At the commencement of his campaign in Springfield, Illinois, on the steps of the State’s Capitol, Senator Obama, presumptive nominee of the Democratic Party for President of the United States, invoked the name and words of Dr King as one of the principal reasons for his candidacy.
Quoting Dr. King, he said he was responding to what Martin often referred to as the “fierce urgency of now.”
Senator Obama is scheduled to deliver his acceptance speech at the Democratic Party National Convention on August 28th, 2008. This will occur 45 years, to the date, when Martin Luther King Jr., delivered his “I Have A Dream” speech to more than 250, 000 people assembled in front of the Lincoln Memorial, in Washington, D.C.
The night before, Dr. King huddled with me and several of his other close advisors in a corner of the Willard Hotel in D.C. to discuss the text of his speech the following day.
It has always been a source of pride to me that Dr. King, for the first seven paragraphs of his remarks, adopted the draft text prepared jointly by myself and Stanley Levison.
Over the 40 years since his assassination the two most recurring questions asked of me have been: Who today, if anyone, in the African-American community is most like Dr. King; and, if he were alive today, what do I think he would say about this or that issue, person or event?
I always answer the first question by saying Dr. King was Sui generis; one of a kind. Then, I ask rhetorically, who today is like Michangelo, Mozart, Copernicus, Shakespeare, Leonardo DaVinci, or Galileo?
I answer the second question by saying: I cannot tell you exactly what Dr. King would say, but I can interpret him, in today’s context. I remind the questioner, that it was often my task, when Dr. King was alive, to prepare, at his request, drafts of suggested text for various speeches or magazine articles on a one or more important national issues or events.
The candidacies of Senators Clinton or Obama for president of the United
States in 2008 would not have been possible without the transformative effect of Dr. King’s struggle, leadership and legacy in dismantling segregation and institutional racism and sexism in the United ‘States.
In 12 years and 4 months, Martin Luther King, Jr., may have done more to achieve racial, gender, social, political justice and equality in America than any other person or event in the previous 400 years or our nation.
Dr. King’s religious faith was the fuel that drove the engine of his moral leadership. Like King, Obama’s faith and religion appear central to his life and political leadership.
Senator Obama’s nomination acceptance speech should be a validation of his “Audacity of Hope” and presentation of his agenda for political change.
Mindful of our struggle for racial justice, only four months earlier in Birmingham, Ala against mounted police, fire hoses, Billy clubs, and police dogs, Dr. King King’s speech on August 28th 1963 was our “Declaration” of partial success, a national moral call to non-violent direct action, and a celebration of his “Dream” for a future, better America.
Two years later, Congress and President Lyndon Johnson responded to Dr. King’s march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama, by enacting a new and comprehensive Voting Rights Act.
At the White House signing of the Act by President Johnson, D.C. Delegate Rev. Walter Fauntroy echoed the sentiments of Martin when he said he “was never more proud to be and American”; similar to those spoken by Michelle Obama following her husband’s primary victory in Iowa. Senator Obama was 3 years old.
This legislation ignited the prairie fires of subsequent southern black voter registration and voting which dramatically altered the political landscape of America.
Senator Obama was 6 years of age on the night of April 3, 1968, when Dr. King gave his last public speech in Memphis, TN. In his concluding remarks, Dr. King lamented that God “had allowed” him “to go up to the mountain,” he had “looked over”; and “seen the Promise Land.”
Poignantly and prophetically, he reflected that, while he may not get there with us; Dr. King wanted us to know, “that we, as a people, will get to the “Promise Land.”
A President Obama will have a historically unique opportunity to lead America from our 20th Century legacy of segregation and institutional racism, to the “Promise Land” of a 21st Century color irrelevant multiracial society.
As a principal successor beneficiary of Dr. King’s legacy, hopefully Sen. Obama and his advisors will see the value of the fortuitous alignment of chronology in the scheduling of the senator’s acceptance speech at his party’s National Convention.
He will have the awesome responsibility for developing a domestic and international agenda responsive and relevant to Dr. King’s “fierce urgency of now.”
Clarence B. Jones, former counsel and draft speechwriter for Dr. M.L. King, is author of “What Would Martin Say?” and a scholar-in-residence, visiting professor, Martin Luther King Jr. Research & Education Institute, Stanford University, Palo Alto, Calif. EDITOR’S NOTE: This online-only guest commentary has not been edited. Guest commentary submissions of up to 650 words may be sent to openforum@denverpost.com.
