[Vision2020] Dr. Martin Luther King Jr: "I Have a Dream"

[Tom Hansen]

Dr. Martin Luther King's "I Have a Dream" Speech

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PbUtL_0vAJk

http://www.notonthepalouse.com/Dream.htm
 
----------------------------

I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the 
greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation. 

Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand 
today, signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as 
a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves, who had been 
seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak 
to end the long night of their captivity. 

But one hundred years later, the Negro still is not free. One hundred 
years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles 
of segregation and the chains of discrimination.  One hundred years later, 
the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean 
of material prosperity. One hundred years later, the Negro is still 
languished in the corners of American society and finds himself an exile 
in his own land. And so we've come here today to dramatize a shameful 
condition. 

In a sense we have come to our nation's capital to cash a check. When the 
architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution 
and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note 
to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all 
men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be guaranteed the 
unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. It is 
obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note, insofar 
as her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred 
obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check, a check which 
has come back marked "insufficient funds." 

But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse 
to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of 
opportunity of this nation. And so we have come to cash this check, a 
check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security 
of justice. 

We have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce 
urgency of Now. This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or 
to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is the time to make real 
the promises of democracy. Now is the time to rise from the dark and 
desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice. Now 
is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to 
the solid rock of brotherhood. Now is the time to make justice a reality 
for all of God's children. 

It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment. 
This sweltering summer of the Negro's legitimate discontent will not pass 
until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality. Nineteen 
sixty-three is not an end but a beginning. Those who hope that the Negro 
needed to blow off steam and will now be content will have a rude 
awakening if the nation returns to business as usual. There will be 
neither rest nor tranquility in America until the Negro is granted his 
citizenship rights. The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the 
foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges. 

But there is something that I must say to my people who stand on the warm 
threshold, which leads into the palace of justice. In the process of 
gaining our rightful place we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us 
not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of 
bitterness and hatred. We must ever conduct our struggle on the high plane 
of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to 
degenerate into physical violence. Again and again we must rise to the 
majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force. 

The marvelous new militancy which has engulfed the Negro community must 
not lead us to a distrust of all white people, for many of our white 
brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to realize 
that their destiny is tied up with our destiny. And they have come to 
realize that their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom. We cannot 
walk alone. 

And as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall always march ahead. 
We cannot turn back. There are those who are asking the devotees of civil 
rights, "When will you be satisfied?" We can never be satisfied as long as 
the Negro is the victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality. We 
can never be satisfied as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of 
travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels 
of the cities. We cannot be satisfied as long as a Negro in Mississippi 
cannot vote and a Negro in New York believes he has nothing for which to 
vote. No, no, we are not satisfied and we will not be satisfied until 
justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream. 

I am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great trials and 
tribulations. Some of you have come fresh from narrow jail cells. Some of 
you have come from areas where your quest for freedom left you battered by 
the storms of persecutions and staggered by the winds of police brutality. 
You have been the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with 
the faith that unearned suffering is redemptive. Go back to Mississippi, 
go back to Alabama, go back to South Carolina, go back to Georgia, go back 
to Louisiana, go back to the slums and ghettos of our northern cities, 
knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed. Let us not 
wallow in the valley of despair, I say to you today, my friends. And so 
even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a 
dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream. 

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true 
meaning of its creed: We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men 
are created equal. 

I have a dream that 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 the table of brotherhood. 

I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state 
sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of 
oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice. 

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation 
where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the 
content of their character. I have a dream today! 

I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, 
with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition 
and nullification; one day right down in Alabama little black boys and 
black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white 
girls as sisters and brothers. I have a dream today! 

I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, and every hill 
and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and 
the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall 
be revealed and all flesh shall see it together. 

This is our hope. This is the faith that I will go back to the South with. 
With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a 
stone of hope. With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling 
discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this 
faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle 
together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, 
knowing that we will be free one day. And this will be the day, this will 
be the day when all of God's children will be able to sing with new 
meaning, "My country 'tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing. 
Land where my fathers died, land of the Pilgrim's pride, from every 
mountainside, let freedom ring!" And if America is to be a great nation, 
this must become true. 

And 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 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, when we allow freedom to 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."

----------------------------

Seeya round town, Moscow.

Tom Hansen
Moscow, Idaho


---------------------------------------------
This message was sent by First Step Internet.
           http://www.fsr.com/