It’s still deeply rooted in the North, and it’s still deeply rooted in the South. And when you begin to change the habits of men, pretty soon the attitudes will be changed. And the fact is that millions of Negros, as a result of centuries of denial and neglect, have been left bootless. (Yes, sir) We are on the move now. Because he was black, doors were closed to him that would not close to other groups. I am convinced that we still need strong civil rights legislation. And so while the law may not change the hearts of men, it can and it does change the habits of men. How long) because "you shall reap what you sow." And so as we go away this afternoon, let us go away more than ever before committed to this struggle and committed to nonviolence. And I think this is what we’ve got to see now, and this is what makes the struggle much more difficult. Certain conditions continue to exist in our society, which must be condemned as vigorously as we condemn riots. But over and over again, at the same time, it made certain backwards steps. And those who project this argument, contend that you’ve got to change the heart, and that you can’t change the heart through legislation. In the North, schools are more segregated today than they were in 1954, when the Supreme Court’s decision on desegregation was rendered. And what is it that America has failed to hear? There were no laws segregating the races then. We could not go to a lunch counter, in so many instances, and get a hamburger or a cup of coffee. What I’m trying to get across is that our nation has constantly taken a positive step forward on the question of racial justice and racial equality. (Yes, sir) The road ahead is not altogether a smooth one. Martin Luther King, Jr.: ( 05:50) Now, let me say that the struggle for our civil rights and the struggle to make these two Americas one America is much more difficult today than it was five, 10 years ago. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. After first giving the speech at Stanford, MLK would continue delivering versions of "The Other America" throughout 1967 and 1968. (Uh huh) And when his undernourished children cried out for the necessities that his low wages could not provide, he showed them the Jim Crow signs on the buses and in the stores, on the streets and in the public buildings. Even though it may be true that the law cannot change the heart, it can restrain the harvest. Famous Speeches and Great Talks. It is normalcy all over Alabama (Yeah) that prevents the Negro from becoming a registered voter. Economically, the Negro is worse off today than he was 15 and 20 years ago. With this faith, we will be able to speed up the day when all of God’s children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and live together as brothers and sisters, all over this great nation. (Yes, sir) Like an idea whose time has come, (Yes, sir) not even the marching of mighty armies can halt us. We’ve fought across the South, in various struggles to get rid of legal, overt segregation and all of the humiliation that surrounded that system of segregation. Toward the end of the Reconstruction era, something very significant happened. And I would be the first to say that there are all too many who are still guided by the racist ethos. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 gave Negroes some part of their rightful dignity, (Speak, sir) but without the vote it was dignity without strength. Yet, Selma, Alabama, became a shining moment in the conscience of man. Martin Luther King, Jr.: (33:05) But I want to close by saying this afternoon that I still have faith in the future. (Yes, sir) That’s what happened when the Negro and white masses of the South threatened to unite and build a great society: a society of justice where none would pray upon the weakness of others; a society of plenty where greed and poverty would be done away; a society of brotherhood where every man would respect the dignity and worth of human personality. (Yes, sir) Glory, hallelujah! It’s more difficult today because we are struggling now for genuine equality, and it’s much easier to integrate a lunch counter than it is to guarantee a livable income and a good, solid job. Now the other thing that we’ve got to come to see now, that many others didn’t see too well during the last 10 years, and that is that racism is still alive in American society, and much more widespread than we realize. We’re going to win our freedom. The question is whether our nation has the will, and I submit that if we can spend $35 billion a year to fight an ill-considered war in Vietnam, and $20 billion to put a man on the moon, our nation can spend billions of dollars to put God's children on their own two … I’m sure you’ve heard this idea. It’s the notion that legislation can’t solve the problem, it can’t do anything in this area. Yes, sir) to turn the whole nation to a new course. And he goes on toward the end to say any man’s death diminishes me because I’m involved in mankind. Martin Luther King, Jr.: (31:22) But if we will go on with the faith that nonviolence and its power can transform dark yesterdays into bright tomorrows, we will be able to change all of these conditions. He went on to say that it was freedom without bread to eat, freedom without land to cultivate. We have the resources. Get a weekly digest of the week’s most important transcripts in your inbox. Let me say, as I’ve always said, and I will always continue to say, that riots are socially destructive and self-defeating. Let us march on ballot boxes (Let us march) until the Wallaces of our nation tremble away in silence. Glory, hallelujah! And so today, we are struggling for something which says we demand genuine equality. (Go ahead. And I came to see that so many people who supported morally and even financially what we were doing in Birmingham and Selma were really outraged against the extremist behavior of Bull Connor and Jim Clark toward Negros, rather than believing in genuine equality for Negros. Martin Luther King, Jr.: (11:06) I went on to remind him that no other racial group has been a slave on American soil. (Yes, Lord) Now, … And I submit, this afternoon, that we can end poverty in the United States. Man was on the plane with me some weeks ago, and he came and talked with me, and he said, “The problem, Dr. King, that I see with what you all are doing is that every time I see you and other Negros, you are protesting. In 1964, the Civil Rights Bill came into being. John Donne placed it years ago in graphic terms, no man is an island, entire of itself. And so you can see what I mean when I say that in the Negro community, that is a major, tragic, and staggering Depression that we face in our everyday lives. And at that same period, America was giving millions of acres of land in the West and the Midwest, which meant that America was willing to undergird its white peasants from Europe with an economic flower that would make it possible to grow and develop, and refused to give that economic flower to its black peasants, so to speak. But one of the greatest things that this war is doing to us in civil rights is that it is allowing the great society to be shot down on the battlefields of Vietnam every day. Yes, sir. And so I will not join anyone who will say that we still can’t develop a coalition of conscience. (Yes, sir) Just ten years ago, in this very city, a new philosophy was born of the Negro struggle. In a sense, the greatest tragedy of this other America is what it does to other children. It’s not merely a struggle against extremist behavior toward Negros. And there were those who said that we would get here only over their dead bodies, (Well. I came to see this in a very difficult and painful way in Chicago, over the last year, where I’ve lived and worked. If it may be said of the slavery era that the white man took the world and gave the Negro Jesus, then it may be said of the Reconstruction era that the southern aristocracy took the world and gave the poor white man Jim Crow. Some have literally slept in the mud. The Negro needs the white man to save him from his fears, the white man needs the Negro to save him from his guilt. It is a myth of the superior and the inferior race. But today as I stand before you and think back over that great march, I can say, as Sister Pollard said—a seventy-year-old Negro woman who lived in this community during the bus boycott—and one day, she was asked while walking if she didn’t want to ride. Speak) There never was a moment in American history (Yes, sir) more honorable and more inspiring than the pilgrimage of clergymen and laymen of every race and faith pouring into Selma to face danger (Yes) at the side of its embattled Negroes. (Yes, sir) We are on the move now. Hitler was a sick and tragic man who carried racism to its logical conclusion, and he ended up leading a nation to the point of killing about six million Jews. (Yes, sir) Alabama has tried to nurture and defend evil, but evil is choking to death in the dusty roads and streets of this state. To meet this threat, the southern aristocracy began immediately to engineer this development of a segregated society. Many things were gained, as a result of these years of struggle. And there’s a bill before Congress right now to have a national, federal open housing bill. I would like to honestly say to you that the white backlash is merely a new name for an old phenomenon. And they find themselves impoverished aliens in this affluent society. In 1967 this was sunday the 12. of november, which makes me pretty sure, that this speech is from that date. It can be used either constructively or destructively. National gross product of America will rise to the astounding figure of some 780 billion dollars this year. 2. After Montgomery’s, heroic confrontations loomed up in Mississippi, Arkansas, Georgia, and elsewhere. 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