Dr.
Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered this speech in support of
the striking sanitation workers at Mason Temple in Memphis,
TN on April 3, 1968 — the day before he was assassinated.
Thank
you very kindly, my friends. As I listened to Ralph Abernathy
in his eloquent and generous introduction and then thought about
myself, I wondered who he was talking about. It's always good
to have your closest friend and associate say something good
about you. And Ralph is the best friend that I have in the world.
I'm
delighted to see each of you here tonight in spite of a storm
warning. You reveal that you are determined to go on anyhow.
Something is happening in Memphis, something is happening in
our world.
As
you know, if I were standing at the beginning of time, with
the possibility of general and panoramic view of the whole human
history up to now, and the Almighty said to me, "Martin
Luther King, which age would you like to live in?" —
I would take my mental flight by Egypt through, or rather across
the Red Sea, through the wilderness on toward the promised land.
And in spite of its magnificence, I wouldn't stop there. I would
move on by Greece, and take my mind to Mount Olympus. And I
would see Plato, Aristotle, Socrates, Euripides and Aristophanes
assembled around the Parthenon as they discussed the great and
eternal issues of reality.
But
I wouldn't stop there. I would go on, even to the great heyday
of the Roman Empire. And I would see developments around there,
through various emperors and leaders. But I wouldn't stop there.
I would even come up to the day of the Renaissance, and get
a quick picture of all that the Renaissance did for the cultural
and esthetic life of man. But I wouldn't stop there. I would
even go by the way that the man for whom I'm named had his habitat.
And I would watch Martin Luther as he tacked his ninety-five
theses on the door at the church in Wittenberg.
But
I wouldn't stop there. I would come on up even to 1863, and
watch a vacillating president by the name of Abraham Lincoln
finally come to the conclusion that he had to sign the Emancipation
Proclamation. But I wouldn't stop there. I would even come up
to the early thirties, and see a man grappling with the problems
of the bankruptcy of his nation. And come with an eloquent cry
that we have nothing to fear but fear itself.
But
I wouldn't stop there. Strangely enough, I would turn to the
Almighty, and say, "If you allow me to live just a few
years in the second half of the twentieth century, I will be
happy." Now that's a strange statement to make, because
the world is all messed up. The nation is sick. Trouble is in
the land. Confusion all around. That's a strange statement.
But I know, somehow, that only when it is dark enough, can you
see the stars. And I see God working in this period of the twentieth
century in a away that men, in some strange way, are responding
— something is happening in our world. The masses of people
are rising up. And wherever they are assembled today, whether
they are in Johannesburg, South Africa; Nairobi, Kenya; Accra,
Ghana; New York City; Atlanta, Georgia; Jackson, Mississippi;
or Memphis, Tennessee — the cry is always the same —
"We want to be free."
And
another reason that I'm happy to live in this period is that
we have been forced to a point where we're going to have to
grapple with the problems that men have been trying to grapple
with through history, but the demand didn't force them to do
it. Survival demands that we grapple with them. Men, for years
now, have been talking about war and peace. But now, no longer
can they just talk about it. It is no longer a choice between
violence and nonviolence in this world; it's nonviolence or
nonexistence.
That
is where we are today. And also in the human rights revolution,
if something isn't done, and in a hurry, to bring the colored
peoples of the world out of their long years of poverty, their
long years of hurt and neglect, the whole world is doomed. Now,
I'm just happy that God has allowed me to live in this period,
to see what is unfolding. And I'm happy that He's allowed me
to be in Memphis.
I
can remember, I can remember when Negroes were just going around
as Ralph has said, so often, scratching where they didn't itch,
and laughing when they were not tickled. But that day is all
over. We mean business now, and we are determined to gain our
rightful place in God's world.
And
that's all this whole thing is about. We aren't engaged in any
negative protest and in any negative arguments with anybody.
We are saying that we are determined to be men. We are determined
to be people. We are saying that we are God's children. And
that we don't have to live like we are forced to live.
Now,
what does all of this mean in this great period of history?
It means that we've got to stay together. We've got to stay
together and maintain unity. You know, whenever Pharaoh wanted
to prolong the period of slavery in Egypt, he had a favorite,
favorite formula for doing it. What was that? He kept the salves
fighting among themselves. But whenever the slaves get together,
something happens in Pharaoh's court, and he cannot hold the
slaves in slavery. When the slaves get together, that's the
beginning of getting out of slavery. Now let us maintain unity.
Secondly,
let us keep the issues where they are. The issue is injustice.
The issue is the refusal of Memphis to be fair and honest in
its dealings with its public servants, who happen to be sanitation
workers. Now, we've got to keep attention on that. That's always
the problem with a little violence. You know what happened the
other day, and the press dealt only with the window-breaking.
I read the articles. They very seldom got around to mentioning
the fact that one thousand, three hundred sanitation workers
were on strike, and that Memphis is not being fair to them,
and that Mayor Loeb is in dire need of a doctor. They didn't
get around to that.
Now
we're going to march again, and we've got to march again, in
order to put the issue where it is supposed to be. And force
everybody to see that there are thirteen hundred of God's children
here suffering, sometimes going hungry, going through dark and
dreary nights wondering how this thing is going to come out.
That's the issue. And we've got to say to the nation: we know
it's coming out. For when people get caught up with that which
is right and they are willing to sacrifice for it, there is
no stopping point short of victory.
We
aren't going to let any mace stop us. We are masters in our
nonviolent movement in disarming police forces; they don't know
what to do, I've seen them so often. I remember in Birmingham,
Alabama, when we were in that majestic struggle there we would
move out of the 16th Street Baptist Church day after day; by
the hundreds we would move out. And Bull Connor would tell them
to send the dogs forth and they did come; but we just went before
the dogs singing, "Ain't gonna let nobody turn me round."
Bull Connor next would say, "Turn the fire hoses on."
And as I said to you the other night, Bull Connor didn't know
history. He knew a kind of physics that somehow didn't relate
to the transphysics that we knew about. And that was the fact
that there was a certain kind of fire that no water could put
out. And we went before the fire hoses; we had known water.
If we were Baptist or some other denomination, we had been immersed.
If we were Methodist, and some others, we had been sprinkled,
but we knew water.
That
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 stacked 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 the jailers looking through the windows being moved
by our prayers, and being moved by our words and our songs.
And there was a power there which Bull Connor couldn't adjust
to; and so we ended up transforming Bull into a steer, and we
won our struggle in Birmingham.
Now
we've got to go on to Memphis just like that. I call upon you
to be with us Monday. Now about injunctions: We have an injunction
and we're going into court tomorrow morning to fight 
this
illegal, unconstitutional injunction. All we say to America
is, "Be true to what you said on paper." If I lived
in China or even Russia, or any totalitarian country, maybe
I could understand the denial of certain basic First Amendment
privileges, because they hadn't committed themselves to that
over there. But somewhere I read of the freedom of assembly.
Somewhere I read of the freedom of speech. Somewhere I read
of the freedom of the press. Somewhere I read that the greatness
of America is the right to protest for right. And so just as
I say, we aren't going to let any injunction turn us around.
We are going on.
We
need all of you. And you know what's beautiful to me, is to
see all of these ministers of the Gospel. It's a marvelous picture.
Who is it that is supposed to articulate the longings and aspirations
of the people more than the preacher? Somehow the preacher must
be an Amos, and say, "Let justice roll down like waters
and righteousness like a mighty stream." Somehow, the preacher
must say with Jesus, "The spirit of the Lord is upon me,
because he hath anointed me to deal with the problems of the
poor."
And
I want to commend the preachers, under the leadership of these
noble men: James Lawson, one who has been in this struggle for
many years; he's been to jail for struggling; but he's still
going on, fighting for the rights of his people. Rev. Ralph
Jackson, Billy Kiles; I could just go right on down the list,
but time will not permit. But I want to thank them all. And
I want you to thank them, because so often, preachers aren't
concerned about anything but themselves. And I'm always happy
to see a relevant ministry.
It's
all right to talk about "long white robes over yonder,"
in all of its symbolism. But ultimately people want some suits
and dresses and shoes to wear down here. It's all right to talk
about "streets flowing with milk and honey," but God
has commanded us to be concerned about the slums down here,
and his children who can't eat three square meals a day. It's
all right to talk about the new Jerusalem, but one day, God's
preachers must talk about the New York, the new Atlanta, the
new Philadelphia, the new Los Angeles, the new Memphis, Tennessee.
This is what we have to do.
Now
the other thing we'll have to do is this: Always anchor our
external direct action with the power of economic withdrawal.
Now, we are poor people, individually, we are poor when you
compare us with white society in America. We are poor. Never
stop and forget that collectively, that means all of us together,
collectively we are richer than all the nations in the world,
with the exception of nine. Did you ever think about that? After
you leave the United States, Soviet Russia, Great Britain, West
Germany, France, and I could name the others, the Negro collectively
is richer than most nations of the world. We have an annual
income of more than thirty billion dollars a year, which is
more than all of the exports of the United States, and more
than the national budget of Canada. Did you know that? That's
power right there, if we know how to pool it.
We
don't have to argue with anybody. We don't have to curse and
go around acting bad with our words. We don't need any bricks
and bottles, we don't need any Molotov cocktails, we just need
to go around to these stores, and to these massive industries
in our country, and say, "God sent us by here, to say to
you that you're not treating his children right. And we've come
by here to ask you to make the first item on your agenda fair
treatment, where God's children are concerned. Now, if you are
not prepared to do that, we do have an agenda that we must follow.
And our agenda calls for withdrawing economic support from you."
And
so, as a result of this, we are asking you tonight, to go out
and tell your neighbors not to buy Coca-Cola in Memphis. Go
by and tell them not to buy Sealtest milk. Tell them not to
buy — what is the other bread? — Wonder Bread. And
what is the other bread company, Jesse? Tell them not to buy
Hart's bread. As Jesse Jackson has said, up to now, only the
garbage men have been feeling pain; now we must kind of redistribute
the pain. We are choosing these companies because they haven't
been fair in their hiring policies; and we are choosing them
because they can begin the process of saying, they are going
to support the needs and the rights of these men who are on
strike. And then they can move on downtown and tell Mayor Loeb
to do what is right.
But
not only that, we've got to strengthen black institutions. I
call upon you to take your money out of the banks downtown and
deposit your money in Tri-State Bank — we want a "bank-in"
movement in Memphis. So go by the savings and loan association.
I'm not asking you something we don't do ourselves at SCLC.
Judge Hooks and others will tell you that we have an account
here in the savings and loan association from the Southern Christian
Leadership Conference. We're just telling you to follow what
we're doing. Put your money there. You have six or seven black
insurance companies in Memphis. Take out your insurance there.
We want to have an "insurance-in."
Now
these are some practical things we can do. We begin the process
of building a greater economic base. And at the same time, we
are putting pressure where it really hurts. I ask you to follow
through here.
Now,
let me say as I move to my conclusion that we've got to give
ourselves to this struggle until the end. Nothing would be more
tragic than to stop at this point, in Memphis. We've got to
see it through. And when we have our march, you need to be there.
Be concerned about your brother. You may not be on strike. But
either we go up together, or we go down together.
Let
us develop a kind of dangerous unselfishness. One day a man
came to Jesus; and he wanted to raise some questions about some
vital matters in life. At points, he wanted to trick Jesus,
and show him that he knew a little more than Jesus knew, and
through this, throw him off base. Now that question could have
easily ended up in a philosophical and theological debate. But
Jesus immediately pulled that question from mid-air, and placed
it on a dangerous curve between Jerusalem and Jericho. And he
talked about a certain man, who fell among thieves. You remember
that a Levite and a priest passed by on the other side. They
didn't stop to help him. And finally a man of another race came
by. He got down from his beast, decided not to be compassionate
by proxy. But with him, administering first aid, and helped
the man in need. Jesus ended up saying, this was the good man,
this was the great man, because he had the capacity to project
the "I" into the "thou," and to be concerned
about his brother. Now you know, we use our imagination a great
deal to try to determine why the priest and the Levite didn't
stop. At times we say they were busy going to church meetings
— an ecclesiastical gathering — and they had to get
on down to Jerusalem so they wouldn't be late for their meeting.
At other times we would speculate that there was a religious
law that "One who was engaged in religious ceremonials
was not to touch a human body twenty-four hours before the ceremony."
And every now and then we begin to wonder whether maybe they
were not going down to Jerusalem, or down to Jericho, rather
to organize a "Jericho Road Improvement Association."
That's a possibility. Maybe they felt that it was better to
deal with the problem from the causal root, rather than to get
bogged down with an individual effort.
But
I'm going to tell you what my imagination tells me. It's possible
that these men were afraid. You see, the Jericho road is a dangerous
road. I remember when Mrs. King and I were first in Jerusalem.
We rented a car and drove from Jerusalem down to Jericho. And
as soon as we got on that road, I said to my wife, "I can
see why Jesus used this as a setting for his parable."
It's a winding, meandering road. It's really conducive for ambushing.
You start out in Jerusalem, which is about 1200 miles, or rather
1200 feet above sea level. And by the time you get down to Jericho,
fifteen or twenty minutes later, you're about 2200 feet below
sea level. That's a dangerous road. In the days of Jesus it
came to be known as the "Bloody Pass." And you know,
it's possible that the priest and the Levite looked over that
man on the ground and wondered if the robbers were still around.
Or it's possible that they felt that the man on the ground was
merely faking. And he was acting like he had been robbed and
hurt, in order to seize them over there, lure them there for
quick and easy seizure. And so the first question that the Levite
asked was, "If I stop to help this man, what will happen
to me?" But then the Good Samaritan came by. And he reversed
the question: "If I do not stop to help this man, what
will happen to him?"
That's
the question before you tonight. Not, "If I stop to help
the sanitation workers, what will happen to all of the hours
that I usually spend in my office every day and every week as
a pastor?" The question is not, "If I stop to help
this man in need, what will happen to me?" "If I do
not stop to help the sanitation workers, what will happen to
them?" That's the question.
Let
us rise up tonight with a greater readiness. Let us stand with
a greater determination. And let us move on in these powerful
days, these days of challenge to make America what it ought
to be. We have an opportunity to make America a better nation.
And I want to thank God, once more, for allowing me to be here
with you.
You
know, several years ago, I was in New York City autographing
the first book that I had written. And while sitting there autographing
books, a demented black woman came up. The only question I heard
from her was, "Are you Martin Luther King?"
And
I was looking down writing, and I said yes. And the next minute
I felt something beating on my chest. Before I knew it I had
been stabbed by this demented woman. I was rushed to Harlem
Hospital. It was a dark Saturday afternoon. And that blade had
gone through, and the X-rays revealed that the tip of the blade
was on the edge of my aorta, the main artery. And once that's
punctured, you drown in your own blood — that's the end
of you.
It
came out in the New York Times the next morning, that if I had
sneezed, I would have died. Well, about four days later, they
allowed me, after the operation, after my chest had been opened,
and the blade had been taken out, to move around in the wheel
chair in the hospital. They allowed me to read some of the mail
that came in, and from all over the states, and the world, kind
letters came in. I read a few, but one of them I will never
forget. I had received one from the President and the Vice-President.
I've forgotten what those telegrams said. I'd received a visit
and a letter from the Governor of New York, but I've forgotten
what the letter said. But there was another letter that came
from a little girl, a young girl who was a student at the White
Plains High School. And I looked at that letter, and I'll never
forget it. It said simply, "Dear Dr. King: I am a ninth-grade
student at the White Plains High School." She said, "While
it should not matter, I would like to mention that I am a white
girl. I read in the paper of your misfortune, and of your suffering.
And I read that if you had sneezed, you would have died. And
I'm simply writing you to say that I'm so happy that you didn't
sneeze."
And
I want to say tonight, I want to say that I am happy that I
didn't sneeze. Because if I had sneezed, I wouldn't have been
around here in 1960, when students all over the South started
sitting-in at lunch counters. And I knew that as they were sitting
in, they were really standing up for the best in the American
dream. And taking the whole nation back to those great wells
of democracy which were dug deep by the Founding Fathers in
the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. If I had
sneezed, I wouldn't have been around in 1962, when Negroes in
Albany, Georgia, decided to straighten their backs up. And whenever
men and women straighten their backs up, they are going somewhere,
because a man can't ride your back unless it is bent. If I had
sneezed, I wouldn't have been here in 1963, when the black people
of Birmingham, Alabama, aroused the conscience of this nation,
and brought into being the Civil Rights Bill. If I had sneezed,
I wouldn't have had a chance later that year, in August, to
try to tell America about a dream that I had had. If I had sneezed,
I wouldn't have been down in Selma, Alabama, been in Memphis
to see the community rally around those brothers and sisters
who are suffering. I'm so happy that I didn't sneeze.
And
they were telling me, now it doesn't matter now. It really doesn't
matter what happens now. I left Atlanta this morning, and as
we got started on the plane, there were six of us, the pilot
said over the public address system, "We are sorry for
the delay, but we have Dr. Martin Luther King on the plane.
And to be sure that all of the bags were checked, and to be
sure that nothing would be wrong with the plane, we had to check
out everything carefully. And we've had the plane protected
and guarded all night."
And
then I got to Memphis. And some began to say the threats, or
talk about the threats that were out. What would happen to me
from some of our sick white brothers?
Well,
I don't know what will happen now. We've got some difficult
days ahead. But it doesn't matter with me now. Because I've
been to the mountaintop. And I don't mind. Like anybody, I would
like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I'm not
concerned about that now. I just want to do God's will. And
He's allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I've looked over.
And I've seen the promised land. I may not get there with you.
But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get
to the promised land. And I'm happy, tonight. I'm not worried
about anything. I'm not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen
the glory of the coming of the Lord.
