Every time Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. spoke, he filled his audience with hope. Essentially, he was our hope. When he was murdered, the lights went out for minorities and the poor, and millions of Americans have continued to live in darkness. His dream of every man and woman living the American Dream has never fully materialized.
Forty two years have passed since Dr. King’s death and yet his words still invoke hope whenever they are spoken and many Americans are still brought to tears at seeing a replay of his funeral. Dr. Martin Luther King helped us to overcome our ignorance of one another. When he was assassinated, oppressed people everywhere lost their most articulate voice. Dr. Martin Luther King was a prophet of the people and to the people. Today, we remain with the unanswered question: who shall we look to for leadership now that he is gone?
On January 8, 2008, in Nashua, New Hampshire, Barack Obama spoke the following words: “We know the battle ahead will be long, but always remember that no matter what obstacles stand in our way, nothing can stand in the way of the power of millions of voices calling for change. We’ve been told what we cannot do. We’ve been asked to pause for a reality check. We’ve been warned against offering the people of this nation “false hope.” But in the unlikely story that is America, there has never been anything false about hope. For when we have faced down impossible odds, when we’ve been told that we’re not ready, or that we shouldn’t try, or that we can’t, generations of Americans have responded with a simple creed that sums of the spirit of a people Yes, we can.
“We will remember that we are not as divided as our politics suggests that we are one people; we are one nation and together we will begin the next great chapter in the American story with three words that will ring from coast to coast, from sea to shining sea – Yes, we can.”
In 2010, it is not enough to attend a meeting or a church service and sing “We Shall Overcome”; which is a powerful song to sing, but it possesses a pressing question: When? We must involve ourselves and our organizations in today’s struggle to achieve full equality for all residents of our communities.
Think back to the many struggles in which Dr. King was involved in for us. In Birmingham he said, “They couldn’t stop us. And we just went on before the dogs and we would look at them; and we’d go on before the water hoses and we would look at it, and we’d just go on singing ‘Over My Head I See Freedom in the Air.’ And then we would be thrown in the paddy wagons, and sometimes we were stuck in there like sardines in a can. And they would throw us in, and old Bull would say, ‘take them off’ and they did, and we would just go in the paddy wagon singing, ‘We Shall Overcome’ and every now and then we’d get in the jail, and we’d see jailers looking through the windows being moved by our prayers and being moved by our words and our songs. And there was a power which Bull Connor couldn’t adjust to; and so we ended up transforming Bull into a steer, and we won our struggle in Birmingham.”
Barack Obama continued his speech spoken in Nashua, New Hampshire on January 8, 2010, saying:
“I am running in this race because of what Dr. King called “the fierce urgency of now” because I believe that there is such a thing as being too late. And that hour is almost upon us. I don’t want to wake up four years from now and find out that millions of Americans still lack health care because we couldn’t take on the insurance industry.
“I don’t want to see that the oceans have risen a few more inches. The planet has reached a point of no return because we couldn’t stop buying oil from dictators.
“I don’t want to see more American lives put at risk because no one had the judgment or courage to stand up against a misguided war before we sent our troops in to fight.
“I don’t want to see homeless veterans on the street. I don’t want to send another generation of American children to failing schools. I don’t want that future for my daughters. I don’t want that future for your sons. I don’t want that future for America.
“I’m in this race for the same reason that I fought for jobs for the jobless and hope for the hopeless on the streets of Chicago; for the same reason I fought for justice and equality as a civil rights lawyer; for the same reason I fought for Illinois families for over a decade.
“Because I will never forget that the only reason that I’m standing here today is because somebody, somewhere stood up for me when it was risky. Stood up when it was hard. Stood up when it wasn’t popular. And because that somebody stood up, a few more stood up, and then a few thousand stood up, and then a few million stood up; and standing up, with courage and clear purpose, they somehow managed to change the world”.
It is time to let the spirit of Dr. King flow through all of us. Only when that phenomenon occurs will there be a new day for Blacks and minorities everywhere – Yes, we can.
Posted By: DAVID JOHNSON
Wednesday, September 1st 2010 at 11:44PM
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