Josh Claybourn has a post up about today being Martin Luther King day. I am very much like him in that I cannot listen to King's "I Have A Dream" speech without getting goosebumps. It is one of the most inspirational speeches you will ever hear (for a realvideo clip, click here), made more so in my view because of his invocation of the Declaration of Independence as a promissory note. My favorite passage is below the fold.
So we have come here today to dramatize an appalling condition. In a sense we have come to our nation's capital to cash a check. When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir.This note was a promise that all men would be guaranteed the inalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note insofar as her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check which has come back marked "insufficient funds." But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation.
So we have come to cash this check -- a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice...I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal." I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slaveowners will be able to sit down together at a table of brotherhood. I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a desert state, sweltering with the heat of injustice and oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice. I have a dream that my four 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...
And if America is to be a great nation, this must become true. So let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire. Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York. Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania! Let freedom ring from the snowcapped Rockies of Colorado! Let freedom ring from the curvaceous peaks of California! But not only that; let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia! Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee! Let freedom ring from every hill and every molehill of Mississippi. From every mountainside, let freedom ring.
I can't even read those words on a page without getting goosebumps. American history, as I have often said, is largely the story of perpetually extending the principles found in the Declaration to cover more and more people. It should have been enough 230 years ago to cover everyone, but change is slow and sometimes it takes a long time for the true implications of our stated principles to rise to the top. It rose through the bravery and sacrifice of Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony and so many others, through the bravery and sacrifice of Martin Luther King and Malcolm X and so many others, just as today it continues to rise through the efforts of millions of people to bring equality and liberty to so many gay Americans who are still denied the basic dignities that the rest of us take for granted. Let freedom ring, indeed.
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I have a similar reaction to this speech by King and a few years ago I had a chance to visit the Lincoln Memorial and when I did I stood on the steps and looked out over the reflecting pool towards the Washington Monument and was filled with a sense of awe thinking about the fact that I was standing where King had delivered those immortal words. This combined with a similar sense of awe I felt standing before the statue of Lincoln and reading his words inscribed beside it make for a very precious memory.
In the years before cable, and digital video, and CSPAN, that day was broadcast on commercial television, live into the homes of citizens of the US willing to watch. I remember much about that day, followed so closely as it was by that fateful November 22nd. I would show the video in my classes this time of year, getting the same body rushes you describe, to remind our nation's future teachers that we were once a nation that could celebrate the promises of our founders, by encouraging hundreds of thousands to camp in the Capitol Mall, bathe in the reflecting pool, and express their worries about what had happened to this great country. Now of course, most of that is no longer possible, i ask why??
At the risk of getting slammed here, I would like to disagree. Don't get me wrong, "Let Freedom Ring" speech is beyond magnificent but it's not the most important speech King ever gave. I think it's not even the most inspirational. I think it's the one a lot of people like because it's likeable. And now, non-threatening and provides a less dangerous view of MLK. He was a revolutionary - like Jesus, Mohammed (the profit & boxer), Buddha, Ghandi, Zapata & Elvis. And like the aforementioned shook the world by holding up a mirror so we could get a good look at ourselves - acne and all. MLK's most important speech, the least known and the one I refer to as the one that got him killed (he could have been killed any time in the 50s and this nation wouldn't have blinked an eye) because King started to speak out against Vietman and the powers that be were afraid his success with civil rights would bleed over into the Vietman protests. This is the speech that should be heard every MLK day. This is the speech that should be heard every April 4th. As a matter of fact, note the date of the speech.
http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/45a/058.html
Pushpak
Spyder, where did you get a copy of video? I've been searching for a reasonably priced copy for years.
Ed, the part you like is the part that led to the "I had a dream" sequence. The "promissory note" stuff was written out, and King delivered it well, but the audience was not so excited as he thought they should be at the end of such a day. So at the end of his prepared remarks, he extemporized, using chunks of speeches he'd given across America in the previous month or so. The extemporized part starts with, "I have a dream today."
Somebody recorded the thing and put it out as a record album. King and his team realized this was a problem, to lose control of the material, and they sued for copyright infringement. One of the defenses the record maker had was that King hadn't registered a text with the Library of Congress' copyright center. Of course, since it was extemporaneous, they didn't have a copy to register. Somebody bought the record, and a transcript was made from that. The transcript was registered with the Library of Congress, and it was on display there a few years ago.
King got his copyright, and his family or the foundation have rather tightly controlled the thing since then.
The PBS Newshour ran a full copy of the speech a couple of years ago. I can get that for $129. Does anybody know of a cheaper copy for classroom use?