to vote, the negro can sustain his right equally. It is plain that, if the right belongs to any, it belongs to all. ”

“ Amid it all two figures ever stand to typify that day to coming men: the one a gray-haired gentleman, whose fathers had quit themselves like men, whose sons lay in nameless graves, who bowed to the evil of slavery because its abolition boded untold ill to all; who stood at last, in the evening of life, a blighted, ruined form, with hate in his eyes. ”