Carol Fisher-Linn
Sixty-one years have passed since a quarter of a million civil rights supporters stood and watched civil rights leader and Baptist minister, Dr. Martin Luther King, deliver a message for the ages at the 1963 Washington D.C. Civil Rights March. The speech was one of the most famous moments of the civil rights movement and among the most iconic speeches in American history.
I know that television was broadcasting many shows in color in 1963, yet I seem to recall watching this speech, appropriately, in black and white. In this modern world where speeches drag on for an hour or more, even close to two, it is interesting that this brief, yet powerful 17-minute speech has found a prominent place in American history. You see, it isn’t how MUCH you say, but what those words mean, what passions they evoke, what hearts they open, and what dreams they capture.
He started with a well-presented, prepared speech – talking about Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address and the Emancipation Proclamation, exclaiming that African Americans were still not free as Lincoln had intended. Even with his powerful, inspiring cadence and profoundly inspiring oratory, part way through the speech he sensed he wasn’t capturing his audience as he had intended. Thankfully, Mahalia Jackson was in the audience. According to bbc.com. “Jackson was the final musical performer on a day in which the civil rights movement mingled with folk music and gospel in front of a national audience – not just the quarter-million assembled to hear King speak about job equality and voting rights, but millions more watching on television and listening on the radio. Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, Odetta, the Freedom Singers and Marian Anderson also had performed, but it was Jackson who seized the day with a song that had particularly deep resonance in the African American community, “How I Got Over.” Sensing the drag in his speech about 13 minutes in, she called out to MLK, urging him to tell the crowd about “the dream,” a powerful theme he had used in earlier events.
Responding to Jackson, he went off speech and extemporaneously shared his many dreams, switching from public speaker to Baptist preacher.
“I say to you today, my friends, so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.…I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. I have a dream that…one day right there in Alabama, little Black boys and Black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.”
The speech hit home with the crowd, particularly when he concluded it with words from the Black spiritual, “Free at last, Free at last. Thank God Almighty, we are free at last.”
In retrospect, it is believed that the universal appeal of this speech helped secure passage of the President Kennedy’s dream – The Civil Rights Act. Passed in 1964 after President Kennedy was assassinated on November 22, 1963, it was not an easy sell but President Lyndon B. Johnson pushed the bill forward despite an astounding and historic 72-day Senate filibuster. Not unanimous, the final vote was 290-130 in the House and 73-27 in the Senate. It was signed into law on July 2, 1964. Sixty years later, civil rights in America is still a hot potato topic. It’s quite true when people say the fight for freedom passes on from one generation to the next. I ask this: Is this is our America? Is this fulfilling MLK’s desire to inspire by his faith and the peaceful teachings of Mahatma Gandhi? His movements were nonviolent, while others were fighting for freedom by any means, including violence. How far has that violence and hate gotten them sixty years later? It was MLK’s approach of nonviolence and love that led him to lead similar campaigns against poverty and international conflict. He never stopped believing and preaching that men and women, everyone, everywhere, are “equal members of the human family.” When will we learn? We often hear, what can one person do? MLK was one person. So are each of you. Use your power, your love, and your heart to make his/our dreams come true.
Photos: https://www.linkedin.com /pulse /mahalia-jackson-shouted-tell-them-dream
He started with a well-presented, prepared speech – talking about Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address and the Emancipation Proclamation, exclaiming that African Americans were still not free as Lincoln had intended. Even with his powerful, inspiring cadence and profoundly inspiring oratory, part way through the speech he sensed he wasn’t capturing his audience as he had intended. Thankfully, Mahalia Jackson was in the audience. Sensing the drag in his speech about 13 minutes in, she called out to MLK, urging him to tell the crowd about “the dream,” a powerful theme he had used in earlier events.
Responding to Jackson, he went off speech and extemporaneously shared his many dreams, switching from public speaker to Baptist preacher.