The day that we celebrate and remember the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. is not just about him or his history. It is a call to action, to service, not just on January 19, but year round. Dr. King's day became a national holiday in 1983, despite the
resistance against it. (Sadly, three states—Alabama, Arkansas, and Mississippi—still celebrate Confederate Robert E. Lee
on the same day.)
A decade later, the national holiday created in his honor became a way to carry forward King's principles and ideals.
The national Martin Luther King Day of Service was started by former Pennsylvania U.S. Senator Harris Wofford and Atlanta Congressman John Lewis, who co-authored the King Holiday and Service Act. The federal legislation challenges Americans to transform the King Holiday into a day of citizen action volunteer service in honor of Dr. King. The federal legislation was signed into law by President Bill Clinton on August 23, 1994.
Veteran civil rights activist
Congressman John Lewis speaks of his first meeting with Dr. King, and why we should serve below the fold.
It is important that we see Dr. King and the movement he was a part of as something we can all engage in.
What is the MLK Day of Service?
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. once said, "Life's most persistent and urgent question is: 'What are you doing for others?'"
Each year, Americans across the country answer that question by coming together on the King Holiday to serve their neighbors and communities. The MLK Day of Service is a part of United We Serve, the President's national call to service initiative. It calls for Americans from all walks of life to work together to provide solutions to our most pressing national problems.
There are thousands of ways
you can become involved, not just on this day, but year round. I enjoyed seeing this 2014 video from the
Center for Civic Engagement at Oregon State University.
Students, faculty, and community members came together on January 18th to commemorate Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. by participating in a day of service! Throughout his lifetime, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. worked toward a dream of equity and equality. King's ideas of unity, purpose, peace, and the great things that can happen when we work together toward a common goal are just some of the many reasons we honor Dr. King through service on this special holiday.
Service projects were organized with Produce for the People, Corvallis Parks Recreation, Heartland Humane Society, SAGE Garden, Jackson Street Youth Shelter, Inc., Corvallis-Gondar Sister Cities Association, Oregon State University Childcare and Family Resources & Meals on Wheels, Benton Habitat for Humanity ReStore and Site Build, Old Mill Center for Children and Families, and SafeHaven Humane Society.
The History:
The idea of Martin Luther King Jr. Day as a holiday was promoted by labor unions in contract negotiations. After King's death, United States Representative John Conyers (a Democrat from Michigan) and United States Senator Edward Brooke (a Republican from Massachusetts) introduced a bill in Congress to make King's birthday a national holiday. The bill first came to a vote in the U.S. House of Representatives in 1979. However, it fell five votes short of the number needed for passage. Two of the main arguments mentioned by opponents were that a paid holiday for federal employees would be too expensive, and that a holiday to honor a private citizen would be contrary to longstanding tradition (King had never held public office). Only two other people have national holidays in the United States honoring them: George Washington and Christopher Columbus.
Soon after, the King Center turned to support from the corporate community and the general public. The success of this strategy was cemented when musician Stevie Wonder released the single "Happy Birthday" to popularize the campaign in 1980 and hosted the Rally for Peace Press Conference in 1981. Six million signatures were collected for a petition to Congress to pass the law, termed by a 2006 article in The Nation as "the largest petition in favor of an issue in U.S. history."
Few of us who were around in 1980 will forget the impact of Stevie Wonder's "
Happy Birthday":
Lyrics:
You know it doesn't make much sense
There ought to be a law against
Anyone who takes offense
At a day in your celebration
'Cause we all know in our minds
That there ought to be a time
That we can set aside
To show just how much we love you
And I'm sure you would agree
It couldn't fit more perfectly
Than to have a world party
On the day you came to be
Happy birthday to you...
I just never understood
How a man who died for good
Could not have a day that would
Be set aside for his recognition
'Cause it should never be
Just 'cause some cannot see
The dream as clear as he
That they should make it become an illusion
And we all know everything
That he stood for time will bring
For in peace our hearts will sing
Thanks to Martin Luther King
Happy birthday to you...
Why has there never been a holiday, yeah
Where peace is celebrated
All throughout the world
The time is overdue
For people like me and you
Who know the way to truth
Is love and unity to all God's children
It should never be a great event
And the whole day should be spent
In full remembrance
Of those who lived and died for the oneness of all people
So let us all begin
We know that love can win
Let it out don't hold it in
Sing it loud as you can
Happy birthday to you...
We know the key to unify all people
Is in the dream that you had so long ago
That lives in all of the hearts of people
That believe in unity
We'll make the dream become a reality
I know we will
Because our hearts tell us so
Happy birthday
Happy birthday
Happy birthday
...
Though people across the nation rallied to the cause, there was still fierce
opposition from openly racist elected officials:
Senators Jesse Helms and John Porter East (both North Carolina Republicans) led opposition to the bill and questioned whether King was important enough to receive such an honor. Helms criticized King's opposition to the Vietnam War and accused him of espousing "action-oriented Marxism". Helms led a filibuster against the bill and on October 3, 1983, submitted a 300-page document to the Senate alleging that King had associations with communists. New York Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan declared the document a "packet of filth", threw it on the Senate floor and stomped on it.
President Ronald Reagan originally opposed the holiday, citing cost concerns. He later signed the measure, after it passed with a 338 to 90 margin in favor in the House of Representatives.
Former Arizona governor Governor Bruce Babbitt, a Democrat, created the holiday in Arizona by executive order just before he left office in 1986, but his Republican successor Evan Mecham, armed with an attorney general's opinion that Babbitt's order was illegal, rescinded it days after he took office. In 1989, the Arizona state legislature replaced Columbus Day with the King holiday. In 1990, Arizonans were given the opportunity to vote to observe an MLK holiday. In 1990 the National Football League threatened to move the Super Bowl that was planned to be in Arizona in 1993 if the MLK holiday was voted down. The state legislature passed a measure to keep both Columbus Day and Martin Luther King Day, but 76% of voters rejected the King holiday. Consequently, the state "lost $500 million and the Super Bowl" which moved to the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California. In a referendum in 1992, the voters approved recognition of the holiday.
Interestingly enough, the history of opposition to MLK Day has resurfaced again, with the selection of Steve Scalise as House Majority whip.
Scalise’s vote against MLK Day gains new relevance:
The totality of an official’s record always matters. This week, for example, it would be easier for House Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R-La.) to overcome the controversy surrounding his appearance at a white-supremacist event in 2002 if he had an otherwise sterling record on issues related to civil rights. That’s not quite the case. Andrew Prokop noted last night:
…Scalise does not have a record of friendliness to African-American causes. When the Louisiana House voted on making Martin Luther King Day a holiday in 2004, 90 members were in favor and Scalise was one of the six against.
Note, as a Republican state lawmaker, Scalise clearly knew the King holiday was going to be approved, but he made a point of voting against it anyway. To be sure, there are other notable Republicans who rose to national prominence after voting against a day honoring MLK. Former Vice President Dick Cheney (R), for example, voted against the King holiday as a member of Congress in 1978. Five years later, Cheney changed his mind. Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) also voted against it in 1983, though in 1999, he said on “Meet the Press,” “We all learn, OK? We all learn. I will admit to learning, and I hope that the people that I represent appreciate that, too. I voted in 1983 against the recognition of Martin Luther King…. I regret that vote.”
As a result of the Scalise appointment, civil rights groups are protesting
Scalise fundraisers.
As the title of this piece states, this is also a time for remembrance, and a time to learn history, not just that of Dr. King, but of the ongoing struggle for civil rights, and others who played a part in those battles.
Starting with Dr. King, one of the most widely circulated posts here at Daily Kos, was written by HamdenRice, and if you have never read it, please do, and pass it on: Most of you have no idea what Martin Luther King actually did:
I would like to remind everyone exactly what Martin Luther King did, and it wasn't that he "marched" or gave a great speech.
My father told me with a sort of cold fury, "Dr. King ended the terror of living in the south."
Please let this sink in and and take my word and the word of my late father on this. If you are a white person who has always lived in the U.S. and never under a brutal dictatorship, you probably don't know what my father was talking about.
But this is what the great Dr. Martin Luther King accomplished. Not that he marched, nor that he gave speeches.
He ended the terror of living as a black person, especially in the south.
I agree with Hamden's father. Does that mean the battle is won? No. We continue to face police brutality, economic injustice, and an horrific criminal justice system—which is why we need to not only do service, but also take action, like joining demonstrations like #blacklivesmatter, or showing up for and supporting movements like Moral Mondays, whose next massive demonstration is being held in
Raleigh, N.C., on Feb. 14.
While searching for pictures of Dr. King, I ran across one that I rarely see reproduced:
Rev. Martin Luther King (L), and attorneys Mrs. Constance Motley and William Kunstler, 1962
Key in the battles for our civil rights are the lawyers who fought tirelessly and fearlessly—they faced death threats too—for the movement.
Often overlooked are many of the powerful women who played a part in that struggle. One of those women was Constance Baker Motley:
Constance Baker was born on September 14, 1921, in New Haven, Connecticut, the ninth of twelve children. Her parents, Rachel Huggins and McCullough Alva Baker, were immigrants from Nevis, in the Caribbean. Her mother was a domestic worker, and her father worked as a chef for different Yale University student societies, including the secret society Skull and Bones.
Her son, Joel Motley, talks about his mom's civil rights history, in this interview:
Consider her civil rights and judicial work:
After graduating from Columbia's Law School in 1946, Baker was hired by the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund as a civil rights lawyer. As the Fund's first female attorney, she became Associate Counsel to the LDF, making her a lead trial attorney in a number of early and significant civil rights cases. Baker visited churches that were fire bombed, sang freedom songs, and visited Rev. Martin Luther King while he sat in jail, as well as spending a night with civil rights activist Medgar Evers under armed guard.
In 1950 she wrote the original complaint in the case of Brown v. Board of Education. The first African-American woman ever to argue a case before the U.S. Supreme Court, in Meredith v. Fair she successfully won James Meredith's effort to be the first black student to attend the University of Mississippi in 1962. Motley was successful in nine of the ten cases she argued before the Supreme Court. The tenth decision, regarding jury composition, was eventually overturned in her favor. She was otherwise a key legal strategist in the civil rights movement, helping to desegregate Southern schools, buses, and lunch counters.
Motley was elected on February 4, 1964, to the New York State Senate (21st district), to fill the vacancy caused by the election of James Lopez Watson to the New York City Civil Court. She was the first African American woman to sit in the State Senate. She took her seat in the 174th New York State Legislature, was re-elected in November 1964 to the 175th New York State Legislature, and resigned her seat when she was chosen on February 23, 1965, as Manhattan Borough President—-the first woman in that position. In November 1965, she was elected to succeed herself for a full four-year term. In September 1966, President Lyndon B. Johnson appointed her to the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, making her the first African American woman federal judge. She remained on the bench, including a term as chief judge, until her death.
In this interview below, Motley talks about Dr. King.
Also in the photo is activist attorney William Kunstler, whom I got to know when he was defending members of the Black Panther Party in New York. His daughters have recently made a documentary about their dad.
In William Kunstler: Disturbing the Universe, filmmakers Emily Kunstler and Sarah Kunstler explore the life of their father, the late radical civil rights lawyer. In the 1960s and 70s, William Kunstler fought for civil rights with Martin Luther King Jr. and represented the famed 'Chicago 8' activists who protested the Vietnam War. When the inmates took over Attica prison, or when the American Indian Movement stood up to the federal government at Wounded Knee, they asked Kunstler to be their lawyer. To his daughters, it seemed that he was at the center of everything important that had ever happened. But when they were growing up, Kunstler represented some of the most reviled members of society, including rapists and assassins. This powerful film not only recounts the historic causes that Kunstler fought for; it also reveals a man that even his own daughters did not always understand, a man who risked public outrage and the safety of his family so that justice could serve all.
One of the people who has been engaged in promoting the National Day of Service on Martin Luther King Day is Ruby Bridges:
Civil rights leader Ruby Bridges remembers integrating the New Orleans school system in 1960 and the lessons of racial justice that her teacher and Dr. King taught. She urges Americans to honor Dr. King's legacy of service by volunteering on MLK Day.
People worldwide may not always know her name, but most have seen the iconic painting by Norman Rockwell, "
The Problem We All Live With," which was a centerfold in
Look Magazine, in 1964.
The Problem We All Live With, Norman Rockwell painting of six year old Ruby Bridges.
Although I watched that little girl on the news, and identified with her, I never thought about what happened to her inside the school, and about who her teachers were.
Meet Barbara Henry, Ruby's teacher, featured in a story in the Boston Globe magazine titled Teaching Ruby Bridges:
She talk about how she wound up in Louisiana as Ruby's teacher.
I began teaching in Malden for a few years after college, and then I went to Quincy. During that time, I had been taking graduate courses at Boston College for a master’s in history and government. I decided I would love to visit the places I was studying about, so I applied to be a teacher to Air Force children. I found myself at an Air Force base outside Paris. It was there that I met this dashing lieutenant.
He went back to Louisiana, which was his home. I married him and came to New Orleans. I wanted to return to teaching. I loved being with the kids. I had applied to the New Orleans school system. The superintendent called and asked me would I like to take first grade.
“Oh, yes,” I said. “Is this to be one of the desegregated schools?”
“Yes it is,” he said. “Would that make any difference?”
What a strange question to ask. Why would it make any difference? I had been part of a desegregated world for years and years. “The police will have your name,” he said. I didn’t realize what that would signify — that there was an expectation of trouble. The morning of Monday, November 14, 1960, my husband followed me to the area. We had to park a distance from the school because of the mobs. I had to make my way through that raging sea of protesters to the front barricade, where I met a policeman and gave him my name. My whole life, in a way, had prepared me for that moment.
My first moments with Ruby are as clear today as they were then. This beautiful little black girl, all dressed in pink. The only clue she was going to school and not to a party was she had her school bag and lunchbox. When kids are shy, they raise their heads a little bit. But enough for me to see her beautiful brown eyes and magnetic smile. I just fell in love with Ruby. How could your heart not be taken by a scene like that?
Ruby and Barbara were
reunited by Oprah Winfrey in 1996:
In 1960, a 6-year-old girl named Ruby Bridges became a powerful symbol of the Civil Rights Movement when she began attending the all-white William Frantz Elementary School in New Orleans. It was a turbulent time for race relations in the south as riots and demonstrations raged across the city. Protesters were trying to not only harass the black children but keep the white children away, as well, in an attempt to prove that desegregation wouldn't work. In the end, Ruby was the only student in first-grade teacher Barbara Henry's class for more than one year.
Bridges says this about her teacher in the interview: "Even though she was white and looked exactly like the people outside the school, she showed me her heart."
We all have lessons to learn from the history of the movement, Dr. King, and activists who fought for and continue to fight for justice.
Each of us can make a difference.