Martin Luther King 'dream' lives on

Martin Luther King 'dream' lives on, 40 years after death

WASHINGTON -- On April 4 America marks the 40th anniversary of the assassination of Martin Luther King, just as the first black candidate with a viable shot at the White House reinvigorates the late reverend's civil rights "dream."

In 1968 the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr was killed by a single bullet to the head while on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel in downtown Memphis, in the southern state of Tennessee.

The Nobel peace prize winner was just 39 years old. Had he lived he would have turned 79 in January.

The mystery surrounding his assassination has swirled for years, with escaped convict James Earl Ray convicted of the murder and sentenced to 99 years in prison.

Ray confessed to pulling the trigger, then quickly proclaimed his innocence. Debate over the official version of events, in which authorities determined that Ray had acted alone, remained sharp.

Conspiracy theories abound, with many refusing to believe how or why this unknown convict could have escaped from a Missouri state penitentiary, planned the assassination, and thwarted King's security detail all on his own.

In death King became a martyr in the civil rights struggle, but in life he was a charismatic hero battling for racial equality, from the 1956 bus boycott in Montgomery, Alabama and non-violent protest marches through to his famous "I have a dream" speech in Washington in 1963.

"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,'" King told some 250,000 people gathered at the Lincoln Memorial in the US capital.

"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."

Four words -- "I have a dream" -- thundered through his speech and entered into the American lexicon as symbols of the pursuit of racial equality in America.

Some 40 years later, Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama's campaign is putting that concept to the test.

The Illinois senator -- the only African American presently in the Senate -- addressed the sensitive race issue directly in a recent speech in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, that drew parallels with King.

Obama's remarks were "the most important speech on the question of race and the future of this country since Dr King's 'I have a dream' speech," said Chaka Fattah, a black Congressman from Pennsylvania.

Several other commentators hailed Obama's address as historic.

According to a CBS News opinion poll, 69 percent of Americans approved of the Illinois senator's speech, in which he urged an end to the country's "racial stalemate."

Obama also spoke eloquently about black "anger" and white "resentment" at a time when divisive talk about race threatened to engulf the presidential campaign.

"I have never been so naive as to believe that we can get beyond our racial divisions in a single election cycle," Obama said.

"But I have asserted a firm conviction ... that working together we can move beyond some of our old racial wounds," said Obama.

While 52 percent of Americans hailed King's "great influence" on civil rights -- with 75 percent of blacks and 47 percent of whites saying so -- some 39 percent of blacks said the country still had "a long way to go" towards racial equality, according to a survey of 1,012 respondents conducted by Ohio University.

Throughout the country, religious ceremonies and university conferences will celebrate King's legacy, including an event at Tennessee's Vanderbilt University, where longtime human rights advocate and black activist Angela Davis will address the theme "We are not now living the dream" of Martin Luther King.

source: http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/