Clarion Defender_1968-04 Special Memorial Edition

CLARION OfFENDER THE LAST PLEA OF MLK (This moving affirmation of his faith in non-violent protest is taken from Martin Luther King's last major writing, a passionate but profound analysis of the Negro's plight and his choices of action today. In his last book -- out on the eve of his assassination -- he looked towards the greatest test this year of the power of non-violence. Tragically that test was to come with his own assassination.) The futility of violence in the struggle for racial justice has been tragically etched in all the recent Negro riots. There is something painfully sad about a riot. One sees screaming youngsters and angry adults fighting hopelessly and aimlessly against impossible odds. Deep down within them you perceive a desire for self-destruction, a suicidal longing. At best the riots have produced ft little additional anti-poverty money, allotted by frightened government officials and a few water sprinklers to cool the children of the ghettos. It is something like improving the food in a prison while the people remain securely incarcerated behind bars. Nowhere have the riots won any concrete improvement as have the organized protest demonstrations. It is not overlooking the limitations of non– violence and the distance we have yet to go to point out the remarkable record of achievements that have already come through non-violent action. The 1960 sit-ins desegregated lunch counters in more than 150 cities within a year. The 1961 Freedom rides put an end to segregation in interstate travel. The 1956 bus boycott in Montgomery, Alabama, ended segregation on the buses not only of that city but in practically every city in the South. The 1963 Birmingham movement and the climactic March on Washington won passage of the most powerful Civil Rights law in a century. The 1965 Selma movement brought enactment of the Voting Rights law. Our non– violent marches in Chicago last summer brought about a housing agreement which, if implemented, will be the strongest step toward open housing taken in any city in the nation. Most significant is the fact that this progress occurred with minimum human sacrifice and loss of life. Fewer people have been killed in ten years of non-violent demonstrations across the South than were killed in one night of rioting in Watts. When one tries to pin down advocates of violence as to what acts would be effective, the answers are blatantly illogical. Sometimes they talk of over– throwing racist state and local governments. They fail to see that no internal revolution has ever succeeded in overthrowing a government by violence unless the government had already lost the allegiance and effective control of its armed forces. Anyone in his right mind knows that ehis will not happen in the United States. Beyond the pragmatic invalidity of violence is its inability to appeal to conscience. Some Black Power advocates consider an appeal to conscience irrelevant. A Black Power exponent said to me not long ago: "To hell with conscience and morality. We want power." But power and morality must go together, implementing, fulfilling and ennobling each other. In the quest for power_ I _cannot bypass the concern for morality. I refuse to be driven to a Machiavellian cynicism with respect to power. Power at its best is the right use of strength. The words of Alfred the Great are still true: "Power is never good unless he who has it is good." Non-violence is power, but it is the right and good use of power. Constructively, it can save the white man as well as the Negro. The majority of white Americans consider them– selves sincerely committed to justice for the Negro. They believe that American society is essentially hospitable to fair play and to steady growth towards a middle-class Utopia embodying racial harmony. But unfortunately this is a fantasy of self-deception vanity. America's Gandhi DR. MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR. To many, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., is America's Mohandas K. Gandhi-– an avowed proponent of non-violence to achieve equality for his people. He is a soft-spoken, personally unassuming man, but his principles have captured the attention of the world. There is an ~loquence to this Baptist minister's non-violent battle for civil rights among American Negroes -- an eloquence that won him the 1964 Nobel Peace Prize. At 36, he was the youngest man ever to receive the coveted international award. Dr. King is a believer in prayers, psalm and peaceful demonstrations to win his fight. While constantly subjected to threats of violenc it is perhaps ironical that his advocacy of non– violence has elevated him beyond the realm and scope of those who have taken the belligerent line. He has, on several occasi·ons, suffered from the violence of his opponents in the Negro revolution, and several attempts have been made on his life. It is not strange that his first major victory in the war against segregation was achieved in the cradle of the Confederacy. In December 1955, Dr. King organized and led the famed Montgomery, Alabama, bus boycott, which 1 resulted in integrated seatin~ on city buses in the Deep South. He is again today in the forefront of th battle for integration in Montgomery and Selma where his persistence wore down resistance after many bloody days. In the face of some of the most bestial violence seen in the Civil Rights battle, Dr. King maintained his non-violent composure and was an inspiration to his followers His initial victory in Montgomery made him the driving force behind the Civil Rights movement. Long an admirer of Gandhi's passive resistence movement, King perfected his own non– violence creed as the basic ~eapon in the war on integration. He carried his campaign into other segregationist strongholds in the South -- Albany Georgia; Birmingham, Alabama; St. Augustine, Florida; Danville, Virginia; Savannah, Georgia, and now in Selma. Comedian Dick Gregory and Dr. King discussing civil rights. Dick Gregory was in town yesterday and said white racism is responsible for King's death and the same ~sm killed Kennedy, Medgar Evers, Malcolm X and Lumumbo of the , Gong<D: , , , ,I ·. 'i •_,·J~l J _, !Cal