African American Peacemakers – Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Brack Obama, and the Struggle Against Racism, Inequality and War

Meanwhile, as our military adventures abroad continue, states are reducing their investments in education, while expanding expenditures in their correctional facilities. Between 1987 and 2007, states spent an average of a 21 percent increase on higher education, but expanded their corrections budgets by an average of 127 percent. Today, for the first time in recent history, there are now five states that spend more state money on prisons than on public colleges – Connecticut, Delaware, Michigan, Oregon, and Vermont. The ugly tradeoff not to educate but to incarcerate continues. The ever-expanding prison industrial complex lies at the center of America’s National Security State. Now is the time to return America’s government to democratic processes and the rule of law. Now is the time to break with the culture of violence – militarism abroad and mass incarceration at home. Now is the time to “give peace a chance.”