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Martin Luther King: Letter from Birmingham Jail

Introduction

Perhaps the most famous words of Martin Luther King are those of that known speech entitled "I Have a Dream". But there is a letter written by that great man who, though not so well known, sums up all his ideas infinitely better. This is a real lecture on civil disobedience on the how's and why's of peaceful resistance movement led by Martin Luther King. He wrote in 1963 while imprisoned in Birmingham, Alabama, as a result of their participation in protests against racial discrimination in the shops in that city in the southern United States. The idea of ??the letter is a response to the public statement that some religious of the town made in urging an end to the demonstrations. The leader of the rights of blacks got out of jail his response through his lawyers, who were responsible for its publication. In the letter, Martin Luther King gave a spectacular overview of the pastors, bishops and rabbis signed this public statement, and of course, left us a real treatise on tactics, strategy and theoretical foundations of the movement for civil rights struggle.

Discussion

As president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), Martin Luther King, Jr., in 1963 identified Birmingham, Alabama, as "probably the most thoroughly segregated city in the United States". His decision to make Birmingham the next battlefield on which to implement his nonviolent civil disobedience strategy brought him condemnation and criticism from fellow clergymen, friends and enemies, black and white. Alabama, they argued, under the leadership of the new governor, Albert Boutwell, would be taking giant steps forward away from the racist and segregationist past promoted and maintained by former governor George Wallace. The prominent evangelist Bill Graham encouraged King to patiently wait, "to put the brakes on".

Indirectly identifying King and his supporters as outsiders, ignorant of Alabama's true internal affairs and new promise of progress, eight local fellow clergymen, convinced that the courts, not demonstrations, were the appropriate venues through which to effect change, made their convictions known; and the Birmingham News published their views and sentiments in a 13-paragraph article titled "White Clergymen Urge Local Negroes to Withdraw from Demonstrations," on April 13, 1963. The men challenged King, rebuking the Birmingham demonstration as "unwise and untimely". Perhaps more important, "the clergymen invoked their religious authority against civil disobedience," the very heartbeat of King's ...