Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. devoted his life to winning for African-Americans the civil rights that had been denied them from the time this country was formed. Monday’s holiday is to recognize his birth in 1929, what he accomplished before his murder in 1968 and the racial issues that still burden this country.
King was educated in theology and gave hundreds of passionate speeches, led marches and was a part of the leadership of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and then the president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, the two organizations working to better rights for African-Americans. While the Supreme Court banned segregation in 1956, it would be another decade before the worst of that treatment would end. And, remnants would remain after that. King’s work began in the mid-1950s.
Two events, the recent release of the movie “Selma” and the shooting in Ferguson, Missouri, last year, remind us of the brutality that African-Americans and their supporters faced in the mid-1960s in the South in advocating for their rights and of what still needs to be done. In the movie, white segregationists used explosives, and the police used water cannons and swung batons from horseback in scenes carried by television that led to the adoption of the Voting Rights Act in 1965. Ferguson, a heavily African-American community on the edge of St. Louis, had few blacks on its police force and among its city’s elected leadership when a young unarmed black man was killed. And, there are numerous other police forces and municipalities with the same shortcoming.
For African-Americans, education and income levels lag significantly behind those of whites and Asians. Blacks are voting to a large degree, are much better represented today in state legislatures and in Congress and are serving at the highest levels in government. However, in government and in the corporate world, they are still under-represented.
At Fort Lewis College on Monday, a peace and unity march will occur from Center of Southwest Studies to the Student Union beginning at 12:10 p.m. At the Student Union, there will be an open mic for thoughts about past events and the times today; and at 12:30 p.m., the student choir will perform. Workshops for the Social Justice Festival on campus will begin at 3:15, and there will be speakers and a film at 6 p.m. in Noble Hall.
The challenges that blacks face can seem far from Durango, but it is worthwhile to spend at least a few minutes Monday reflecting on the issues that surround Selma and Ferguson.