The autobiography of martin luther

out end unless there is a significant and profound change in American

life and policy. So such thoughts take us beyond Vietnam, but not be-

yond our calling as sons of the living God.

In 1957, a sensitive American official overseas said that it seemed

to him that our nation was on the wrong side of a world revolution.

During the past ten years we have seen emerge a pattern of suppression

which has now justified the presence of U.S. military advisors in Vene-

zuela. This need to maintain social stability for our investment accounts

for the counter-revolutionary action of American forces in Guatemala.

It tells why American helicopters are being used against guerrillas in

Cambodia and why American napalm and Green Beret forces have

already been active against rebels in Peru.

It is with such activity in mind that the words of the late John F.

Kennedy come back to haunt us. Five years ago he said, "Those who

make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevi-

table." Increasingly, by choice or by accident, this is the role our nation

has taken: the role of those who make peaceful revolution impossible by

refusing to give up the privileges and the pleasures that come from the

immense profits of overseas investments. I am convinced that if we are

to get on the right side of the world revolution, we as a nation must

undergo a radical revolution of values. We must rapidly begin the shift

from a thing-oriented society to a person-oriented society. When ma-

chines and computers, profit motives and property rights, are considered

more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, extreme mate-

rialism, and militarism are incapable of being conquered.

A true revolution of values will soon cause us to question the fair-

ness and justice of many of our past and present policies. On the one

hand we are called to play the Good Samaritan on life's roadside, but

that will be only an initial act. One day we must come to see that the

whole Jericho Road must he transformed so that men and women will

not be constantly beaten and robbed as they make their journey on life's

highway. True compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar. It

comes to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring.

A true revolution of values will soon look uneasily on the glaring

contrast of poverty and wealth. With righteous indignation, it will look

across the seas and see individual capitalists of the West investing huge

sums of money in Asia, Africa, and South America, only to take the

profits out with no concern for the social betterment of the countries,

and say: "This is not just." It will look at our alliance with the landed

gentry of South America and say: "This is not just." The Western arro-

gance of feeling that it has everything to teach others and nothing to

learn from them is not just

A true revolution of values will lay hands on the world order and

say of war: "This way of settling differences is not just." This business

of burning human beings with napalm, of filling our nation's homes

with orphans and widows, of injecting poisonous drugs of hate into the

veins of peoples normally humane, of sending men home from dark and

bloody battlefields physically handicapped and psychologically de-

ranged, cannot be reconciled with wisdom, justice, and love. A nation

that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense

than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death.

America, the richest and most powerful nation in the world, can

well lead the way in this revolution of values. There is nothing except a

tragic death wish to prevent us from reordering our priorities, so that

the pursuit of peace will take precedence over the pursuit of war. There

is nothing to keep us from molding a recalcitrant status quo with

bruised hands until we have fashioned it into a brotherhood. . . .

These are revolutionary times. All over the globe men are revolting

against old systems of exploitation and oppression, and, out of the

wounds of a frail world, new systems of justice and equality are being

born. The shirtless and barefoot people of the land are rising up as

never before. The people who sat in darkness have seen a great light.

We in the West must support these revolutions.

It is a sad fact that because of comfort, complacency, a morbid fear

of communism, and our proneness to adjust to injustice, the Western

nations that initiated so much of the revolutionary spirit of the modern

world have now become the arch anti-revolutionaries. This has driven

many to feel that only Marxism has a revolutionary spirit. Therefore,

communism is a judgment against our failure to make democracy real

and follow through on the revolutions that we initiated. Our only hope

today lies in our ability to recapture the revolutionary spirit and go out

into a sometimes hostile world declaring eternal hostility to poverty,

racism, and militarism. With this powerful commitment we shall boldly

challenge the status quo and unjust mores, and thereby speed the day

when "every valley shall he exalted, and every mountain and hill shall

be made low, the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough places

plain."

A genuine revolution of values means in the final analysis that our

must now develop an overriding loyalty to mankind as a whole in order

to preserve the best in their individual societies. . . .

We must move past indecision to action. We must find new ways to

speak for peace in Vietnam and justice throughout the developing

world, a world that borders on our doors. If we do not act, we shall

surely be dragged down the long, dark, and shameful corridors of time

reserved for those who possess power without compassion, might with-

out morality, and strength without sight.

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 yearn-

ings, 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.

When I first took my position against the war in Vietnam, almost

every newspaper in the country criticized me. It was a low period in

my life. I could hardly open a newspaper. It wasn't only white people

either; it was Negroes. But then I remember a newsman coming to

me one day and saying, "Dr. King, don't you think you're going to

have to change your position now because so many people are critic-

izing you? And people who once had respect for you are going to

lose respect for you. And you're going to hurt the budget, I under-

stand, of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference; people have

cut off support. And don't you think that you have to move now

more in fine with the administration's policy?" That was a good

question, because he was asking me the question of whether I was

going to think about what happens to me or what happens to truth

and justice in this situation.

On some positions. Cowardice asks the question, "Is it safe?"

Expediency asks the question, "Is it politic?" And Vanity comes

along and asks the question, "Is it popular?" But Conscience asks

the question, "Is it right?" And there comes a time when one must

take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but he

must do it because Conscience tells him it is right.

The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments

of convenience, but where he stands in moments of challenge, moments

of great crisis and controversy. And this is where I choose to cast my lot

today. And this is why I wanted to go through with this, because I think

this is where SCLC should be. There may be others who want to go

another way, but when I took up the cross I recognized its meaning. It

is not something that you merely put your hands on. It is not something

that you wear. The cross is something that you bear and ultimately that

you die on. The cross may mean the death of your popularity. It may

mean the death of your bridge to the White House. It may mean the

death of a foundation grant. It may cut your budget down a little, but

take up your cross and just hear it. And that is the way I have decided

to go. Come what may, it doesn't matter now.

A myth about my views on Vietnam credited me with advocating

the fusion of the civil rights and peace movements, and I was criti-

cized for such a "serious tactical mistake." I held no such view. In a

formal public resolution, my organization, SCLC, and I explicitly

declared that we had no intention of diverting or diminishing our

activities in civil rights, and we outlined extensive programs for the

immediate future in the South as well as in Chicago.

I was saddened that the board of directors of the NAACP, a fel-

low civil rights organization, would join in the perpetuation of the

myth about my views. They challenged and repudiated a nonexistent

proposition. SCLC and 1 expressed our view on the war and drew

attention to its damaging effects on civil rights programs, a fact we

believed to be incontrovertible and, therefore, mandatory to express

in the interest of the struggle for equality. I challenged the NAACP

and other critics of my position to take a forthright stand on the

rightness or wrongness of this war, rather than going off creating a

nonexistent issue.

I am a clergyman as well as a civil rights leader and the moral roots

of our war policy are not unimportant to me. I do not believe our

nation can be a moral leader of justice, equality, and democracy if it is

trapped in the role of a self-appointed world policeman. Throughout

my career in the civil rights movement I have been concerned about

justice for all people. For instance, I strongly feel that we must end not

merely poverty among Negroes but poverty among white people. Like-

wise, I have always insisted on justice for all the world over, because

justice is indivisible. And injustice anywhere is a threat to justice every-

where. I will not stand idly by when I see an unjust war taking place

"SO PRECIOUS THAT YOU WILL DIE FOR IT"

I say to you, this morning, that if you have never found something so

dear and so precious to you that you will die for it, then you aren't fit to

live. You may be thirty-eight years old, as 1 happen to be, and one day,

some great opportunity stands before you and calls upon you to stand up

for some great principle, some great issue, some great cause. And you

refuse to do it because you are afraid. You refuse to do it because you

want to live longer. You're afraid that you will lose your job, or you are

afraid that you will be criticized or that you will lose your popularity, or

you're afraid that somebody will stab you or shoot at you or bomb your

house. So you refuse to take the stand. Well, you may go on and live

until you are ninety, but you are just as dead at thirty-eight as you

would be at ninety. And the cessation of breathing in your life is but the

belated announcement of an earlier death of the spirit. You died when

you refused to stand up for right. You died when you refused to stand

up for truth. You died when you refused to stand up for justice. . . .

Don't ever think that you're by yourself. Go on to jail if necessary, but

you never go alone. Take a stand for that which is right, and the world

may misunderstand you, and criticize you. But you never go alone, for

somewhere I read that one with God is a majority. And God has a way

of transforming a minority into a majority. Walk with Him this morning

and believe in Him and do what is right, and He'll be vnih you even

until the consummation of the ages. Yes, I've seen the lightning flash.

I've heard the thunder roll. I've felt sin breakers dashing, trying to con-

quer my soul, but I heard the voice of Jesus saying, still to fight on. He

promised never to leave me alone, never to leave me alone. No, never

alone. No, never alone.

From sermon at Ebenezer, November 5, 1967

without in any way diminishing my activity in civil rights, just as mil-

lions of Negro and white people are doing day in and day out

This war played havoc with the destiny of the entire world. It

tore up the Geneva Agreement, seriously impaired the United Na-

tions, exacerbated the hatreds between continents and, worse still,

between races. It frustrated our development at home, telling our

own underprivileged citizens that we place insatiable military de-

mands above their most critical needs; it greatly contributed to the

forces of reaction in America and strengthened the military-

industrial complex against which even President Eisenhower

solemnly warned us; it practically destroyed Vietnam and left thou-

sands of American and Vietnamese youth maimed and mutilated;

and it exposed the whole world to the risk of nuclear warfare.

The Johnson Administration seemed amazingly devoid of states-

manship, and when creative statesmanship wanes, irrational milita-

rism increases. President Kennedy was a man who was big enough

to admit when he was wrong—as he did after the Bay of Pigs inci-

dent. But Johnson seemed to be unable to make this kind of states-

manlike gesture in connection with Vietnam. Even when he could

readily summon popular support to end the bombing in Vietnam,

he persisted. Yet bombs in Vietnam also exploded at home; they

destroyed the hopes and possibilities for a decent America.

I followed a policy of being very honest with President Johnson

when he consulted me about civil rights. I went to the White House

when he invited me. I made it very clear to him why I had taken a

stand against the war in Vietnam. I had a long talk with him on the

telephone about this and made it clear to him I would be standing

up against it even more. I was not centering this on President John-

son. I thought there was collective guilt. Four Presidents participated

in some way leading us to the war in Vietnam. So, I am not going

to put it all on President Johnson. What I was concerned about was

that we end the nightmarish war and free our souls.

There isn't a single official of our country that can go anywhere in

the world without being stoned and eggs being thrown at him. It's be-

cause we have taken on to ourselves a kind of arrogance of power. We've

ignored the mandates of justice and morality. And I don't know about

you, but I wish I could make a witness more positive about this thing.

I wish I was of draft age. I wish I did not have my ministerial exemp-

tion. I tell you this morning, I would not fight in the war in Vietnam.

I'd go to jail before I'd do it And I say to the federal government or

anybody else: they can do to me what they did to Dr. Spock and Wil-

liam Sloan Coffin, my good friend, the chaplain of Yale. They can just

as well get ready to convict me, because I'm going to continue to say to

young men, that if you feel it in your heart that this war is wrong,

unjust, and objectionable, don't go and fight in it Follow the path of

Jesus Christ

31

THE POOR PEOPLE'S

We have moved into an era where we are called upon to raise certain

basic questions about the whole society. We are still called upon to

give aid to the beggar who finds himself in misery and agony on life's

highway. But one day, we must ask the question of whether an edifice

which produces beggars must not be restructured and refurbished.

That is where we are now.

MAY 22, 1967

At an SCLC staff retreat King calls for a radical redistribution of

economic and political power

DECEMBER 4

Launches the Poor People's Campaign

MARCH 18, 1968

Speaks to striking sanitation workers in Memphis

MARCH 28

Leads Memphis march that is disrupted by violence

In November 1967 the staff of the Southern Christian Leadership

Conference held one of the most important meetings we ever

convened. We had intensive discussions and analyses of our work

and of the challenges which confront us and our nation. At the end,

we made a decision: the SCLC would lead waves of the nation's

poor and disinherited to Washington, D.C., in the spring of 1968 to

demand redress of their grievances by the United States government

and to secure at least jobs or income for all.

We had learned from hard and bitter experience in our move-

ment that our government did not move to correct a problem in-

volving race until it was confronted directly and dramatically. It

required a Selma before the fundamental right to vote was written

into the federal statutes. It took a Birmingham before the govern-

ment moved to open doors of public accommodations to all human

beings. What we now needed was a new kind of Selma or Bir-

mingham to dramatize the economic plight of the Negro, and com-

pel the government to act.

We would go to Washington and demand to be heard, and we

would stay until America responded. If this meant forcible repres-

sion of our movement, we would confront it, for we had done this

before. If this meant scorn or ridicule, we embraced it for that is

what America's poor received. If it meant jail, we accepted it will-

ingly, for the millions of poor were already imprisoned by exploita-

tion and discrimination. But we hoped, with growing confidence,

that our campaign in Washington would receive a sympathetic un-

derstanding across our nation, followed by dramatic expansion of

nonviolent demonstrations in Washington and simultaneous pro-

tests elsewhere. In short we would be petitioning our government

for specific reforms, and we intended to build militant nonviolent

actions until that government moved against poverty.

We intended to channel the smouldering rage and fi-ustration of

Negro people into an effective, militant, and nonviolent movement

of massive proportions in Washington and other areas. Similarly, we

would be calling on the swelUng masses of young people in this

country who were disenchanted with this materialistic society and

asking them to join us in our new Washington movement. We also

looked for participation by representatives of the millions of non-

Negro poor—Indians, Mexican-Americans, Puerto Ricans, Appala-

chians, and others. And we welcomed assistance fi-om all Americans

of goodwill.

And so, we decided to go to Washington and to use any means

of legitimate nonviolent protest necessary to move our nation and

our government on a new course of social, economic, and political

reform. In the final analysis, SCLC decided to go to Washington

because, if we did not act, we would be abdicating our responsibih-

ties as an organization committed to nonviolence and freedom. We

were keeping that commitment, and we called on America to join us

in our Washington campaign. In this way, we could work creatively

against the despair and indifference that so often caused our nation

to be immobiHzed during the cold winter and shaken profoundly in

the hot summer.

"New tactics which do not count on government goodwill"

The policy of the federal government is to play Russian roulette v/ith

riots; it is prepared to gamble with another summer of disaster. Despite

two consecutive summers of violence, not a single basic cause of riots

has been corrected. All of the misery that stoked the flames of rage

and rebellion remains undiminished. With unemployment, intolerable

housing, and discriminatory education, a scourge in Negro ghettos.

Congress and the administration still tinker with trivial, halfhearted

measures.

Yet only a few years ago, there was discernible, if limited, progress

through nonviolence. Each year, a wholesome, vibrant Negro self-

confidence was taking shape. The fact is inescapable that the tactic of

nonviolence, which had then dominated the thinking of the civil rights

movement, has in the last two years not been playing its transforming

role. Nonviolence was a creative doctrine in the South because it check-

mated the rabid segregationists who were thirsting for an opportunity

to physically crush Negroes. Nonviolent direct action enabled the Negro

to take to the streets in active protest, hut it muzzled the guns of the

oppressor because even he could not shoot down in daylight unarmed

men, women, and children. This is the reason there was less loss of life

in ten years of Southern protest than in ten days of Northern riots.. . .

I agree with the President's National Advisory Commission on Civil

Disorders that our nation is splitting into two hostile societies and that

the chief destructive cutting edge is white racism. We need, above all,

effective means to force Congress to act resolutely—but means that do

not involve the use of violence.

The time has come for a return to mass nonviolent protest. Accord-

ingly, we are planning a series of such demonstrations this spring and

summer, to begin in Washington, D.C. They will have Negro and white

participation, and they will seek to benefit the poor of both races.

"A TESTAMENT OF HOPE"

The nation waited until the black man was explosive with fury before

stirring itself even to partial concern. Confronted now with the interre-

lated problems of war, inflation, urban decay, white backlash, and a cli-

mate of violence, it is now forced to address itself to race relations and

poverty, and it is tragically unprepared. What might once have been a

series of separate problems now merge into a social crisis of almost stu-

pefying complexity.

I am not sad that black Americans are rebelling; this was not only

inevitable but eminently desirable. Without this magnificent ferment

among Negroes, the old evasions and procrastinations would have con-