Martin Luther King Day
Note: Underlined words have definitions at the end of this article provided by The Basic Newbury House Dictionary. Definitions with an asterisk (*) are supplied by the author, Bill Perry.
Martin Luther King Day is the newest national holiday in the US. It is celebrated on January 15th, the birthday of civil rights leader, Martin Luther King. He did many important things in a short time.
Martin was born in 1929 in Atlanta, Georgia. He was the second child of Pastor Michael King and a very good student in school. After high school he attended Morehouse College and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1948. He later attended Crozer Theological Seminary, a religious school, and then received a doctorate degree in 1955 from Boston University. During his time in Boston, he met Coretta Scott and married her in 1953. A year later he became pastor of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama.
Slavery had been a custom in the South for over 200 years. Abraham Lincoln, America’s 16th President [see President’s Day], freed the Blacks from slavery in 1863, in the middle of the Civil War. But Blacks and Whites did things differently. Many times they did not understand each other. State laws required segregation, a policy that kept Blacks and Whites separated. In restaurants Whites ate in one room; Blacks ate in another. On public buses Blacks sat in the back; Whites sat in the front. Even simple things like restrooms and water fountains were separate. In some places Blacks were not permitted to eat in some restaurants, shop in certain stores, visit a few parks or go to some schools. This separation happened all over the southern part of the US. Blacks had little hope that it would ever change.
One day a lady named Rosa Parks decided to do something about it. Rosa did not give up her seat to a white man on a full bus. Her action started a national debate about the differences between groups of people and how they should act toward each other. Martin Luther King helped organize a one-year boycott of the bus company that made Blacks give up their seats to Whites. Newspapers reported his work across the country and he became famous by 1956. Two years later he wrote his first book, Stride Toward Freedom, which explained his ideas. In 1960 he became a pastor with his father of Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta. Later that year the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), a civil rights group, chose him to be their leader.
Dr. King believed that things would get better. He wanted to change the laws white Americans made about Blacks. His “I Have A Dream” speech in Washington, DC, in 1964 was truly his finest hour. Time magazine named him “Man of the Year.” Later that same year he received the Nobel (Peace) Prize, the first black American to win it. At age 35, he was also the youngest person ever to win this award.
By 1965 King saw that segregation was keeping Blacks poor and hurt their chance to make more money. Therefore he called for a “revolution of values,” and asked the government for economic help for Blacks. More people joined him and helped in his marches, boycotts and rallies. Some people thought these new workers were not really interested in helping Blacks, but wanted to help themselves. By 1968 he returned to Washington, DC, demanding a $12 billion “Economic Bill of Rights” for black Americans. By this time some Americans stopped supporting him. They did not agree with this demand for economic help from the government and thought it was not a good idea.
In April 1968, in the middle of this work in Washington, King went to Memphis, Tennessee. He wanted to help support a strike by workers who pick up garbage. While he stood on an open patio of the second floor in the back of the motel where he was staying, a gunman, James Earl Ray, shot King on April 4th. King died that night at the age of 39. King read, believed in and taught the teachings of Jesus. He also followed the example of peacefully protesting things in society taught by India’s former leader, Mohandas Gandhi. King did not die peacefully. In the next few months, many people who were angry about King’s death caused a lot of trouble in cities around the US. Riots, fires, shooting, stealing, and fighting happened everyday for weeks. It took a long time for the police and the military to stop the riots. Ray finally said he shot King and went to prison. Later he changed his story, but he died there in 1998.
More than any other man in America, Martin Luther King made Americans aware of the struggles of a minority group (Blacks) in the country. He taught how people were similar in many ways. He also said our differences should not separate us; we should understand and accept each other. History sees him to be one of the most important leaders of diversity, a belief that understanding the differences in human beings is good. In 1983 the Congress of the United States passed a law that made King’s birthday, January 15th, a national holiday. Because some Americans did not agree with his ideas, it took years before all the states obeyed the new holiday law. Celebrations include rallies, speeches, marches, and movies or special programs on television about King’s life and the history of civil rights. King is important in American history. Some of his statements are famous around the world.
The values of brotherhood, love and understanding others are ideas King taught. He learned them from the Bible. It says that God does not treat people differently because of how they look. God tells his people to do the same. Martin Luther King’s gift to us is that the well being of all people of any race, language, cultural or national background, should be important to everyone.
Vocabulary
boycott (noun) – the action of deciding for political reasons not to buy products or do business with a company.
civil rights (noun) – in the USA, the rights of each citizen guaranteed by the Constitution, such as the rights to vote and not suffer prejudice because of race, nationality, etc.
diversity (noun) – differences among people in race, ethnic group, religion, etc.
*march (noun) – a public demonstration of people walking together from one point to another to display a common opinion.
minority (adjective) – related to people of a different race, background or religion from those of the majority of people in a nation.
Nobel Prize (noun) – an award given each year in the following areas: physical sciences, medicine, economics, literature and efforts toward world peace.
pastor (noun) – a minister in charge of a church.
rallies (noun) – meetings of people to excite them about an idea, product or sports event.
revolution (noun) – a big change, sometimes caused by force or war, especially in a government economy, or field of study.
riot (noun) – an act of violent behavior by a large group.
strike (noun) – a work stoppage because of disagreements with management.
©Bill Perry. All rights reserved. This material may not be reproduced in any form without written permission from the author.
