Hameno

on Martin Luther King

Last weekend when we were in Atlanta — specifically to see the Carter Muesum – Lisa, Leanne and I also saw the Martin Luther King historical sites. They are just near each other in Atlanta, and they are connected by a Walk of Peace of some sort.

I learned a lot more at the MLK site than at the Carter site; the most outstanding was the turbulence of the fifties in the civil rights arena — Rosa Parks was arrested for refusing to give up her seat in 1955. And, more importantly, we became more aware of the fact that she was highly supported by a network of growing unrest and organized protests in that decade, which is not typically talked about in the Leave-it-to-Beaver-esque descriptions of the time. [Note to self: seeing the Eisenhower museum has now become higher priority.]

I’ve always been a fan of rules, and MLK is just so much more admirable for working within the rules in a nonviolent fashion to affect the change he wanted to see in the world. There are some good things about the United States Government, not the least of which is allowing for peaceful protest. All those black students did was walk into a lunch counter and ask for a sandwich, which is a peaceful act. It was against the law (a law they disagreed with), and they were arrested (with much fanfare). Law broken and punished. No big deal here, except that the punishers seemed to get more out of shape than the law-breakers. And it was enough for the rest of the country to watch the disturbing news footage of these events to see how unjust these laws seemed and then for them to help affect change in these laws. It was turbulent, but the government that our founding fathers set up allowed these changes to take place more or less legally.

Of course, it was our founding fathers who set up this “some of us are more equal than others” business in the first place, but fortunately the rules they set up in the government allowed the rest of us to bring ”All men are created equal” to mean everyone, including non-caucasians and women. With great thanks to Lincoln and MLK and even to LBJ for signing the Civil Rights Act. While I was at the MLK museum, I frankly wasn’t that interested in reading more about the life of MLK (although it was interesting). I was more interested in the path that civil rights law followed from the founding fathers through the US Civil War through the imprisonment of Japanese during World War Two through the turbulent 60’s and up to today’s sad state of affairs with the Patriot Act.

Although some of my friends think that the Patriot Act signals the end of the line for civil rights, I have confidence in our government and its ability to right itself after seeing the extent of its wrongs. Lincoln, at the beginning of his career, said that the founding fathers had performed all of the heroic acts and there was nothing left for simple folk like him to do. He went on to be more heroic than those fathers. Martin Luther King, originally denied rights as a citizen, changed the law so that he and his people had rights equal to the founding fathers. And I still have faith that the Patriot Act will be repealed or amended by someone like Lincoln or MLK or Susan B Anthony — however, let’s be completely honest here, it will likely not be me.