1968 was a very eventful year, and we’re seeing a number of anniversaries which – hopefully – stimulate further reflection on some of the key personalities, cultural and political events four decades down the track. Friday the 4th of April was the fortieth anniversary of the death of Dr Martin Luther King.
There are a number of such reflections around in the blogosphere this weekend. Andrew Bartlett provides a number of valuable links, including one to Joseph Palermo at The Huffington Post who makes an interesting and important point about the difference in perceptions about King before and after his death:
Contrary to mainstream belief today, while King was alive he was never widely heralded in the media as a “savior” or a “great leader.” He was just as often denounced as a “polarizing” figure and his work was often denigrated in racist terms. As was the case with Robert F. Kennedy, the love affair with MLK only took off long after he had become a kind of martyr.
King had actually found himself at something of a crossroads in 1968 – most of the civil rights the movement had been seeking had been embodied in law – largely through LBJ’s decision to force them through a mainly reticent if not unwilling Congress. There was increasing frustration with the approach King had championed among Black militants, and support for LBJ’s “Great Society” – which was supposed to put the economic flesh on the legislative bones – was fast diminishing under the shadow of the Vietnam War.
King himself, as Shiraz Socialist observes, had turned his attention to union and labour rights. That’s part of his legacy – along with the continued disparity between the life chances of white Americans and African-Americans which he had wanted to ameliorate – which is rarely discussed. Indeed the spectre of the “angry Black” explains a lot of the tensions around Barack Obama’s candidacy and race. King has been written into a narrative of American destiny, but in many ways this canonisation obscures the concerns and problems which actually led him to emerge as such an historical figure.
Martin Luther King would have spanked Obama and sent him to sit in a corner. See:
http://acimmessages.blogspot.com/
Christian Prophecy (?)
You’re being very disingenuous here. Karl Marx’s father, who came from a long line of rabbis, converted to Christianity to escape 19c Prussian anri-semitism. There’s no reason to suppose his conversion was sincere. Any other comment I make on your link would be OT, (off thread, not Old Testament) and would be so vicious it would probably be put into moderation, so I’ll stop here.
A very interesting link, CP.
You’re not a member of the Landover Baptist Church by any chance, are you? http://www.landoverbaptist.org/
Funny place that land of the brave, home of the free. Some white folk live by the gun to a ripe old age like Charlton Heston. Others, like MLK, die relatively young by one.
King railed against racism and had the physical courage of his convictions to lead demonstraters on “Freedom Marches” as they were confronted by the fury of Southern racist cops many of whom were Klansmen armed with nooses, clubs, guns, tear gas, jack-boots and bile. He put his body and life on the line day in day out. Hounded as he was by Jedgar Hoover’s FBI, no Secret Service squads protected Dr. Martin or his followers. The MSM of the day were hardly onside either.
In view of the depth of his support in the late sixties by those who voted with their feet and other supporters who knew him through media and word of mouth, I suggest that MLK’s message, especially his “I Have A Dream” address, had considerable nationwide impact BEFORE his “martyrdom”, and so disagree with Huffpo’s Joe Palermo on this point.
Through his audacity of hope, uppity though some claim it is, Obama has not only re-ignited those hopes and dreams but also breached, burst and busted demographic boundaries with his widespread appeal to Americans prepared to chip in with 20 and 50 bucks a time to fund his campaign against Beltway imprimatured opponents who use surrogates to dog-whistle the racial prejudices of potential supporters.
King also drew attention to the ongoing inconvenient truth of “economic apartheid”.
(Mouse over date box to April 4.)
http://news.yahoo.com/edcartoons/tonyauth;_ylt=Ak4QeuSJVgJOQsGmmDbr2xwVvTYC
The demeaning comments about Obama (only bad “boys” are sent to sit in the corner aren’t they?) by the first commenter on this thread arouses suspicion that Christian Prophecy is talking through his or her oracle. Always thought Jesus Christ was big on preaching love for society’s flotsam and jetsom.
We’ll never know, but I strongly suspect that MLK would have wholeheartedly endorsed the contents of Obama’s Philadelphia Address.
Loved your link, GregM. Best belly-laughs I’ve had today.
I wouldn’t worry too much about “Christian Prophecy”. I suspect he/she/it is one of that species of spammer who has their finger on the comment button poised to go off whenever google or technorati turns up another post on a particular topic.
EC, I haven’t read the Palermo post but only the quote, but I don’t read him as diminishing the support King had while alive, but making a different point which I think is expanded on in the post.
EC: “the contents of Obama’s Philadelphia Address.”
Contents?! What, you mean like, “Hey everybody, look over there! I think it’s a UFO! [runs away while everyone's head is turned]” That sort of rousing ‘Address’?
Mark, I take your point. Mine was sparked by this bit from Palermo:
“the love affair with MLK only took off long after he had become a kind of martyr.”
Reckon a lot of folk loved him and what he was on about while he was still alive. Not sure if persecuted people qualify as martyrs while they’re still kicking. Sister Mary Oliver distinctly left me with the impression that folk had to have carked it first to qualify.
That’s terribly witty j_p_z. Btw, have you checked the latest board odds? Seems your heroine is fading fast.
President – WINNER Cbet
OBAMA, Barack 1.90
MCCAIN, John 2.85
CLINTON, Hillary 4.50
And then there’s that dreaded “Pincer Narrowing” for HRC v BHO in the PA polls. What was once a 28 point lead in now down to MOEs-ville, and most of it has happened since Obi’s Philly Address and HRC’s special imaginary Lara Croft recollections about a Bosnian air-strip.
Yeah, I reckon it was just a careless bit of phrasing on Palermo’s part, EC.
I took Palermo’s comment on “the love affair with MLK” to be referring to mainstream media and society in general. There was no doubt that MLK had a huge following before his death, otherwise his killing wouldn’t have spearked the outrage that it did (and possibly he wouldn’t have been killed in the first place). But that was mostly among black people and social justice and peace activists, who certainly were not a majority, particularly when it came to being in positions of power and influence. King certainly wasn’t the almost universally praised icon he is today, but rather was regularly met with ferocious criticism from the powerbrokers and elites of the day – not surprisingly, since he was ferociously critical of many of them (in a nonviolent type of way)
That’s my recollection too, Andrew.
There were many black “leaders” and spokespersons. He stood out for certain qualities.
He had a following in Australia too, as we watched the civil rights movement develop, and thought of our own conditions and what needed to be changed here. Very influential here: the USA as a social trendsetter. Why did the Charlie Perkins [et al] bus trip take the name “Freedom Ride”? Just one example.
cheers
EC: “have you checked the latest board odds? Seems your heroine is fading fast.”
So, is your point that a bad position is made into a good one by virtue of getting more votes? I guess that would make you a great supporter of George W. Bush for the past 8 years. (btw, HRC as my “heroine”? That’s like asking Do you walk to school or carry your lunch? Or maybe, If you’d rather be punched in the nose than in the teeth, does that mean you *like* being punched in the nose?)
MARTIN LUTHER KING: I have a dream…
BARACK OBAMA: I have an excuse…
But enough about Obama, since this thread is supposed to be about MLK.
I think one thing you could say, is that King’s enduring legacy, from a literalist point of view, was the real concrete dismantling of a morally repugnant set of legal structures and mores designed to prevent American blacks from fully exercising their rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. But many of the socio-economic calamities and disparities that followed were much more to do with large-scale organic social processes, not to do with legal or civil rights as such. In that social sense, you could argue that a force vastly more influential than King’s from circa 1968-1998, was the refusal of the black political establishment and the left-liberal establishment to engage seriously with the analytical and policy claims of D.P. Moynihan. If King was the prophet honored but not always heeded, Moynihan was the prophet for the most part cast out and disregarded.
Kim: “but in many ways this canonisation obscures the concerns and problems which actually led him to emerge as such an historical figure.”
Very true, but unfortunately a fate which many (maybe even most) major historical figures have shared.
I’ve often thought that King’s sum-total influence was unwittingly (and unhappily) lessened or damaged by his own eloquence and charisma. Most Americans who were not yet alive during the Civil Rights era know the compelling phrase “I have a dream,” but cannot elaborate on it or interpret it effectively or even accurately, nor do they know the content of the rest of the oration. Not to mention the simple rhetorical fact that a potent phrase like “I have a dream” is, from a practical policy point of view, not nearly as useful as “I have a lucid analysis with reliable predictive power” or “I have a detailed and workable plan.” Not that that is King’s fault; but such is the world, I guess. The wise man points to the moon, and the rest of us stare at his finger.
The MLK myth polished and elaborated post-mortem by the MSM is that the work of MLK is now essentially completed business that happened a long time ago and really what was all the fuss about?
MLK’s sense of his own failure and the broadening scope of his mission in the months preceding his assassination have been edited out of the story.
Would MLK have been capable of maintaining his forward momentum while broadening the scope of his mission? Probably not. But like all alternative history, my conclusion is based on mere conjecture.
Maybe MLK could have created a broad coalition of people of colour, the poor, organised labour, peaceniks, the counter-culture. But I doubt it. There were too many internal contradictions and frictions in such a coalition for it to last very long at all.
So the sub-text of MSM MLK is: well wasn’t that splendid? But don’t even think about trying it again because America doesn’t need another MLK.
Katz says:
Absolutely correct. An excellent insight to those days and the very sorts of divisions and contradictions with which King had to contend is found in a superb, if slim volume titled The Temple Bombing.
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1316/is_n7-8_v28/ai_18480805
The politics of the Middle East was not only bound to drive a wedge between Afro-American and Jewish civil rights workers, it would lead directly to the murder of Robert Kennedy as surely as white supremacism led to the murder of Martin Luther King.
And had the aim of American radical feminist Valerie Solanas been slightly better, the murder of Andy Warhol only two days before Robert Kennedy would have made a neat trifecta for maniacal hatreds in ‘68.
I don’t think Barrack Obama will win the Presidency, simply because his politics is probably a bit too left of centre. But I hope I’m wrong.
j_p_z, one of the beautiful aspects of his “I have a dream” speech is that he talks about his own children and their prospects, his hopes for them. There stands a parent, black or white; and it touches the hearts of other parents, other children indeed.
His oratory was as fine as Winston Churchill’s. Clear, direct and uplifting. Where Obama seems (to me) artificial artifice heaping art artlessly on top of air. A bullsh** artiste.
Different times called forth different speakers.
Thank the Lord Rev King never had to appear on Oprah.
Enemy Combatant says:
They sure did. Check out this photo
http://www.msc.navy.mil/sealift/2007/February/graphics/KingPhoto.jpg