IN THE NEWS
Although my previous post argued for a national day of remembrance that does not yet exist, this weekend marks an existing national commemoration, Martin Luther King Day. Although we usually hear his "I Have a Dream" speech on this anniversary, my favorite King speech is his last one. (Click here for a RealAudio clip.) It's eerie to hear King talk about his own death, which happened soon after he gave this address. It is just as inspiring a speech as "I Have a Dream," and it displays all the same eloquence that made King one of the greatest orators in US history.
King's last speech gave its audience something we desperately need today: a denial of fear. At the moment that King gave his last address, many forces in American society, from Klansmen to elements of the FBI, were trying to intimidate King and his followers. King's powerful rhetoric took people who might otherwise have been cowed by the like of Bull Connor and transported them from the world that is to the world that will be. The civil rights movement built the road to that future, showing the way to reach the world that will be. To defeat segregation, Americans needed both this vision of a better future and the practical means to reach it. One could not succeed without the other. One could not have dispelled fear without the other.
Today, we don't have leaders like King, or organizations like the Southern Christian Leadership Conference to stand in the path of fear and coercion. It is hard to be unafraid. However, as I've said many times in these pages, terrorists and tyrants alike depend on fear. If you do not want to grant them a victory, spend Martin Luther King Day, and every day after it, refusing to be terrified.
The civil rights anthem We Shall Overcome has a chorus about fear:
We are not afraid,
We are not afraid,
We are not afraid today.
We are not afraid today.
Sing a chorus tomorrow when you remember Dr. King.
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