Martin Luther King Jr. was a civil-rights leader and was more famous and well-known for his “I Have A Dream” speech. However, he also came up with the “Letter From A Birmingham Jail” which is what this paper will discuss and will also compare and contrast Martin Luther King Jr. to the clergymen that his letter addresses, white moderates, black nationalists, the white church, and the white racist groups.
This letter was written on April 16, 1963. This paper will cover the perspective of Martin Luther King Jr. and where his mindset and thinking was and where that thinking came from. This was another of his great works as he stands up for the negroes like himself and about the unjust treatment that “our fellow brothers” have to endure. Martin Luther King Jr. was an advocate for non-violence during his campaign for the segregation of black people in the South
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"Letter From Birmingham Jail".
This letter that Martin Luther King Jr. wrote was addressed to, “my dear fellow clergymen.” A clergyman is an ordained Christian minister, whereas Marin Luther King Jr. was a Baptist minister. There are a number of important aspects which are included in the letter, many of these stand out because that was who Martin Luther King Jr. was, someone who stood up for his beliefs and those of the black individuals.
King Jr. states that, “I am in Birmingham because injustice is here…” (King Jr., Letter From A Birmingham Jail.) King Jr. is, of course, referring to the injustice that is being done to the negroes and how nothing is being done to put a stop to this. The clergymen however, disagree with this and feel there is nothing wrong with what is happening to these Negros.
King Jr. continues, “…but it is even more unfortunate that the city’s white power structure left the Negro community with no alternative.” (King Jr., Letter From A Birmingham Jail.) King Jr. is stating how unfair the Negros are being treated without any sort of alternative to help them in any way possible. Whereas the clergymen seem to not see this or not want to see this and instead, wants to sweep the injustice under the rug and look the other way. King Jr. then goes on to state, “Negroes have experienced grossly unjust treatment in the courts. There have been more unsolved bombings of Negro homes and churches.” (King Jr., Letter From A Birmingham Jail.) With this part of the letter, King Jr. is stating a fact and seemingly brings to light what is happening in Birmingham, whether some individuals find it hard to swallow, that is all the more reason to bring this issue to light to make those individuals look this way.
The Negros are being told to “wait.” According to King Jr., “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.” (King Jr., Letter From A Birmingham Jail.) It appears that King Jr. is stating a fact of what is happening to these Negros and it appears that because of this, it is the white men’s fault that this is happening. It also appears that King Jr. is trying to get the clergymen to understand why this situation is important and why something should be done about this because it is unjust, unfair, and sinful as King Jr. states.
King Jr. then continues, “We have waited for more than 340 years for our constitutional and God given rights.” (King Jr., Letter From A Birmingham Jail.) This is also a statement from King Jr., once again about the Negros being treated unfairly and unjustly. King Jr. then states in the letter, “You express a great deal of anxiety over our willingness to break laws. This is certainly a legitimate concern.” (King Jr., Letter From A Birmingham Jail.) It appears that King Jr. does not think of this as breaking the law but rather standing up for their rights to be treated equally, fairly, and justly. Because if the roles were reversed, the white’s would also be standing up for these same rights that the Negros are fighting for when they shouldn’t have to fight at all since the Declaration of Independence states that, “We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal.” These white men should remember this and stay true to this no matter what color an individual is because all men are created equally and should be treated as equally as other individuals.
King Jr. then goes on to state, “I doubt that you would have so warmly commended the police force if you had seen its dogs sinking their teeth into unarmed, non-violent Negroes.” (King Jr., Letter From A Birmingham Jail.) With this sentence, King Jr. is making a point of telling these clergymen that they don’t see what actually happens behind closed doors so to speak, they only see what the police and city want you to see. These Negros were treated badly and should not have been at all because it was wrong, unfair, and unjust and no one even looked but instead tuned the other way and ignored this serious problem.
A white moderate is defined as an individual who is in the middle class and in the middle of the political spectrum. These individuals lean more towards who, in the political party, is appealing to them. According to King Jr., “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…” (King Jr., Letter From A Birmingham Jail.) King Jr. is more interested in justice rather than order because justice needs to be served rather than just order and every individual in America should have that right to have justice.
Black nationalists are individuals or a member of blacks that advocate separatism from the whites and self-governing black communities. King Jr. seems to be for this idea since it seems easier to do this in order to keep trouble out of the picture, whereas, these white individuals feel that the black do not even have a right to do this separatism because they feel blacks do not have any rights for the fact that their skin is a different color than theirs.
The white churches was exactly that, churches that are only for white’s. However, when King Jr. made his points clear on how wrong it was for the blacks to be treated as they were from the white’s, these “so-called Christians” just could not understand and grasp exactly what was wrong with the situation between the blacks and the white’s. In this letter, King Jr. addressed that aspect and made clear what the problem was in the best way possible where these white individuals would understand what the problem was.
White racist groups were those groups of individuals that had something against the blacks, mainly because they had different color skin and the white’s felt as though they were better than the blacks and used them for slaves and the blacks did not have any rights at all, or so the white’s thought the blacks didn’t. This being the main reason why King Jr. was trying to defend and stand up for all blacks because of the harsh and poor treatment the blacks were getting from the white’s.
In conclusion, This paper has covered the perspective of Martin Luther King Jr. and where his mindset and thinking was and where that thinking came from. Martin Luther King Jr. stands up for the negroes like himself and the unjust treatment that “our fellow brothers” had to endure. This paper has covered the thoughts and mindset of Martin Luther King Jr. and how he is a lot different from his fellow clergyman who looks at the situation rather than trying to hide from it and turn the other cheek and ignore what is really happening and going on.
