Letter from Birmingham Jail Text
The words of Dr. Martin
Luther King are detailed in the Letter from Birmingham Jail Text
that was written by MLK on April 16, 1963.
My Dear Fellow Clergymen:
While confined here in the Birmingham city jail,
I came across your recent statement calling my present activities
"unwise and untimely." Seldom do I pause to answer criticism of my
work and ideas. If I sought to answer all the criticisms that cross
my desk, my secretaries would have little time for anything other
than such correspondence in the course of the day, and I would have
no time for constructive work. But since I feel that you are men of
genuine good will and that your criticisms are sincerely set forth,
I want to try to answer your statement in what I hope will be
patient and reasonable terms.
I think I should indicate why I am here in Birmingham, since you
have been influenced by the view which argues against "outsiders
coming in." I have the honor of serving as president of the Southern
Christian Leadership Conference, an organization operating in every
southern state, with headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia. We have some
eighty five affiliated organizations across the South, and one of
them is the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights. Frequently
we share staff, educational and financial resources with our
affiliates. Several months ago the affiliate here in Birmingham
asked us to be on call to engage in a nonviolent direct action
program if such were deemed necessary. We readily consented, and
when the hour came we lived up to our promise. So I, along with
several members of my staff, am here because I was invited here. I
am here because I have organizational ties here.
But more basically, I am in Birmingham because injustice is here.
Just as the prophets of the eighth century B.C. left their villages
and carried their "thus saith the Lord" far beyond the boundaries of
their home towns, and just as the Apostle Paul left his village of
Tarsus and carried the gospel of Jesus Christ to the far corners of
the Greco Roman world, so am I compelled to carry the gospel of
freedom beyond my own home town. Like Paul, I must constantly
respond to the Macedonian call for aid.
Moreover, I am cognizant of the interrelatedness of all communities
and states. I cannot sit idly by in Atlanta and not be concerned
about what happens in Birmingham. Injustice anywhere is a threat to
justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of
mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one
directly, affects all indirectly. Never again can we afford to live
with the narrow, provincial "outside agitator" idea. Anyone who
lives inside the United States can never be considered an outsider
anywhere within its bounds.
You deplore the demonstrations taking place in Birmingham. But your
statement, I am sorry to say, fails to express a similar concern for
the conditions that brought about the demonstrations. I am sure that
none of you would want to rest content with the superficial kind of
social analysis that deals merely with effects and does not grapple
with underlying causes. It is unfortunate that demonstrations are
taking place in Birmingham, but it is even more unfortunate that the
city's white power structure left the Negro community with no
alternative.
In any nonviolent campaign there are four basic steps: collection of
the facts to determine whether injustices exist; negotiation; self
purification; and direct action. We have gone through all these
steps in Birmingham. There can be no gainsaying the fact that racial
injustice engulfs this community. Birmingham is probably the most
thoroughly segregated city in the United States. Its ugly record of
brutality is widely known. Negroes have experienced grossly unjust
treatment in the courts. There have been more unsolved bombings of
Negro homes and churches in Birmingham than in any other city in the
nation. These are the hard, brutal facts of the case. On the basis
of these conditions, Negro leaders sought to negotiate with the city
fathers. But the latter consistently refused to engage in good faith
negotiation.
Then, last September, came the opportunity to talk with leaders of
Birmingham's economic community. In the course of the negotiations,
certain promises were made by the merchants--for example, to remove
the stores' humiliating racial signs. On the basis of these
promises, the Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth and the leaders of the
Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights agreed to a moratorium
on all demonstrations. As the weeks and months went by, we realized
that we were the victims of a broken promise. A few signs, briefly
removed, returned; the others remained. As in so many past
experiences, our hopes had been blasted, and the shadow of deep
disappointment settled upon us. We had no alternative except to
prepare for direct action, whereby we would present our very bodies
as a means of laying our case before the conscience of the local and
the national community. Mindful of the difficulties involved, we
decided to undertake a process of self purification. We began a
series of workshops on nonviolence, and we repeatedly asked
ourselves: "Are you able to accept blows without retaliating?" "Are
you able to endure the ordeal of jail?" We decided to schedule our
direct action program for the Easter season, realizing that except
for Christmas, this is the main shopping period of the year. Knowing
that a strong economic-withdrawal program would be the by product of
direct action, we felt that this would be the best time to bring
pressure to bear on the merchants for the needed change.
Then it occurred to us that Birmingham's mayoral election was coming
up in March, and we speedily decided to postpone action until after
election day. When we discovered that the Commissioner of Public
Safety, Eugene "Bull" Connor, had piled up enough votes to be in the
run off, we decided again to postpone action until the day after the
run off so that the demonstrations could not be used to cloud the
issues. Like many others, we waited to see Mr. Connor defeated, and
to this end we endured postponement after postponement. Having aided
in this community need, we felt that our direct action program could
be delayed no longer.
You may well ask: "Why direct action? Why sit ins, marches and so
forth? Isn't negotiation a better path?" You are quite right in
calling for negotiation. Indeed, this is the very purpose of direct
action. Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and
foster such a tension that a community which has constantly refused
to negotiate is forced to confront the issue. It seeks so to
dramatize the issue that it can no longer be ignored. My citing the
creation of tension as part of the work of the nonviolent resister
may sound rather shocking. But I must confess that I am not afraid
of the word "tension." I have earnestly opposed violent tension, but
there is a type of constructive, nonviolent tension which is
necessary for growth. Just as Socrates felt that it was necessary to
create a tension in the mind so that individuals could rise from the
bondage of myths and half truths to the unfettered realm of creative
analysis and objective appraisal, so must we see the need for
nonviolent gadflies to create the kind of tension in society that
will help men rise from the dark depths of prejudice and racism to
the majestic heights of understanding and brotherhood. The purpose
of our direct action program is to create a situation so crisis
packed that it will inevitably open the door to negotiation. I
therefore concur with you in your call for negotiation. Too long has
our beloved Southland been bogged down in a tragic effort to live in
monologue rather than dialogue.
One of the basic points in your statement is that the action that I
and my associates have taken in Birmingham is untimely. Some have
asked: "Why didn't you give the new city administration time to
act?" The only answer that I can give to this query is that the new
Birmingham administration must be prodded about as much as the
outgoing one, before it will act. We are sadly mistaken if we feel
that the election of Albert Boutwell as mayor will bring the
millennium to Birmingham. While Mr. Boutwell is a much more gentle
person than Mr. Connor, they are both segregationists, dedicated to
maintenance of the status quo. I have hope that Mr. Boutwell will be
reasonable enough to see the futility of massive resistance to
desegregation. But he will not see this without pressure from
devotees of civil rights. My friends, I must say to you that we have
not made a single gain in civil rights without determined legal and
nonviolent pressure. Lamentably, it is an historical fact that
privileged groups seldom give up their privileges voluntarily.
Individuals may see the moral light and voluntarily give up their
unjust posture; but, as Reinhold Niebuhr has reminded us, groups
tend to be more immoral than individuals.
We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily
given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.
Frankly, I have yet to engage in a direct action campaign that was
"well timed" in the view of those who have not suffered unduly from
the disease of segregation. For years now I have heard the word
"Wait!" It rings in the ear of every Negro with piercing
familiarity. This "Wait" has almost always meant "Never." We must
come to see, with one of our distinguished jurists, that "justice
too long delayed is justice denied."
We have waited for more than 340 years for our constitutional and
God given rights. The nations of Asia and Africa are moving with
jetlike speed toward gaining political independence, but we still
creep at horse and buggy pace toward gaining a cup of coffee at a
lunch counter. Perhaps it is easy for those who have never felt the
stinging darts of segregation to say, "Wait." But when you have seen
vicious mobs lynch your mothers and fathers at will and drown your
sisters and brothers at whim; when you have seen hate filled
policemen curse, kick and even kill your black brothers and sisters;
when you see the vast majority of your twenty million Negro brothers
smothering in an airtight cage of poverty in the midst of an
affluent society; when you suddenly find your tongue twisted and
your speech stammering as you seek to explain to your six year old
daughter why she can't go to the public amusement park that has just
been advertised on television, and see tears welling up in her eyes
when she is told that Funtown is closed to colored children, and see
ominous clouds of inferiority beginning to form in her little mental
sky, and see her beginning to distort her personality by developing
an unconscious bitterness toward white people; when you have to
concoct an answer for a five year old son who is asking: "Daddy, why
do white people treat colored people so mean?"; when you take a
cross county drive and find it necessary to sleep night after night
in the uncomfortable corners of your automobile because no motel
will accept you; when you are humiliated day in and day out by
nagging signs reading "white" and "colored"; when your first name
becomes "nigger," your middle name becomes "boy" (however old you
are) and your last name becomes "John," and your wife and mother are
never given the respected title "Mrs."; when you are harried by day
and haunted by night by the fact that you are a Negro, living
constantly at tiptoe stance, never quite knowing what to expect
next, and are plagued with inner fears and outer resentments; when
you are forever fighting a degenerating sense of "nobodiness"--then
you will understand why we find it difficult to wait. There comes a
time when the cup of endurance runs over, and men are no longer
willing to be plunged into the abyss of despair. I hope, sirs, you
can understand our legitimate and unavoidable impatience. You
express a great deal of anxiety over our willingness to break laws.
This is certainly a legitimate concern. Since we so diligently urge
people to obey the Supreme Court's decision of 1954 outlawing
segregation in the public schools, at first glance it may seem
rather paradoxical for us consciously to break laws. One may well
ask: "How can you advocate breaking some laws and obeying others?"
The answer lies in the fact that there are two types of laws: just
and unjust. I would be the first to advocate obeying just laws. One
has not only a legal but a moral responsibility to obey just laws.
Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws. I
would agree with St. Augustine that "an unjust law is no law at
all."
Now, what is the difference between the two? How does one determine
whether a law is just or unjust? A just law is a man made code that
squares with the moral law or the law of God. An unjust law is a
code that is out of harmony with the moral law. To put it in the
terms of St. Thomas Aquinas: An unjust law is a human law that is
not rooted in eternal law and natural law. Any law that uplifts
human personality is just. Any law that degrades human personality
is unjust. All segregation statutes are unjust because segregation
distorts the soul and damages the personality. It gives the
segregator a false sense of superiority and the segregated a false
sense of inferiority. Segregation, to use the terminology of the
Jewish philosopher Martin Buber, substitutes an "I it" relationship
for an "I thou" relationship and ends up relegating persons to the
status of things. Hence segregation is not only politically,
economically and sociologically unsound, it is morally wrong and
sinful. Paul Tillich has said that sin is separation. Is not
segregation an existential expression of man's tragic separation,
his awful estrangement, his terrible sinfulness? Thus it is that I
can urge men to obey the 1954 decision of the Supreme Court, for it
is morally right; and I can urge them to disobey segregation
ordinances, for they are morally wrong.
Let us consider a more concrete example of just and unjust laws. An
unjust law is a code that a numerical or power majority group
compels a minority group to obey but does not make binding on
itself. This is difference made legal. By the same token, a just law
is a code that a majority compels a minority to follow and that it
is willing to follow itself. This is sameness made legal. Let me
give another explanation. A law is unjust if it is inflicted on a
minority that, as a result of being denied the right to vote, had no
part in enacting or devising the law. Who can say that the
legislature of Alabama which set up that state's segregation laws
was democratically elected? Throughout Alabama all sorts of devious
methods are used to prevent Negroes from becoming registered voters,
and there are some counties in which, even though Negroes constitute
a majority of the population, not a single Negro is registered. Can
any law enacted under such circumstances be considered
democratically structured?
Sometimes a law is just on its face and unjust in its application.
For instance, I have been arrested on a charge of parading without a
permit. Now, there is nothing wrong in having an ordinance which
requires a permit for a parade. But such an ordinance becomes unjust
when it is used to maintain segregation and to deny citizens the
First-Amendment privilege of peaceful assembly and protest.
I hope you are able to see the distinction I am trying to point out.
In no sense do I advocate evading or defying the law, as would the
rabid segregationist. That would lead to anarchy. One who breaks an
unjust law must do so openly, lovingly, and with a willingness to
accept the penalty. I submit that an individual who breaks a law
that conscience tells him is unjust, and who willingly accepts the
penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience of the
community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the highest
respect for law.
Of course, there is nothing new about this kind of civil
disobedience. It was evidenced sublimely in the refusal of Shadrach,
Meshach and Abednego to obey the laws of Nebuchadnezzar, on the
ground that a higher moral law was at stake. It was practiced
superbly by the early Christians, who were willing to face hungry
lions and the excruciating pain of chopping blocks rather than
submit to certain unjust laws of the Roman Empire. To a degree,
academic freedom is a reality today because Socrates practiced civil
disobedience. In our own nation, the Boston Tea Party represented a
massive act of civil disobedience.
We should never forget that everything Adolf Hitler did in Germany
was "legal" and everything the Hungarian freedom fighters did in
Hungary was "illegal." It was "illegal" to aid and comfort a Jew in
Hitler's Germany. Even so, I am sure that, had I lived in Germany at
the time, I would have aided and comforted my Jewish brothers. If
today I lived in a Communist country where certain principles dear
to the Christian faith are suppressed, I would openly advocate
disobeying that country's antireligious laws.
I must make two honest confessions to you, my Christian and Jewish
brothers. First, I must confess that over the past few years I have
been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost
reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro's great stumbling
block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen's
Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is
more devoted to "order" than to justice; who prefers a negative
peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is
the presence of justice; who constantly says: "I agree with you in
the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct
action"; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for
another man's freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and
who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a "more convenient
season." Shallow understanding from people of good will is more
frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will.
Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright
rejection.
I had hoped that the white moderate would understand that law and
order exist for the purpose of establishing justice and that when
they fail in this purpose they become the dangerously structured
dams that block the flow of social progress. I had hoped that the
white moderate would understand that the present tension in the
South is a necessary phase of the transition from an obnoxious
negative peace, in which the Negro passively accepted his unjust
plight, to a substantive and positive peace, in which all men will
respect the dignity and worth of human personality. Actually, we who
engage in nonviolent direct action are not the creators of tension.
We merely bring to the surface the hidden tension that is already
alive. We bring it out in the open, where it can be seen and dealt
with. Like a boil that can never be cured so long as it is covered
up but must be opened with all its ugliness to the natural medicines
of air and light, injustice must be exposed, with all the tension
its exposure creates, to the light of human conscience and the air
of national opinion before it can be cured.
In your statement you assert that our actions, even though peaceful,
must be condemned because they precipitate violence. But is this a
logical assertion? Isn't this like condemning a robbed man because
his possession of money precipitated the evil act of robbery? Isn't
this like condemning Socrates because his unswerving commitment to
truth and his philosophical inquiries precipitated the act by the
misguided populace in which they made him drink hemlock? Isn't this
like condemning Jesus because his unique God consciousness and never
ceasing devotion to God's will precipitated the evil act of
crucifixion? We must come to see that, as the federal courts have
consistently affirmed, it is wrong to urge an individual to cease
his efforts to gain his basic constitutional rights because the
quest may precipitate violence. Society must protect the robbed and
punish the robber. I had also hoped that the white moderate would
reject the myth concerning time in relation to the struggle for
freedom. I have just received a letter from a white brother in
Texas. He writes: "All Christians know that the colored people will
receive equal rights eventually, but it is possible that you are in
too great a religious hurry. It has taken Christianity almost two
thousand years to accomplish what it has. The teachings of Christ
take time to come to earth." Such an attitude stems from a tragic
misconception of time, from the strangely irrational notion that
there is something in the very flow of time that will inevitably
cure all ills. Actually, time itself is neutral; it can be used
either destructively or constructively. More and more I feel that
the people of ill will have used time much more effectively than
have the people of good will. We will have to repent in this
generation not merely for the hateful words and actions of the bad
people but for the appalling silence of the good people. Human
progress never rolls in on wheels of inevitability; it comes through
the tireless efforts of men willing to be co workers with God, and
without this hard work, time itself becomes an ally of the forces of
social stagnation. We must use time creatively, in the knowledge
that the time is always ripe to do right. Now is the time to make
real the promise of democracy and transform our pending national
elegy into a creative psalm of brotherhood. Now is the time to lift
our national policy from the quicksand of racial injustice to the
solid rock of human dignity.
You speak of our activity in Birmingham as extreme. At first I was
rather disappointed that fellow clergymen would see my nonviolent
efforts as those of an extremist. I began thinking about the fact
that I stand in the middle of two opposing forces in the Negro
community. One is a force of complacency, made up in part of Negroes
who, as a result of long years of oppression, are so drained of self
respect and a sense of "somebodiness" that they have adjusted to
segregation; and in part of a few middle-class Negroes who, because
of a degree of academic and economic security and because in some
ways they profit by segregation, have become insensitive to the
problems of the masses. The other force is one of bitterness and
hatred, and it comes perilously close to advocating violence. It is
expressed in the various black nationalist groups that are springing
up across the nation, the largest and best known being Elijah
Muhammad's Muslim movement. Nourished by the Negro's frustration
over the continued existence of racial discrimination, this movement
is made up of people who have lost faith in America, who have
absolutely repudiated Christianity, and who have concluded that the
white man is an incorrigible "devil."
I have tried to stand between these two forces, saying that we need
emulate neither the "do nothingism" of the complacent nor the hatred
and despair of the black nationalist. For there is the more
excellent way of love and nonviolent protest. I am grateful to God
that, through the influence of the Negro church, the way of
nonviolence became an integral part of our struggle. If this
philosophy had not emerged, by now many streets of the South would,
I am convinced, be flowing with blood. And I am further convinced
that if our white brothers dismiss as "rabble rousers" and "outside
agitators" those of us who employ nonviolent direct action, and if
they refuse to support our nonviolent efforts, millions of Negroes
will, out of frustration and despair, seek solace and security in
black nationalist ideologies--a development that would inevitably
lead to a frightening racial nightmare.
Oppressed people cannot remain oppressed forever. The yearning for
freedom eventually manifests itself, and that is what has happened
to the American Negro. Something within has reminded him of his
birthright of freedom, and something without has reminded him that
it can be gained. Consciously or unconsciously, he has been caught
up by the Zeitgeist, and with his black brothers of Africa and his
brown and yellow brothers of Asia, South America and the Caribbean,
the United States Negro is moving with a sense of great urgency
toward the promised land of racial justice. If one recognizes this
vital urge that has engulfed the Negro community, one should readily
understand why public demonstrations are taking place. The Negro has
many pent up resentments and latent frustrations, and he must
release them. So let him march; let him make prayer pilgrimages to
the city hall; let him go on freedom rides -and try to understand
why he must do so. If his repressed emotions are not released in
nonviolent ways, they will seek expression through violence; this is
not a threat but a fact of history. So I have not said to my people:
"Get rid of your discontent." Rather, I have tried to say that this
normal and healthy discontent can be channeled into the creative
outlet of nonviolent direct action. And now this approach is being
termed extremist. But though I was initially disappointed at being
categorized as an extremist, as I continued to think about the
matter I gradually gained a measure of satisfaction from the label.
Was not Jesus an extremist for love: "Love your enemies, bless them
that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them
which despitefully use you, and persecute you." Was not Amos an
extremist for justice: "Let justice roll down like waters and
righteousness like an ever flowing stream." Was not Paul an
extremist for the Christian gospel: "I bear in my body the marks of
the Lord Jesus." Was not Martin Luther an extremist: "Here I stand;
I cannot do otherwise, so help me God." And John Bunyan: "I will
stay in jail to the end of my days before I make a butchery of my
conscience." And Abraham Lincoln: "This nation cannot survive half
slave and half free." And Thomas Jefferson: "We hold these truths to
be self evident, that all men are created equal . . ." So the
question is not whether we will be extremists, but what kind of
extremists we will be. Will we be extremists for hate or for love?
Will we be extremists for the preservation of injustice or for the
extension of justice? In that dramatic scene on Calvary's hill three
men were crucified. We must never forget that all three were
crucified for the same crime--the crime of extremism. Two were
extremists for immorality, and thus fell below their environment.
The other, Jesus Christ, was an extremist for love, truth and
goodness, and thereby rose above his environment. Perhaps the South,
the nation and the world are in dire need of creative extremists.
I had hoped that the white moderate would see this need. Perhaps I
was too optimistic; perhaps I expected too much. I suppose I should
have realized that few members of the oppressor race can understand
the deep groans and passionate yearnings of the oppressed race, and
still fewer have the vision to see that injustice must be rooted out
by strong, persistent and determined action. I am thankful, however,
that some of our white brothers in the South have grasped the
meaning of this social revolution and committed themselves to it.
They are still all too few in quantity, but they are big in quality.
Some -such as Ralph McGill, Lillian Smith, Harry Golden, James
McBride Dabbs, Ann Braden and Sarah Patton Boyle--have written about
our struggle in eloquent and prophetic terms. Others have marched
with us down nameless streets of the South. They have languished in
filthy, roach infested jails, suffering the abuse and brutality of
policemen who view them as "dirty nigger-lovers." Unlike so many of
their moderate brothers and sisters, they have recognized the
urgency of the moment and sensed the need for powerful "action"
antidotes to combat the disease of segregation. Let me take note of
my other major disappointment. I have been so greatly disappointed
with the white church and its leadership. Of course, there are some
notable exceptions. I am not unmindful of the fact that each of you
has taken some significant stands on this issue. I commend you,
Reverend Stallings, for your Christian stand on this past Sunday, in
welcoming Negroes to your worship service on a nonsegregated basis.
I commend the Catholic leaders of this state for integrating Spring
Hill College several years ago.
But despite these notable exceptions, I must honestly reiterate that
I have been disappointed with the church. I do not say this as one
of those negative critics who can always find something wrong with
the church. I say this as a minister of the gospel, who loves the
church; who was nurtured in its bosom; who has been sustained by its
spiritual blessings and who will remain true to it as long as the
cord of life shall lengthen.
Letter from Birmingham Jail Text continued
The words of Dr. Martin
Luther King continue in the Letter from Birmingham Jail Text that
was written by MLK on April 16, 1963.
Letter from Birmingham Jail Text continued...
When I was suddenly catapulted into the leadership of the bus
protest in Montgomery, Alabama, a few years ago, I felt we would
be supported by the white church. I felt that the white
ministers, priests and rabbis of the South would be among our
strongest allies. Instead, some have been outright opponents,
refusing to understand the freedom movement and misrepresenting
its leaders; all too many others have been more cautious than
courageous and have remained silent behind the anesthetizing
security of stained glass windows.
In spite of my shattered dreams, I came to Birmingham with the
hope that the white religious leadership of this community would
see the justice of our cause and, with deep moral concern, would
serve as the channel through which our just grievances could
reach the power structure. I had hoped that each of you would
understand. But again I have been disappointed.
I have heard numerous southern religious leaders admonish their
worshipers to comply with a desegregation decision because it is
the law, but I have longed to hear white ministers declare:
"Follow this decree because integration is morally right and
because the Negro is your brother." In the midst of blatant
injustices inflicted upon the Negro, I have watched white
churchmen stand on the sideline and mouth pious irrelevancies
and sanctimonious trivialities. In the midst of a mighty
struggle to rid our nation of racial and economic injustice, I
have heard many ministers say: "Those are social issues, with
which the gospel has no real concern." And I have watched many
churches commit themselves to a completely other worldly
religion which makes a strange, un-Biblical distinction between
body and soul, between the sacred and the secular.
I have traveled the length and breadth of Alabama, Mississippi
and all the other southern states. On sweltering summer days and
crisp autumn mornings I have looked at the South's beautiful
churches with their lofty spires pointing heavenward. I have
beheld the impressive outlines of her massive religious
education buildings. Over and over I have found myself asking:
"What kind of people worship here? Who is their God? Where were
their voices when the lips of Governor Barnett dripped with
words of interposition and nullification? Where were they when
Governor Wallace gave a clarion call for defiance and hatred?
Where were their voices of support when bruised and weary Negro
men and women decided to rise from the dark dungeons of
complacency to the bright hills of creative protest?"
Yes, these questions are still in my mind. In deep
disappointment I have wept over the laxity of the church. But be
assured that my tears have been tears of love. There can be no
deep disappointment where there is not deep love. Yes, I love
the church. How could I do otherwise? I am in the rather unique
position of being the son, the grandson and the great grandson
of preachers. Yes, I see the church as the body of Christ. But,
oh! How we have blemished and scarred that body through social
neglect and through fear of being nonconformists.
There was a time when the church was very powerful--in the time
when the early Christians rejoiced at being deemed worthy to
suffer for what they believed. In those days the church was not
merely a thermometer that recorded the ideas and principles of
popular opinion; it was a thermostat that transformed the mores
of society. Whenever the early Christians entered a town, the
people in power became disturbed and immediately sought to
convict the Christians for being "disturbers of the peace" and
"outside agitators."' But the Christians pressed on, in the
conviction that they were "a colony of heaven," called to obey
God rather than man. Small in number, they were big in
commitment. They were too God-intoxicated to be "astronomically
intimidated." By their effort and example they brought an end to
such ancient evils as infanticide and gladiatorial contests.
Things are different now. So often the contemporary church is a
weak, ineffectual voice with an uncertain sound. So often it is
an archdefender of the status quo. Far from being disturbed by
the presence of the church, the power structure of the average
community is consoled by the church's silent--and often even
vocal--sanction of things as they are.
But the judgment of God is upon the church as never before. If
today's church does not recapture the sacrificial spirit of the
early church, it will lose its authenticity, forfeit the loyalty
of millions, and be dismissed as an irrelevant social club with
no meaning for the twentieth century. Every day I meet young
people whose disappointment with the church has turned into
outright disgust.
Perhaps I have once again been too optimistic. Is organized
religion too inextricably bound to the status quo to save our
nation and the world? Perhaps I must turn my faith to the inner
spiritual church, the church within the church, as the true
ekklesia and the hope of the world. But again I am thankful to
God that some noble souls from the ranks of organized religion
have broken loose from the paralyzing chains of conformity and
joined us as active partners in the struggle for freedom. They
have left their secure congregations and walked the streets of
Albany, Georgia, with us. They have gone down the highways of
the South on tortuous rides for freedom. Yes, they have gone to
jail with us. Some have been dismissed from their churches, have
lost the support of their bishops and fellow ministers. But they
have acted in the faith that right defeated is stronger than
evil triumphant. Their witness has been the spiritual salt that
has preserved the true meaning of the gospel in these troubled
times. They have carved a tunnel of hope through the dark
mountain of disappointment. I hope the church as a whole will
meet the challenge of this decisive hour. But even if the church
does not come to the aid of justice, I have no despair about the
future. I have no fear about the outcome of our struggle in
Birmingham, even if our motives are at present misunderstood. We
will reach the goal of freedom in Birmingham and all over the
nation, because the goal of America is freedom. Abused and
scorned though we may be, our destiny is tied up with America's
destiny. Before the pilgrims landed at Plymouth, we were here.
Before the pen of Jefferson etched the majestic words of the
Declaration of Independence across the pages of history, we were
here. For more than two centuries our forebears labored in this
country without wages; they made cotton king; they built the
homes of their masters while suffering gross injustice and
shameful humiliation -and yet out of a bottomless vitality they
continued to thrive and develop. If the inexpressible cruelties
of slavery could not stop us, the opposition we now face will
surely fail. We will win our freedom because the sacred heritage
of our nation and the eternal will of God are embodied in our
echoing demands. Before closing I feel impelled to mention one
other point in your statement that has troubled me profoundly.
You warmly commended the Birmingham police force for keeping
"order" and "preventing violence." I doubt that you would have
so warmly commended the police force if you had seen its dogs
sinking their teeth into unarmed, nonviolent Negroes. I doubt
that you would so quickly commend the policemen if you were to
observe their ugly and inhumane treatment of Negroes here in the
city jail; if you were to watch them push and curse old Negro
women and young Negro girls; if you were to see them slap and
kick old Negro men and young boys; if you were to observe them,
as they did on two occasions, refuse to give us food because we
wanted to sing our grace together. I cannot join you in your
praise of the Birmingham police department.
It is true that the police have exercised a degree of discipline
in handling the demonstrators. In this sense they have conducted
themselves rather "nonviolently" in public. But for what
purpose? To preserve the evil system of segregation. Over the
past few years I have consistently preached that nonviolence
demands that the means we use must be as pure as the ends we
seek. I have tried to make clear that it is wrong to use immoral
means to attain moral ends. But now I must affirm that it is
just as wrong, or perhaps even more so, to use moral means to
preserve immoral ends. Perhaps Mr. Connor and his policemen have
been rather nonviolent in public, as was Chief Pritchett in
Albany, Georgia, but they have used the moral means of
nonviolence to maintain the immoral end of racial injustice. As
T. S. Eliot has said: "The last temptation is the greatest
treason: To do the right deed for the wrong reason."
I wish you had commended the Negro sit inners and demonstrators
of Birmingham for their sublime courage, their willingness to
suffer and their amazing discipline in the midst of great
provocation. One day the South will recognize its real heroes.
They will be the James Merediths, with the noble sense of
purpose that enables them to face jeering and hostile mobs, and
with the agonizing loneliness that characterizes the life of the
pioneer. They will be old, oppressed, battered Negro women,
symbolized in a seventy two year old woman in Montgomery,
Alabama, who rose up with a sense of dignity and with her people
decided not to ride segregated buses, and who responded with
ungrammatical profundity to one who inquired about her
weariness: "My feets is tired, but my soul is at rest." They
will be the young high school and college students, the young
ministers of the gospel and a host of their elders, courageously
and nonviolently sitting in at lunch counters and willingly
going to jail for conscience' sake. One day the South will know
that when these disinherited children of God sat down at lunch
counters, they were in reality standing up for what is best in
the American dream and for the most sacred values in our Judaeo
Christian heritage, thereby bringing our nation back to those
great wells of democracy which were dug deep by the founding
fathers in their formulation of the Constitution and the
Declaration of Independence.
Never before have I written so long a letter. I'm afraid it is
much too long to take your precious time. I can assure you that
it would have been much shorter if I had been writing from a
comfortable desk, but what else can one do when he is alone in a
narrow jail cell, other than write long letters, think long
thoughts and pray long prayers?
If I have said anything in this letter that overstates the truth
and indicates an unreasonable impatience, I beg you to forgive
me. If I have said anything that understates the truth and
indicates my having a patience that allows me to settle for
anything less than brotherhood, I beg God to forgive me.
I hope this letter finds you strong in the faith. I also hope
that circumstances will soon make it possible for me to meet
each of you, not as an integrationist or a civil-rights leader
but as a fellow clergyman and a Christian brother. Let us all
hope that the dark clouds of racial prejudice will soon pass
away and the deep fog of misunderstanding will be lifted from
our fear drenched communities, and in some not too distant
tomorrow the radiant stars of love and brotherhood will shine
over our great nation with all their scintillating beauty.
Yours for the cause of Peace and Brotherhood, Martin Luther
King, Jr.
Letter from Birmingham Jail Text -
April 16, 1963
●
Interesting Facts about Letter from Birmingham Jail Text for kids
●
Summary of the Letter from Birmingham Jail Text in US history
●
The Letter from Birmingham Jail Text, a major
event in US history
● Martin Luther King and the
Letter from Birmingham Jail Text
●
Fast, fun facts about the Letter from Birmingham Jail Text
● Dr. Martin Luther King and the
Letter from Birmingham Jail Text
● Martin Luther King Jr. and the
Letter from Birmingham Jail Text for schools,
homework, kids and children |