Where Do We Go from Here?

Like many other people who are passionate about racial reconciliation in America, I have extensively studied the life of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. I have read several biographies about him, listened to many of his inspiring speeches, and meditated on his prolific writings. I even made a pilgrimage to Memphis TN in April 2018 to honor his legacy on the 50th anniversary of his tragic assassination. Touring the National Civil Rights Museum at the Lorraine Motel – and standing just a few feet from the balcony where Dr. King was slain – was one of the most profoundly moving experiences of my entire life.

My favorite treatise by Dr. King is “Letter from Birmingham Jail”, especially the part where he defends the rationale for nonviolent civil disobedience by logically and eloquently describing the difference between moral and immoral laws. If you have never read that landmark manuscript, which was smuggled out of the jail piece by piece, I strongly encourage that you do.

Dr. King’s final book, published just months before his assassination, was titled, “Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community?” Written four years after the March on Washington, three years after the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and two years after the Voting Rights Act of 1965, the book poses – and then seeks to answer – the title question.

Now that long-overdue legal equality had finally been achieved, Dr. King spent his final days looking forward, not backwards. He was a man who dedicated his life to making the future brighter and the world more equitable, which is why – in my estimation – Dr. King would be deeply troubled by what has been transpiring recently in America’s streets.

For the life of me, I cannot see Dr. King concluding that a white cop kneeling on the neck of a black suspect means that the majority of law enforcement officers are inherently racist. Likewise, I cannot fathom him calling for reparations for long-past injustices that didn’t involve a single living American, black or white.

Dr. King supported building bridges, not burning buildings. He led peaceful protests, not violent riots. He advocated for full employment and fair hiring practices, not looting and stealing.

What would Dr. King have thought about BLM and Antifa? We can only speculate. However, what we do know is that, in “Where Do We Go from Here?”, Dr. King sought to “establish a clear contrast between his own views and that of the Black Power Movement, arguing that abandoning the fight for nonviolent social change and replacing it with personal militarism tinged with black separatism was both immoral and self-defeating.” He also emphasized that he was neither a Marxist nor a Socialist, instead choosing to work withing the existing political parties to create permanent social change.

Let me conclude with two excerpts from a speech that Dr. King gave on August 16, 1967 in Atlanta GA. Its title was the same as his final book.

“Now, let me rush on to say we must reaffirm our commitment to nonviolence. And I want to stress this. The futility of violence in the struggle for racial justice has been tragically etched in all the recent Negro riots. Now, yesterday, I tried to analyze the riots and deal with the causes for them. Today I want to give the other side. There is something painfully sad about a riot. One sees screaming youngsters and angry adults fighting hopelessly and aimlessly against impossible odds. And deep down within them, you perceive a desire for self-destruction, a kind of suicidal longing.”

“Occasionally, Negroes contend that the 1965 Watts riot and the other riots in various cities represented effective civil rights action. But those who express this view always end up with stumbling words when asked what concrete gains have been won as a result. At best, the riots have produced a little additional anti-poverty money allotted by frightened government officials and a few water sprinklers to cool the children of the ghettos. It is something like improving the food in the prison while the people remain securely incarcerated behind bars. Nowhere have the riots won any concrete improvement such as have the organized protest demonstrations.”

We miss you, Dr. King, both your passion and your principles. And we pledge to continue your nonviolent crusade for positive social change, forever striving to become that “more perfect union” that our Founders envisioned.

Until we meet in Glory… peace.