HdTn0+=3hRnm)zK#-t\|Ha)S I Have a Dream, speech by Martin Luther King, Jr., that was delivered on August 28, 1963, during the March on Washington. Surely we must understand their feelings even if we do not condone their actions. And he starts out in the opening line at Riverside Church by saying: I am here tonight because my conscience leaves me no other choice. But they chose Riverside because King was going to be speaking some days later at a huge rally and march in New York City, and they knew that that rally was going to bring out a different kind of element, a more controversial element. Martin Luther King April 4, 1967 Riverside Church, New York City . And that's the issue that King was raising. JwNt YHiA:{p . Also it must be clear that the leaders of Hanoi considered the presence of American troops in support of the Diem regime to have been the initial military breach of the Geneva agreements concerning foreign troops, and they remind us that they did not begin to send in any large number of supplies or men until American forces had moved into the tens of thousands. The great initiative in this war is ours. His speech appears below. So all that we have is less than 10 minutes of video of the speech. As we all know, Neal, before he died, Robert McNamara, the Defense secretary that had Walt and others over in Vietnam, before he died, of course, announced that he was wrong. We are confronted with the fierce urgency of now. 0000040748 00000 n trailer << /Size 93 /Info 36 0 R /Root 40 0 R /Prev 148547 /ID[<8f2b4dd6f2f061944c7ff807c44fcc1f><651247ae294a1a197a948cb3bc3f8412>] >> startxref 0 %%EOF 40 0 obj << /Type /Catalog /Pages 38 0 R /Metadata 37 0 R /Threads 41 0 R /Names 43 0 R /OpenAction [ 44 0 R /XYZ null null null ] /PageMode /UseNone /PageLabels 35 0 R >> endobj 41 0 obj [ 42 0 R ] endobj 42 0 obj << /I << /Title (A)>> /F 45 0 R >> endobj 43 0 obj << /Dests 33 0 R >> endobj 91 0 obj << /S 76 /E 200 /L 216 /Filter /FlateDecode /Length 92 0 R >> stream The world now demands a maturity of America that we may not be able to achieve. He passed the Voting Rights Act. Martin Luther King Jr. was a social activist that led the Civil Rights Movement, and other movements until his assassination in 1968. This is the calling of the sons of God, and our brothers wait eagerly for our response. King linked his anti-war and civil rights work in speeches throughout the country, where he described the three problems he saw plaguing the nation: racism, poverty, and the war in Vietnam. There is nothing to keep us from molding a recalcitrant status quo with bruised hands until we have fashioned it into a brotherhood. Fearful of being labeled a Communist, which would diminish the impact of his civil rights work, King tempered his criticism of U.S. policy in Vietnam through late 1965 and 1966. Will our message be that the forces of American life militate against their arrival as full men, and we send our deepest regrets? Your donation is fully tax-deductible. W. E. B. Q%F70%iR! Let us not join those who shout war and through their misguided passions urge the United States to relinquish its participation in the United Nations. In 1957 a sensitive American official overseas said that it seemed to him that our nation was on the wrong side of a world revolution. Visit our website terms of use and permissions pages at www.npr.org for further information. Email us: talk@npr.org. We must speak with all the humility that is appropriate to our limited vision, but we must speak. Mr. SMILEY: Well, I think the question is whether or not - I hear your point, Neal, and I take it. But this is, again, precisely what King was concerned about, putting the lives of everyday Americans on the line in a fight that was not winnable and a war that was unjust. The image of America will never again be the image of revolution, freedom and democracy, but the image of violence and militarism.. Hb```f``; 6Pco;{Q. 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As if the weight of such a commitment to the life and health of America were not enough, another burden of responsibility was placed upon me in 1964; and I cannot forget that the Nobel Prize for Peace was also a commission a commission to work harder than I had ever worked before for the brotherhood of man. This is a calling that takes me beyond national allegiances, but even if it were not present I would yet have to live with the meaning of my commitment to the ministry of Jesus Christ. In "People and Peace, not Profits and War," Shirley Chisholm repeats the words "two more years" (42). I've always thought that was, to me, his best speech, his most consequential speech, even better than I have a dream in the mountain top speech. And after I was wounded, we had four or five 100-pound bomb dropped on us, and 10 Marines were killed outright and 24 were wounded. 0000011739 00000 n They see the children, degraded by our soldiers as they beg for food. Screenshots are considered by the King Estate a violation of this notice. For nine years following 1945 we denied the people of Vietnam the right of independence. It includes a portion of his speech. 0000005717 00000 n The cornerstones of his activism were based on non-violence and civil disobedience, both of which were inspired by his Christian faith and the teachings of Mahatma Gandhi. Nor is it an attempt to overlook the ambiguity of the total situation and the need for a collective solution to the tragedy of Vietnam. or 404 526-8968. But what I want - I think the question - I've always thought that Dr. King, that that speech about Vietnam was his best speech in my mind. To speak for them is to explain this lack of confidence in Western words, and especially their distrust of American intentions now. Challenges of the final years of Martin Luther King, Jr. King delivered the speech, sponsored by the group Clergy and Laymen Concerned About Vietnam, after committing to participate in New York's April 15, 1967 anti-Vietnam war march from Central Park to the United Nations, sponsored by the Spring Mobilization to End the War in Vietnam. Smiley continues, "it was the most controversial speech he ever gave. 0000002516 00000 n CONAN: And I think a lot of people will see your parallels regarding Iraq, where, indeed, the United States was the aggressor in that conflict. Stanford University, Stanford, California 94305. That night Dr. King shocked the world and his followers when . This speech was enormously controversial. We are adding cynicism to the process of death, for they must know after a short period there that none of the things we claim to be fighting for are really involved. But for those who presently choose but one, I would hope they will finally come to see the moral roots common to both. Dr. Benjamin Spock (2nd-L), Martin Luther King, Jr. (C), Father Frederick Reed and Cleveland Robinson lead a huge pacifist rally protesting U.S. involvement in the Vietnam war, Mar. In the north, where our bombs now pummel the land, and our mines endanger the waterways, we are met by a deep but understandable mistrust. While King was personally opposed to the war, he was concerned that publicly criticizing U.S. foreign policy would damage his relationship with President Lyndon B. Johnson, who had been instrumental in passing civil rights legislation and who had declared in April 1965 that he was willing to negotiate a diplomatic end to the war in Vietnam. Benjamin Hedin on Martin Luther King, Jr.'s, anti-Vietnam War speech at Riverside Church in New York, which risked King's relationship with Lyndon Johnson. $25.00. Legendary civil rights leader Rev. I just wanted to say that I was an 18-year-old Marine in Vietnam when the speech was given, and I didn't hear it until three or four years ago. Martin Luther King, Jr., giving his speech Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence at Riverside Church in NYC, April 4, 1967. We have supported the enemies of the peasants of Saigon. As I have walked among the desperate, rejected and angry young men I have told them that Molotov cocktails and rifles would not solve their problems. He would no longer be respected. Some civil rights leaders urged King not to speak out on the Vietnam War, but he said he could not separate issues of economic injustice, racism, war, and militarism. Why are you joining the voices of dissent? Their questions hit home, and I knew that I could never again raise my voice against the violence of the oppressed in the ghettos without having first spoken clearly to the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today my own government. The only change came from America as we increased our troop commitments in support of governments which were singularly corrupt, inept and without popular support. King 's work to eradicate racial segregation was abruptly halted when he was assassinated on April 4, 1968, on the balcony of Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee. It was a wonderful, I think, place to give the speech in the sense that it's pretty cavernous. Life often leaves us standing bare, naked and dejected with a lost opportunity. [12] 0000004834 00000 n After the French were defeated it looked as if independence and land reform would come again through the Geneva agreements. Martin Luther King Jr. was deeply troubled by the Vietnam War for years, but the "Beyond Vietnam" speech was his first major policy statement on the issue. 2/QB(yQVz^*oU.FW What do they think of our condoning the violence which led to their own taking up of arms? Mr. SMILEY: He'd wanted to give it two years earlier and had attempted a dry run at this speech, to your appoint, Neal, a couple of years prior to when he gave it. I speak as a child of God and brother to the suffering poor of Vietnam. So it is that those of us who are yet determined that America will be are led down the path of protest and dissent, working for the health of our land. But LBJ disinvites him to the White House. By the time King made the "Beyond Vietnam" speech, Smiley tells host Neal Conan, "he had fallen off already the list of most-admired Americans as tallied by Gallup every year." My third reason moves to an even deeper level of awareness, for it grows out of my experience in the ghettoes of the North over the last three years especially the last three summers. King had read Marx while at Morehouse, but while he rejected "traditional capitalism", he also rejected communism because of its "materialistic interpretation of history" that denied religion, its "ethical relativism", and its "political totalitarianism. Dr. This quote is from a sermon by Dr. King on April 30, 1967 at Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, Georgia, drawing from his infamous April 4 sermon at Riverside Church. Mr. SMILEY: Indeed he did, Neal. Not only that, but then-President Lyndon Johnson disinvited King to the White House. 5. So we have been repeatedly faced with the cruel irony of watching Negro and white boys on TV screens as they kill and die together for a nation that has been unable to seat them together in the same schools. And I believe everyone has a duty to be in both the civil-rights and peace movements. At the time, civil rights leaders publicly condemned him for it. We must speak for them and raise the questions they cannot raise. King spoke strongly against the U.S.'s role in the war, arguing that the U.S. was in Vietnam "to occupy it as an American colony" and calling the U.S. government "the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today. Ho Chi Minh has watched as America has spoken of peace and built up its forces, and now he has surely heard of the increasing international rumors of American plans for an invasion of the north. Dr. CONAN: And the place - choice of place is very interesting too. If we do not stop our war against the people of Vietnam immediately the world will be left with no other alternative than to see this as some horribly clumsy and deadly game we have decided to play. And he said these three issues of racism and poverty and militarism are going to destroy this nation. And I think that if nothing else what we need to wrestle with in a contemporary sense, Neal, is the question of whether or not there is another way that King would have us consider were he allowed to do. CONAN: We (unintelligible) to see it. This is an excellent Common Core-aligned primary source from Martin Luther King speaking about his stance on the Vietnam War. "[8] He connected the war with economic injustice, arguing that the country needed serious moral change: A true revolution of values will soon look uneasily on the glaring contrast of poverty and wealth. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., is known for being one of the greatest orators of the twentieth century, and perhaps in all of American history. The truth of these words is beyond doubt but the mission to which they call us is a most difficult one. "[9] He stated that North Vietnam "did not begin to send in any large number of supplies or men until American forces had arrived in the tens of thousands", and accused the U.S. of having killed a million Vietnamese, "mostly children. Could it be that they do not know that the good news was meant for all men for Communist and capitalist, for their children and ours, for black and for white, for revolutionary and conservative? The choice is ours, and though we might prefer it otherwise we must choose in this crucial moment of human history. HOWARD: How are you doing, Tavis? Martin Luther King's Beyond Vietnam Speech is in many ways even more relevant today than in 1967. . Martin Luther King, Jr. believed that peace and economic justice were critical to his fight for human rights. On 4 April 1967 Martin Luther King, Jr., delivered his seminal speech at Riverside Church condemning the Vietnam War. ", In 1967, a year to the day before his death, Martin Luther King, Jr. departed from his message of civil rights to deliver a speech that denounced America's war in Vietnam. Communism will never be defeated by the use of atomic bombs or nuclear weapons. A call for equality and freedom, it became one of the defining moments of the civil rights movement and one of the most iconic speeches in American history. Let's go to Walt(ph). I come to this magnificent house of worship tonight because my conscience leaves me no other choice. In order to atone for our sins and errors in Vietnam, we should take the initiative in bringing a halt to this tragic war. And so the question was, Martin, why would you antagonize the president who has been our friend? King, Beyond Vietnam, in A Call to Conscience, ed. 0000001616 00000 n Tavis Smiley joins us today from the Sheryl Flowers Studios in Los Angeles. "MLK: A Call to Conscience" premieres on PBS tomorrow night. War is not the answer. In 1967, in the shadows of Columbia, Dr. King shifted the world again. In Martin Luther King Jr.'s Vietnam speech, lines 413-416, he repeats the phrase "this is not just" (161). 0000002004 00000 n Perhaps a new spirit is rising among us. 0000004621 00000 n PBS talk show. The tide in the affairs of men does not remain at the flood; it ebbs. With this powerful commitment we shall boldly challenge the status quo and unjust mores and thereby speed the day when every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight and the rough places plain.. So you got a Nobel laureate named King, a war president with a Nobel Prize named Obama, for all that we have done over the last two years to wed King and Obama together on T- shirts and everywhere else, were King alive today at 81, he and Obama would have a tension point, Neal, on this issue. King to Weigh Civil Disobedience If War Intensifies, New York Times, 2 April 1967. What must they think of us in America when they realize that we permitted the repression and cruelty of Diem which helped to bring them into being as a resistance group in the south? King, Excerpts, Address at mass rally on 12 August 1965, 13 August 1965, MLKJP-GAMK. They question our political goals and they deny the reality of a peace settlement from which they will be excluded. Now let us begin. And when you see the piece on "Lens" tonight that's the part of the speech that set off so many of those who are in King's inner circle, so many scholars who have written about King. They know they must move or be destroyed by our bombs. I speak for those whose land is being laid waste, whose homes are being destroyed, whose. Then came the buildup in Vietnam and I watched the program broken and eviscerated as if it were some idle political plaything of a society gone mad on war, and I knew that America would never invest the necessary funds or energies in rehabilitation of its poor so long as adventures like Vietnam continued to draw men and skills and money like some demonic destructive suction tube. 0000003454 00000 n It was they who led a second struggle against French domination at tremendous costs, and then were persuaded to give up the land they controlled between the thirteenth and seventeenth parallel as a temporary measure at Geneva. Of course, again, that philosophy, when the papers got a hold of him the next day, that strategy didn't work so well. They ask how we can speak of free elections when the Saigon press is censored and controlled by the military junta. Let's get Howard(ph) on the line. History is cluttered with the wreckage of nations and individuals that pursued this self-defeating path of hate. Therefore the first hope in our inventory must be the hope that love is going to have the last word..
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