Though the world knows the words of Martin Luther King Jr.’s most famous speeches, there are still many aspects of his life and work that remain lesser known
TIME put the question to 10 experts whose recent or forthcoming books touch on the topic: a half-century after his death, what is something that most people still don’t know about Martin Luther King Jr.?Breaking White Supremacy: Martin Luther King Jr. and the Black Social GospelDr. King, in his last years, was more radical than everyone around him. He dragged the Southern Christian Leadership Conference to campaign in Chicago, where his lieutenants did not want to go.
After he was gone the memory of King taking the struggle to Chicago, railing against the Vietnam War and economic injustice, emphasizing what was true in the Black Power movement, and organizing a Poor People’s Campaign faded into an unthreatening idealism. King became safe and ethereal, registering as a noble moralist. It became hard to remember why, or even that, King was the most hated person in America during his lifetime.
In his book Why We Can’t Wait, which was written in the afterglow of the 1963 March on Washington, King demonstrates that the simple and eloquent dream he articulated on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial was really informed by a multicultural sense of America that transcended the black-white binary and by a class consciousness that was critical of conspicuous consumption and deeply aware of structural inequality.
King’s optimism about democratic political institutions, however, declined over time, as he witnessed the increasingly violent opposition to racial justice, complete with challenges to the scope of federal power over state governments. Nonetheless, King’s assessments of the American political system speak to his perceived belief in the American political system to advance racial justice.Please enter a valid email address.
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