The annual commemoration of Martin Luther King Jr.’s life and work takes place this year on January 18. While still a minister in Atlanta, Georgia, Dr. King became a leader in the movement to achieving social justice through nonviolent means. His visionary leadership and powerful oratory changed the conversation on race and social relations in the United States.
King was assassinated in 1968 while leading in a national effort to end discrimination and racial segregation. In the days following his death, John Conyers, a Michigan congressional representative, introduced a bill to make Dr. King’s birthday a national holiday. While that first attempt did not succeed, Conyers brought the legislation back to Congress every year until it finally passed in 1983. It took until 2000 for the federal holiday to be recognized in all 50 states.
Since 1994, Congress has designated the MLK holiday a national day of service, encouraging all Americans to voluntarily serve to improve their community. The day was inspired by one of Dr. King’s most memorable quotes: “Life’s most persistent and urgent question is, ‘What are you doing for others?’ ”
For many people, the pinnacle of Dr. King’s work occurred in Washington, D.C., when he delivered his iconic “I Have a Dream” speech. Delivered during the August 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, King called for civil and economic rights and an end to racism in the United States. King’s historic speech ended with a powerful call for freedom:
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 snow-capped Rockies of Colorado. Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California. But not only that; let freedom ring from the Stone Mountain of Georgia. Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee.
Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi. From every mountainside, let freedom ring.
And when this happens, and when we allow freedom ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that 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 sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual, “Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!”
Dr. King’s envisioned a nation whose citizens would work together toward the goals of equality and democracy. He sought a nation that would become free of violence, hate, poverty, and segregation. As we honor Dr. King’s life and service, we also need to acknowledge his work remains unfinished. In his famous letter from Birmingham jail, he wrote,” Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere,” Martin Luther King Jr. fought for all Americans. May this day inspire us to continue that effort.
