UNIT-5 MARTIN LUTHER KING JR. I Have a Dream (Lincoln Memorial, Washington C.C.

, August 28, 1963) Martin Luther King Jr. (1929 1968) was an American Clergyman, activist and prominent leader of civil rights movement. He is influenced by Lincoln, Gandhi, Leo Tolstoy and Henry David Thoreau. He was awarded Nobel prize in 1964 and revied Presidential Medal of Freedom. Kings efforts led to the 1963 March on Washington, where he delivered his I Have a Dream speech. His speech on August 28, 1963, from the steps of the Lincoln memorial during the march on Washington for jobs and freedom, was a major movement of the American civil Rights Movement. Martin Luther King Jr. expresses his pain that blacks are not equally treated. He delivered thought invoking, inspiring speech on August 28, 1963. A great man (Abraham Lincoln) had proclaimed that blacks are free and can join into the American Army. This official order brought a light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been suffering in the flames of injustice. But one hundred years later, the Negro still is not free. They are still oppressed in the corners of American society. One hundred years later, the Negro lives on the lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity. So, he is expressing their painful racial discrimination. The constitution of America guaranteed the rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for the blacks and white equally. The American government neglected completely the rights of blacks. No justice is shared equally. Martin Luther King hopes that the present need is to retain our freedom which was promised long ago. It is the time to awaken and open the doors of opportunity to all and build a solid rock of brotherhood. Nineteen sixty-three is not an end, but a beginning. If the

nation is not giving importance to blacks then it would be experiencing a big shock.. There will be neither rest nor tranquility in America until the Negro is granted his citizenship rights. Martin Luther King was instilling hopes, chances, foresight, and vision for his people. He says that they must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. There should be no physical harm. Everything has to go in hand in hand with white brothers. Their destiny is tied up with our destiny and their freedom is bound to our freedom. We cannot walk alone. Martin Luther King asked the Negroes always to march ahead and never turn back. They should not be satisfied until they could enter motels and hotels, and move from smaller homes to larger homes like others. They would not be satisfied unless they were allowed to vote for a better future and get injustice and righteous treatment. Finally, Martin Luther King gave a clarion call to the Negroes to come out of their despair and continue to work with the faith that selfless suffering would result in redemption. Martin Luther King announced that he had a dream within the larger American dream. The dream was for a better destiny for the Negroes of America. The dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: We hold these truths to the self-evident: that all men are created equal. One day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave-owners will be able to sit down together at a table of brotherhood. One day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice and oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice. The dream that my four children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the colour of their skin but by the content of their character. Where all the little white boys and white girls walk together as sisters and brothers. One day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight, the glory of the lord shall be revealed, and all the flesh shall see it together. This is our hope. This is the faith with which I return to the South. With our hope we destroy the mountain of hopelessness. With our hope we build up relation of brotherhood and work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, they knew that they would be free one day. This was the fond dream of Martin Luther King.