Thursday, January 26, 2012

Name change

Roger wrote: 
I have asked Libertarian Party members before if they are so opposed to
government then why are they not opposed to those governments that are
called corporations. They just cannot seem to understand the concept. If
an entity tells you how to run your life then it is a government.
Corporations do that. These so-called libertarians seem to think I am
speaking Klingon when I say that to them.
********

Curious carl replies:
 
You know, you've got something here Roger. 
It's all in the name.  Change the name of states, like the Washington State Corporation.  Change the name of the nation, like The Corporate States of America. 
Change the name of Taxes to Shares.  All Share Holders(formerly called citizens) will purchase annual shares based upon their income.  These shares will be applied to a wide variety of services to be provided by the corporations. 
All current corporations shall be henceforth called Governments.  They may not be considered to be "persons".  They may not be allowed to lobby.  That right is reserved for Corporations alone. 
 
This could be the start of something grand. 
 
Curious Carl
 

Fw: The Oppressive Nature of "Small Government" By Carl Gibson, Reader Supported News

Mike writes: 
I've never understood why the people who scream about small government also want to monitor what you do in the bedroom, control who gets married, what you smoke, homeland security, etc.
*********
Curious Carl replies:

Actually Mike, they are one and the same.  Small government is a code phrase for Dictatorship.  As you can imagine, Big Government is far too bulky and difficult to control.  Small government is primarily a Police State.  It provides few social services, outside of prisons.  It collects taxes and provides total police protection.  Excess taxes are put to good use building luxury palaces for the Beloved Leaders to live in while they are sacrificing their time for us. 
Now, once the police have kicked everyone into shape, what else can they do except check out bed rooms and public rest rooms? 
 

Tweets and Twitters: Whatever happened to English?


Just call me an old Caveman, but I don't tweet or twitter.  I don't have Face Book and my cell phone takes no pictures, in fact it doesn't even know how to text.  No iPhone here, either.  Hard to tell how I get by from day to day. 
It won't be long until our language is reduced to a series of chirps, tweets and grunts.  In fact our youth are already difficult to understand.  But the thought of reducing our most meaningful conversations to little sound bites and tweets is more than I can take. 
But if anyone wants to send my message to the president via Tweeter, here it is: 
Mister President,
Stop talking. 
Begin Acting. 
 
Curious Carl
 

Saturday, January 21, 2012

I'll just be dribbling off

Rick,
You can stop wondering.  We have all been brain washed by constant hammering over many years.  But some of us did a naughty thing.  We ate a bite of the fruit from that Tree of Knowledge and since then we can't stop asking questions. 
Now as to what we can do?  Well for one thing, if we can afford a few dollars a month, we can contribute to one of those low power or public radio stations that carry progressive programs.  We can write letters to the editor of our local papers.  I was surprised at how many of my dad's letters the Spokane Spokesman Review published, with his radical positions and what with them being very conservative.  We can call talk programs if we enjoy being cut to ribbons by the local talk jock.  We can join lists like blind democracy and read the articles posted by several members.  Mostly we can ask questions.  I know that I'm not going to convince my conservative friends and family members to change horses in the middle of life, but I can put questions in their minds. 
We are going to a rally in Port Townsend Saturday.  That doesn't seem to be much, but if enough of us show up it can be a big deal.  It could even make the weekly Leader paper.  Sometimes other people go along with the propaganda because they don't like to take a stand.  But if they see lots of other people taking a stand they might just decide that it's time for them to stand up, too. 
Anyway, the one thing we don't want to do is to do nothing.  Little drops of water make the mighty river. 
So, now I'll just be dribbling off. 
 
Carl Jarvis
 
 
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Thursday, January 19, 2012 5:28 PM
Subject: Re: [acb-chat] Equality Matters

I really wonder if a lot of people have been brainwashed.  We have been taught that we all have a chance in this country.  Conservatives preach trickle-down.  If you cut the don't tax the rich too much, more money will be available for jobs.  Conservatives love to speak about tax rates going up in general, not just for the rich.
 
Progressive radio is heard mainly on weak stations and in a few markets.  No station here in Louisville carries it. I can only get it on the Internet and XM.
 
So, the question really becomes, how do we educate people not to vote against their own interests?

A Letter from Mitt Romney...Really?

Subject: Re: A Letter from Mitt Romney

I'll bet you 10 thousand dollars and see you one bottle of Chateau Lafite Rothschild 1982 , that someone asks, "Did Mitt Romney really write this letter?" 
Well, did he? 
 
Curious Carl
 
 
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Thursday, January 19, 2012 7:59 PM
Subject: FW: A Letter from Mitt Romney

Nice?

-----Original Message-----
From: borowitzreport.com
[mailto:andy=borowitzreport.com@email.borowitzreport.com] On Behalf Of
borowitzreport.com
Sent: Thursday, January 19, 2012 10:40 AM
To: miriamvieni@optonline.net
Subject: A Letter from Mitt Romney

January 19, 2012

A Letter from Mitt Romney

About My Finances

SOUTH CAROLINA (The Borowitz Report) - Republican presidential frontrunner
Mitt Romney has released the following letter to the American people:

Dear American People:

Over the past several days, my personal finances have been distorted into a
grotesque caricature by the mainstream media, pundits, and other people who
can count. I am writing to you to set the record straight by explaining my
finances in terms the American people can relate to.

Let's say you bought a bottle of Chateau Lafite Rothschild 1982 for $5,000.
A couple of years later, what do you know, you sell that same bottle for
$10,000. So you just made a profit of $5,000 through your own hard work.
How much of that should you pay to the government? I'd say fifteen percent.

Now let's say you have a fellow mowing the lawn at your 7,000 square foot
home in La Jolla, and he turns out to be an illegal. You say, "No way,
Jose" (Jose is actually his real name) and send him packing. He doesn't
deserve his full paycheck, since he lied to you in Spanish, but it wouldn't
be fair to give him nothing, either. So you pay him fifteen percent.

Now let's pretend the United States of America is like one big restaurant.
Not a fancy restaurant, mind you, but one that only gets two Michelin
stars. And let's say that you order a meal of Beluga caviar, white truffles
and gold shavings, washing it down with your favorite beverage, Chateau
Lafite Rothschild 1982. The bill arrives and it's quite a hefty one for a
working stiff who only made $375,000 last year in speaking fees. (That's
right: minimum wage.) So when it comes to toting up the bill, how much
should I tip the waiter, who in case you're having trouble following this
metaphor is the IRS? You got it: fifteen percent.

I think I've now shown, using these real-life examples that everyone can
relate to, that no one should ever pay more than fifteen percent on their
taxes. If you have been paying more than that, you should get rid of your
loser accountant pronto. That's another thing I have in common with regular
Americans: we like firing people.

So - now that I've laid it out in simple terms that even you can understand,
do you agree that you and Mitt Romney have a whale of a lot more in common
than you thought? I'll bet you ten grand you do.

Au revoir,

Mitt

To unsubscribe to this e-mail list please paste the following URL:
http://borowitzreport.us1.list-manage.com/unsubscribe?u=49de3335c30245ecd0fa
291aa&id=743947b930&e=8ae48feffd&c=7edbf40a41 into your browser address bar
or forward this message to "remove@borowitzreport.com".
www.Borowitzreport.com

Waste Someone's Time: Forward to a Friend:
http://borowitzreport.us1.list-manage.com/track/click?u=49de3335c30245ecd0fa
291aa&id=9436a389c5&e=8ae48feffd

Sign up today for your own Borowitz Reports, click the link below or paste
it into your browser.
http://borowitzreport.us1.list-manage1.com/track/click?u=49de3335c30245ecd0f
a291aa&id=f8382bd1b2&e=8ae48feffd

speaking of blind piano players making a living


There have been well known blind pianists.  Alec Templeton comes to mind, and I had the pleasure and privilege of spending an afternoon visiting with George Shearing.  I think Louis Braille made a living as a church organist.  Now if you can sing and ham it up, Ray Charles and Stevie Wonder come to mind. 
I've known several good piano players who actually made their living as Tuners, earning extra dollars playing for church or club appearances. 
But most of the piano players that I know, like most of those playing any instrument, do it to fill their own needs.  Oh yes, I also know good piano players who teach music for a living. 
I think the key to having a paying job out of playing the piano is a commitment of time.  Some talent helps, but average piano players have been able to parley their basic skill with showmanship and do rather well.  Liberace comes to mind. 
 
Curious Carl
 

taking the trip

When we follow our passions we may never reach a pot of gold.  We may never be certain of what lies around the next bend.  We may not please our families or friends.  But we will have a Hell of a good time taking the trip. 
 
Curious Carl
 

just rambling

My dad said, "There's no such thing as boy's chores and girl's chores.  When there is work to be done, we all pitch in and do it". 
And so I took my turn clambering up on the kitchen chair, pulled over to the sink, washing and rinsing the dinner dishes or drying them and putting them on their shelves, or sweeping the floor and mopping.  When I was 12 years old my mother handed me the iron and took me to the ironing board.  I learned to press my own shirts, pants and handkerchiefs.  By this time my two sisters and I put up our own lunches in the morning.  By 13 I was taught the ins and outs of an old wringer washer.  My dad was on the road a lot back in those days and his hours were long and often he spent several nights away from home.  Of course we had our victory garden.  What All American Family didn't have one of those during the war?  So mother spent much of her time gardening, she also loved flowers and eventually became a Master Gardener. 
At 6 I carried a twice weekly throw away paper.  At 9 I moved up to a daily paper and by 10 I and a couple of buddies  formed a gardening service named The Dependable Yard Service, mowing lawns, weeding gardens, raking and clearing.  Fifty cents an hour!  At 17, when I had detached retina surgery and could not do heavy yard work or work in the fields, I found that there were mothers who liked to have a dependable boy baby sit their sons.  And they had the bonus of a young enterprising fellow who also knew how to clean house and do ironing.  All for a price, of course. 
I was probably legally blind, but who fussed about stuff like that.  Either you could see, which I could, or you could not see, in which case you were blind.  Which I was not. 
But we knew that, blind or sighted,  success would depend at least in part on our willingness to roll up our sleeves and pitch in. 
 
Curious Carl
 

Newt and Old Hickory

So, I listened to a couple of the so called debates and heard clips from others.  South Carolinians, at least the ones gathered to hear Newt Gingrich, makes me wonder who raised them?  A pack of wolves...sorry wolves, I didn't mean to demean you...maybe a pack of hungry Laughing Hyenas is more like it. 
When Newt bent down and kissed the bloody hem of the garment of Old Hickory, the ruthless exterminator of Native Americans...remember them?  They were here first?...and said, "Andy Jackson knew who his enemies were and what to do with them.  Kill them!"  The crowd went wild.  At that point, for the first time, I truly feared for the life of Barak Obama. 
Can't you just imagine all of these slobbering, yowling folks heading home after this mass hypnotic session and hearing their phones ringing.  "Hello.  Oh Mother, how are you doing there in the old folks home?  You watched the rally?  What's that?  You thought you saw me drooling and not closing my mouth?  Gosh Mom, it was Newt speaking Truth.  You know Mom, Newt is running a positive campaign.  He's positive he knows what he's going to do to our enemies, those stinking Democrats.  Kill them.  Well Mom, gotta go now and kick that Damn dog howling in the back yard.  Besides, if I talk too long my little sweetie will sneak into bed and pretend to be fast asleep.  But thanks for all you did in raising me up the right way.  And don't worry, we'll get by the Home as soon as we find the time." 
 
Curious Carl
 

Thursday, January 19, 2012

rant...rant...rant...


As long as we have an administration that supports and advances murder, and looks the other way while the Ruling Class robs Working Class Americans, and approves training young men and women to be professional killers, and then postures and protests when some of these well trained killers become so enraged at their enemies that they piss on the dead bodies, and the Ruling Class decides that this is just too naughty and will investigate and punish the offenders, and yet they will not investigate the robbers among them who have stolen people's life savings and the equity out of their homes, and they even want to sell the public buildings that the Working Class bought with their hard earned dollars, and rent them back to those same people, as long as that is what is running things then I refuse to honor any of them with my vote. 
 
Curious Carl
 

plucking the middle class for dinner

Roger,
Right you are.  Working Class folks who moved into offices and began wearing white shirts and ties and directly kissing the boss's backside instead of having to go through a foreman, those working class people decided that they were just a teeny bit better than the Chester Riley's who wore cover-alls and carried a lunch bucket. 
So they saw themselves as somewhere between the despised Working Class, and the Upper or Ruling Class. 
They even got to the place where they created an Upper Middle Class.  But guess what.  They were never anything except puffed up, self important working class folk. 
And the Ruling Class waited until they were plump and ripe and then began plucking them for dinner. 
 
Curious Carl
 

NFB V. ACB

Subject: Re: NFB V. ACB

My grumble with the NFB is not as much regarding their basic philosophy, although it is rather narrowly focused toward working blind people of some financial means, my problem has always been with the structure of the organization. 
If NFB called itself a National Agency of and for the Blind, I could live with that.  Or perhaps, The National Federation of the Blind Corporation.  But to play the game that they are somehow a "grass roots movement" or, "the blind leading the blind", is just plain untrue. 
Just because an organization holds conventions and people come and vote for stuff does not make that organization a grass roots movement. 
Regardless of whether we like or dislike how ACB is run, we have the ability to change policies and priorities, as well as officers.  We have no lifetime officers.  We don't even always treat our officers with the respect their office should receive.  But that's part of a give and take, honest to goodness, real peoples grass roots movement. 
And ACB is the only such game in town. 
But if folks like being told what to think, and who to vote for, and how much money they should be giving, etc., then have a go with the NFB.  I have several very good and sincere friends in that Company, and I have great respect for what they believe they are doing. 
 
Curious Carl
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Monday, January 16, 2012 10:10 PM
Subject: Re: [acb-chat] NFB V. ACB

Darla, I have similar feelings. I don't agree with the NFB's basic philosophies. So, I don't associate myself with them. I listen to what they say from time to time but cannot support their basic premise. I do agree and support ACB's basic premise so thus I choose to associate with them. However, where I withhold my time and efforts is with my state's chapter of ACB. I do not feel that the current power structure is keeping with the ACB's philosophies of all inclusiveness and grass roots bottom up approach. We talked some time ago, on a different list, about how insular things are around here.  But, that is just the state of affairs here in MA and that doesn't discredit the ACB as a whole.

Frank

 

sucking it up

The process of making our needs met is a slow, pick and shovel affair.  Funny how quickly our working class wealth can be sucked up, but how difficult it is to get any of it back. 
We are on the right track, however.  Growing dissatisfaction and more and more visible protest will move us toward one of two things.  Either we will force government into providing the American working class people some services and protection from predators, or we will be attacked by the forces of the Ruling Class as has been happening around the Globe.  
But the sad truth is that in the meantime we who are on the bottom of the pile will suffer. 
 
Curious Carl
 

sitting on the poop deck

From Charlie: 
         I personally think that there is some important value to
keeping change at a lesser pace than some might prefer.  Keeping the
ship upright as it sails the seas of history is not a bad thing.  Not
paying attention to injustice and greed that keep the upper levels of
the ship in control is not good since those who control the ship also
tend to determine its direction.  My view is we all need to
participate in the decision making around where this ship is headed
and be ready to enjoy both the destination and the ride as we move along.
Charlie.
 
 

Charlie,
 
I can agree with you because I am sitting on the poop deck with a glass of beer and a tuna salad sandwich.  So the ride, while it might be better from the captain's quarters, is pretty good.  But if I were one of those fellows scrubbing the pots and pans for a few dollars and a cramped bunk in the smelly bowels of the cruise ship, I'd have a different slant on things. 
 
Curious Carl
 

are we a class society? maybe a caste system?


It seems to me that much of our nation's history was a two class society.  There were the few very wealthy land owners, later they were joined by the wealthy industrialists, and there was labor. 
All those who labored in the fields or in the factories constituted Labor, or the Working Class.  Whether you were a Black Smith, a ditch digger, a railroad engineer, a carpenter, a painter, a clerk, a short order cook, a construction foreman or a hooker, you were considered part of Labor, or the Working Class. 
It was not the Ruling Class who thought up the term, Middle Class.  It was the members of the working class who wanted to be seen as better than their "blue collar" associates. 
In one of my sociology classes back in the 50's, I recall a graph showing us the Lower Class...those folks living in poverty; the Working Class...Blue Collar Workers; Middle Class...White Collar Workers; Upper Middle Class...Doctors, lawyers, small business owners; Upper Class...or what we call the Ruling Class, Heads of corporations, land barons, etc. 
The memory that stands out in my mind was not the fuzzy lines defining these Classes, but the fact that it was the first time I'd seen anyone suggest that America had Classes.  My grade and high school history classes all taught me that only in America did we live in a classless society.  Why, any boy could grow up to be president.  Any boy could grow up to be a Rockefeller, or a Morgan.  Naturally we were only talking about white boys. 
Anyway, it's all bogus, the pipe dream of some inflated professor needing to publish or perish. 
 
Curious Carl
 
 
 
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Tuesday, January 17, 2012 9:37 AM
Subject: Re: America Isn't a Corporation By PAUL KRUGMAN

Roger:
A middle class country is a nation where, while there are rich and poor, the vast majority of people earn enough money to fall between the two. From a long-term (and economic) perspective, it is better to have a middle class country, because it means that more people have ready cash available to purchase the products manufactured by both the country's manufacturers and importers.
---- Roger --
Ted Chittenden

some thoughts on our class system

Hi All,
What drives me crazy is that so many of us have been brain washed by the constant hammering of the Ruling Classes propaganda that we go along buying into their attitudes about us. 
Certainly when the Ruling Class looks down their noses at the Working Class and tells us over and over to remember our place, and tells us that we are lazy, shiftless, ungrateful, undisciplined, unsophisticated and uneducated, naturally many of us, in order to put distance between ourselves and the rest of the working class,  pretend to be just a little better than the others. 
It bugged me when I looked at what went on within the agency I worked for.  We had a real Pecking Order.  The director let us know that he/she was the top dog and had privileges that went with the office.  The management team, made up from the program administrators, lorded it over the VRC's and Rehab Teachers, and those worthy folk looked down their professional noses at the clerical staff. 
I suggested whenever I could, that we were all employees of the Legislature.  They were our collective boss.  And our legislature in those days looked upon all state employees as if they were doodoo on the shoe of life. 
But no, we must play our little Class Games within the agency. 
We copy what we've been trained to do.  We are a class society and we behave as one regardless of how loudly some of our folks protest. 
 
Curious Carl
 
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Tuesday, January 17, 2012 6:05 PM
Subject: RE: America Isn't a Corporation By PAUL KRUGMAN

Well Carl,

I used to ride on a bus each morning from the apartment that we rented to
Queens College, a city college that charged $10 admission for New York City
high school graduates whose high school averages were above a particular
number.  My father was a skilled laborer.  I had an uncle who had become an
optometrist and he and his wife purchased a little house in the Long Island
suburbs.  I had another uncle who had gone to beauticians' school and who
eventually owned a beauty shop in Washington D.C.  I think one of my uncles
in Canada, owned a store, but I don't know much about the relatives in
Canada.  Anyway, that ride on the bus, shared by many young people, moved
all of us who attended and graduated Queens college into the middle class,
as far as our families were concerned.  Some of us became teachers.  Some of
us went on to graduate school.  The idea was that if you got an education
and worked hard, you'd better your position in society.  You'd earn more
than your parents had and you'd have more opportunities.  There was a clip
on Moyers' show of a teacher from Iowa, addressing a congressional
committee.  She was talking about the fact that she and her husband had both
attained graduate degrees.  They had a good deal of debt from their
education.  They'd worked hard, followed the rules, saved money, waited to
have children and to buy a home, and now they were barely making it
financially.  She was saying, we've worked hard to be a part of the middle
class and we're barely holding on.  That's what the book was talking about.
When the factory jobs leave and everyone is told that they need an education
to compete with the rest of the world, what message is our government giving
to people about the working class?  When farming is done by machines and
underpaid undocumented immigrants, and the respected labor, automobile and
steel manufacture, has disappeared, and that, by the way is what a lot of
people mean by "middle class", those good paying working class jobs, why
wouldn't everyone be confused?

Miriam   

________________________________

From: blind-democracy-bounces@octothorp.org
[mailto:blind-democracy-bounces@octothorp.org] On Behalf Of Carl Jarvis
Sent: Tuesday, January 17, 2012 6:20 PM
To: Blind Democracy Discussion List
Subject: Re: America Isn't a Corporation By PAUL KRUGMAN


It seems to me that much of our nation's history was a two class society.
There were the few very wealthy land owners, later they were joined by the
wealthy industrialists, and there was labor. 
All those who labored in the fields or in the factories constituted Labor,
or the Working Class.  Whether you were a Black Smith, a ditch digger, a
railroad engineer, a carpenter, a painter, a clerk, a short order cook, a
construction foreman or a hooker, you were considered part of Labor, or the
Working Class. 
It was not the Ruling Class who thought up the term, Middle Class.  It was
the members of the working class who wanted to be seen as better than their
"blue collar" associates. 
In one of my sociology classes back in the 50's, I recall a graph showing us
the Lower Class...those folks living in poverty; the Working Class...Blue
Collar Workers; Middle Class...White Collar Workers; Upper Middle
Class...Doctors, lawyers, small business owners; Upper Class...or what we
call the Ruling Class, Heads of corporations, land barons, etc. 
The memory that stands out in my mind was not the fuzzy lines defining these
Classes, but the fact that it was the first time I'd seen anyone suggest
that America had Classes.  My grade and high school history classes all
taught me that only in America did we live in a classless society.  Why, any
boy could grow up to be president.  Any boy could grow up to be a
Rockefeller, or a Morgan.  Naturally we were only talking about white boys.

Anyway, it's all bogus, the pipe dream of some inflated professor needing to
publish or perish. 
 
Curious Carl 
 
 
 

letter from jail

In honor of Martin Luther King Day, reprinted below is the text of Dr. King's original letter written while he was being held in the Birmingham City Jail in Birmingham, Alabama, in April 1963.

 

 

Birmingham City Jail

April 16, 1963

 

My dear Fellow Clergymen,

 

While confined here in the Birmingham City Jail, I came across your recent statement calling our present activities "unwise and untimely." Seldom, if ever, do I pause to answer criticism of my work and ideas. If I sought to answer all the criticisms that cross my desk, my secretaries would be engaged in little else in the course of the day and I would have no time for constructive work. But since I feel that you are men of genuine goodwill and your criticisms are sincerely set forth, I would like to answer your statement in what I hope will be patient and reasonable terms.

 

I think I should give the reason for my being in Birmingham, since you have been influenced by the argument of "outsiders coming in." I have the honor of serving as president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, an organization operating in every Southern state with headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia. We have some eighty-five affiliate organizations all across the South – one being the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights. Whenever necessary and possible we share staff, educational, and financial resources with our affiliates. Several months ago our local affiliate here in Birmingham invited us to be on call to engage in a nonviolent direct action program if such were deemed necessary. We readily consented and when the hour came we lived up to our promises. So I am here, along with several members of my staff, because we were invited here. I am here because I have basic organizational ties here. Beyond this, I am in Birmingham because injustice is here. Just as the eighth century prophets left their little villages and carried their "thus saith the Lord" far beyond the boundaries of their home town, and just as the Apostle Paul left his little village of Tarsus and carried the gospel of Jesus Christ to practically every hamlet and city of the Graeco-Roman world, I too am compelled to carry the gospel of freedom beyond my particular home town. Like Paul, I must constantly respond to the Macedonian call for aid.

 

Moreover, I am cognizant of the interrelatedness of all communities and states. I cannot sit idly by in Atlanta and not be concerned about what happens in Birmingham. Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly affects all indirectly. Never again can we afford to live with the narrow, provincial "outside agitator" idea. Anyone who lives inside the United States can never be considered an outsider anywhere in this country.

 

You deplore the demonstrations that are presently taking place in Birmingham. But I am sorry that your statement did not express a similar concern for the conditions that brought the demonstrations into being. I am sure that each of you would want to go beyond the superficial social analyst who looks merely at effects, and does not grapple with underlying causes. I would not hesitate to say that it is unfortunate that so-called demonstrations are taking place in Birmingham at this time, but I would say in more emphatic terms that it is even more unfortunate that the white power structure of this city left the Negro community with no other alternative.

 

In any nonviolent campaign there are four basic steps: (1) Collection of the facts to determine whether injustices are alive; (2) Negotiation; (3) Self-purification; and (4) Direct action. We have gone through all of these steps in Birmingham. There can be no gainsaying of the fact that racial injustice engulfs this community. Birmingham is probably the most thoroughly segregated city in the United States. Its ugly record of police brutality is known in every section of this country. Its unjust treatment of Negroes in the courts is a notorious reality. There have been more unsolved bombings of Negro homes and churches in Birmingham than any city in this nation. These are the hard, brutal, and unbelievable facts. On the basis of these conditions Negro leaders sought to negotiate with the city fathers. But the political leaders consistently refused to engage in good faith negotiation.

 

Then came the opportunity last September to talk with some of the leaders of the economic community. In these negotiating sessions certain promises were made by the merchants – such as the promise to remove the humiliating racial signs from the stores. On the basis of these promises Rev. Shuttlesworth and the leaders of the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights agreed to call a moratorium on any type of demonstrations. As the weeks and months unfolded we realized that we were the victims of a broken promise. The signs remained. As in so many experiences of the past we were confronted with blasted hopes, and the dark shadow of a deep disappointment settled upon us. So we had no alternative except that of preparing for direct action, whereby we would present our very bodies as a means of laying our case before the conscience of the local and national community. We were not unmindful of the difficulties involved. So we decided to go through a process of self-purification. We started having workshops on nonviolence and repeatedly asked ourselves the questions, "Are you able to accept blows without retaliating?" "Are you able to endure the ordeals of jail?"

 

We decided to set our direct-action program around the Easter season, realizing that with the exception of Christmas, this was the largest shopping period of the year. Knowing that a strong economic withdrawal program would be the by-product of direct action, we felt that this was the best time to bring pressure on the merchants for the needed changes. Then it occurred to us that the March election was ahead, and so we speedily decided to postpone action until after election day. When we discovered that Mr. Connor was in the run-off, we decided again to postpone action so that the demonstrations could not be used to cloud the issues. At this time we agreed to begin our nonviolent witness the day after the run-off.

 

This reveals that we did not move irresponsibly into direct action. We too wanted to see Mr. Connor defeated; so we went through postponement after postponement to aid in this community need. After this we felt that direct action could be delayed no longer.

 

You may well ask, Why direct action? Why sit-ins, marches, etc.? Isn't negotiation a better path?" You are exactly right in your call for negotiation. Indeed, this is the purpose of direct action. Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and establish such creative tension that a community that has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue. It seeks so to dramatize the issue that it can no longer be ignored. I just referred to the creation of tension as a part of the work of the nonviolent resister. This may sound rather shocking. But I must confess that I am not afraid of the word tension. I have earnestly worked and preached against violent tension, but there is a type of constructive nonviolent tension that is necessary for growth. Just as Socrates felt that it was necessary to create a tension in the mind so that individuals could rise from the bondage of myths and half-truths to the unfettered realm of creative analysis and objective appraisal, we must see the need of having nonviolent gadflies to create the kind of tension in society that will help men rise from the dark depths of prejudice and racism to the majestic heights of understanding and brotherhood. So the purpose of the direct action is to create a situation so crisis-packed that it will inevitably open the door to negotiation. We, therefore, concur with you in your call for negotiation. Too long has our beloved Southland been bogged down in the tragic attempt to live in monologue rather than dialogue.

 

One of the basic points in your statement is that our acts are untimely. Some have asked, "Why didn't you give the new administration time to act?" The only answer that I can give to this inquiry is that the new administration must be prodded about as much as the outgoing one before it acts. We will be sadly mistaken if we feel that the election of Mr. Boutwell will bring the millennium to Birmingham. While Mr. Boutwell is much more articulate and gentle than Mr. Connor, they are both segregationists dedicated to the task of maintaining the status quo. The hope I see in Mr. Boutwell is that he will be reasonable enough to see the futility of massive resistance to desegregation. But he will not see this without pressure from the devotees of civil rights. My friends, I must say to you that we have not made a single gain in civil rights without determined legal and nonviolent pressure. History is the long and tragic story of the fact that privileged groups seldom give up their privileges voluntarily. Individuals may see the moral light and voluntarily give up their unjust posture; but as Reinhold Niebuhr has reminded us, groups are more immoral than individuals.

 

We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed. Frankly I have never yet engaged in a direct action movement that was "well timed," according to the timetable of those who have not suffered unduly from the disease of segregation. For years now I have heard the word "Wait!" It rings in the ear of every Negro with a piercing familiarity. This "wait" has almost always meant "never." It has been a tranquilizing thalidomide, relieving the emotional stress for a moment, only to give birth to an ill-formed infant of frustration. We must come to see with the distinguished jurist of yesterday that "justice too long delayed is justice denied." We have waited for more than three hundred and forty years for our constitutional and God-given rights. The nations of Asia and Africa are moving with jet-like speed toward the goal of political independence, and we still creep at horse and buggy pace toward the gaining of a cup of coffee at a lunch counter.

 

I guess it is easy for those who have never felt the stinging darts of segregation to say wait. But when you have seen vicious mobs lynch your mothers and fathers at will and drown your sisters and brothers at whim; when you have seen hate filled policemen curse, kick, brutalize, and even kill your black brothers and sisters with impunity; when you see the vast majority of your twenty million Negro brothers smothering in an air-tight cage of poverty in the midst of an affluent society; when you suddenly find your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you seek to explain to your six-year-old daughter why she can't go to the public amusement park that has just been advertised on television, and see tears welling up in her little eyes when she is told that Funtown is closed to colored children, and see the depressing clouds of inferiority begin to form in her little mental sky, and see her begin to distort her little personality by unconsciously developing a bitterness toward white people; when you have to concoct an answer for a five-year-old son asking in agonizing pathos: "Daddy, why do white people treat colored people so mean?"; when you take a cross-country drive and find it necessary to sleep night after night in the uncomfortable corners of your automobile because no motel will accept you; when you are humiliated day in and day out by nagging signs reading "white" men and "colored"; when your first name becomes "nigger" and your middle name becomes "boy" (however old you are) and your last name becomes "John," and when your wife and mother are never given the respected title "Mrs."; when you are harried by day and haunted by night by the fact that you are a Negro, living constantly at tip-toe stance never quite knowing what to expect next, and plagued with inner fears and outer resentments; when you are forever fighting a degenerating sense of "nobodiness" – then you will understand why we find it difficult to wait. There comes a time when the cup of endurance runs over, and men are no longer willing to be plunged into an abyss of injustice where they experience the bleakness of corroding despair. I hope, sirs, you can understand our legitimate and unavoidable impatience.

 

You express a great deal of anxiety over our willingness to break laws. This is certainly a legitimate concern. Since we so diligently urge people to obey the Supreme Court's decision of 1954 outlawing segregation in the public schools, it is rather strange and paradoxical to find us consciously breaking laws. One may well ask: "How can you advocate breaking some laws and obeying others?" The answer is found in the fact that there are two types of laws: There are just laws and there are unjust laws. I would be the first to advocate obeying just laws. One has not only a legal but moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws. I would agree with Saint Augustine that "An unjust law is no law at all."

 

Now what is the difference between the two? How does one determine when a law is just or unjust? A just law is a man-made code that squares with the moral law or the law of God. An unjust law is a code that is out of harmony with the moral law. To put it in the terms of Saint Thomas Aquinas, an unjust law is a human law that is not rooted in eternal and natural law. Any law that uplifts human personality is just. Any law that degrades human personality is unjust. All segregation statutes are unjust because segregation distorts the soul and damages the personality. It gives the segregator a false sense of superiority and the segregated a false sense of inferiority. To use the words of Martin Buber, the great Jewish philosopher, segregation substitutes an "I-it" relationship for an "I-thou" relationship, and ends up relegating persons to the status of things. So segregation is not only politically, economically, and sociologically unsound, but it is morally wrong and sinful. Paul Tillich has said that sin is separation. Isn't segregation an existential expression of man's tragic separation, an expression of his awful estrangement, his terrible sinfulness? So I can urge men to obey the1954 decision of the Supreme Court because it is morally right, and I can urge them to disobey segregation ordinances because they are morally wrong.

 

Let us turn to a more concrete example of just and unjust laws. An unjust law is a code that a majority inflicts on a minority that is not binding on itself. This is difference made legal. On the other hand a just law is a code that a majority compels a minority to follow that it is willing to follow itself. This is sameness made legal.

 

Let me give another explanation. An unjust law is a code inflicted upon a minority which that minority had no part in enacting or creating because they did not have the unhampered right to vote. Who can say that the legislature of Alabama which set up the segregation laws was democratically elected? Throughout the state of Alabama all types of conniving methods are used to prevent Negroes from becoming registered voters and there are some counties without a single Negro registered to vote despite the fact that the Negro constitutes a majority of the population. Can any law set up in such a state be considered democratically structured?

 

These are just a few examples of unjust and just laws. There are some instances when a law is just on its face but unjust in its application. For instance, I was arrested Friday on a charge of parading without a permit. Now there is nothing wrong with an ordinance which requires a permit for a parade, but when the ordinance is used to preserve segregation and to deny citizens the First Amendment privilege of peaceful assembly and peaceful protest, then it becomes unjust.

 

I hope you can see the distinction I am trying to point out. In no sense do I advocate evading or defying the law as the rabid segregationist would do. This would lead to anarchy. One who breaks an unjust law must do it openly, lovingly (not hatefully as the white mothers did in New Orleans when they were seen on television screaming "nigger, nigger, nigger") and with a willingness to accept the penalty. I submit that an individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him is unjust, and willingly accepts the penalty by staying in jail to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the very highest respect for law.

 

Of course there is nothing new about this kind of civil disobedience. It was seen sublimely in the refusal of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego to obey the laws of Nebuchadnezzar because a higher moral law was involved. It was practiced superbly by the early Christians who were willing to face hungry lions and the excruciating pain of chopping blocks, before submitting to certain unjust laws of the Roman Empire. To a degree academic freedom is a reality today because Socrates practiced civil disobedience.

 

We can never forget that everything Hitler did in Germany was "legal" and everything the Hungarian freedom fighters did in Hungary was "illegal." It was "illegal" to aid and comfort a Jew in Hitler's Germany. But I am sure that, if I had lived in Germany during that time, I would have aided and comforted my Jewish brothers even though it was illegal. If I lived in a communist country today where certain principles dear to the Christian faith are suppressed, I believe I would openly advocate disobeying these anti-religious laws.

 

I must make two honest confessions to you, my Christian and Jewish brothers. First, I must confess that over the last few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negroes' great stumbling block in the 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; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says "I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I can't agree with your methods of direct action"; who paternalistically feels that he can set the timetable for another man's freedom; who lives by the myth of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait until a "more convenient season." Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.

 

I had hoped that the white moderate would understand that law and order exist for the purpose of establishing justice, and that when they fail to do this they become dangerously structured dams that block the flow of social progress. I had hoped that the white moderate would understand that the present tension in the South is merely a necessary phase of the transition from an obnoxious negative peace, where the Negro passively accepted his unjust plight, to a substance-filled positive peace, where all men will respect the dignity and worth of human personality. Actually, we who engage in nonviolent direct action are not the creators of tension. We merely bring to the surface the hidden tension that is already alive. We bring it out in the open where it can be seen and dealt with. Like a boil that can never be cured as long as it is covered up but must be opened with all its pus-flowing ugliness to the natural medicines of air and light, injustice must likewise be exposed, with all of the tension its exposing creates, to the light of human conscience and the air of national opinion before it can be cured.

 

In your statement you asserted that our actions, even though peaceful, must be condemned because they precipitate violence. But can this assertion be logically made? Isn't this like condemning the robbed man because his possession of money precipitated the evil act of robbery? Isn't this like condemning Socrates because his unswerving commitment to truth and his philosophical delvings precipitated the misguided popular mind to make him drink the hemlock? Isn't this like condemning Jesus because His unique God consciousness and never-ceasing devotion to His will precipitated the evil act of crucifixion? We must come to see, as federal courts have consistently affirmed, that it is immoral to urge an individual to withdraw his efforts to gain his basic constitutional rights because the quest precipitates violence. Society must protect the robbed and punish the robber.

 

I had also hoped that the white moderate would reject the myth of time. I received a letter this morning from a white brother in Texas which said: "All Christians know that the colored people will receive equal rights eventually, but is it possible that you are in too great of a religious hurry? It has taken Christianity almost 2,000 years to accomplish what it has. The teachings of Christ take time to come to earth." All that is said here grows out of a tragic misconception of time. It is the strangely irrational notion that there is something in the very flow of time that will inevitably cure all ills. Actually time is neutral. It can be used either destructively or constructively. I am coming to feel that the people of ill will have used time much more effectively than the people of good will. We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the vitriolic words and actions of the bad people, but for the appalling silence of the good people. We must come to see that human progress never rolls in on wheels of inevitability. It comes through the tireless efforts and persistent work of men willing to be co-workers with God, and without this hard work time itself becomes an ally of the forces of social stagnation.

 

We must use time creatively, and forever realize that the time is always ripe to do right. Now is the time to make real the promise of democracy, and transform our pending national elegy into a creative psalm of brotherhood. Now is the time to lift our national policy from the quicksand of racial injustice to the solid rock of human dignity.

 

You spoke of our activity in Birmingham as extreme. At first I was rather disappointed that fellow clergymen would see my nonviolent efforts as those of the extremist. I started thinking about the fact that I stand in the middle of two opposing forces in the Negro community. One is a force of complacency made up of Negroes who, as a result of long years of oppression, have been so completely drained of self-respect and a sense of "somebodiness" that they have adjusted to segregation, and of a few Negroes in the middle class who, because of a degree of academic and economic security, and because at points they profit by segregation, have unconsciously become insensitive to the problems of the masses. The other force is one of bitterness and hatred and comes perilously close to advocating violence. It is expressed in the various black nationalist groups that are springing up over the nation, the largest and best known being Elijah Muhammad's Muslim movement. This movement is nourished by the contemporary frustration over the continued existence of racial discrimination. It is made up of people who have lost faith in America, who have absolutely repudiated Christianity, and who have concluded that the white man is an incurable "devil." I have tried to stand between these two forces saying that we need not follow the "do-nothingism" of the complacent or the hatred and despair of the black nationalist. There is the more excellent way of love and nonviolent protest. I'm grateful to God that, through the Negro church, the dimension of nonviolence entered our struggle. If this philosophy had not emerged I am convinced that by now many streets of the South would be flowing with floods of blood. And I am further convinced that if our white brothers dismiss us as "rabble rousers" and "outside agitators" – those of us who are working through the channels of nonviolent direct action – and refuse to support our nonviolent efforts, millions of Negroes, out of frustration and despair, will seek solace and security in black-nationalist ideologies, a development that will lead inevitably to a frightening racial nightmare.

 

Oppressed people cannot remain oppressed forever. The urge for freedom will eventually come. This is what has happened to the American Negro. Something within has reminded him of his birthright of freedom; something without has reminded him that he can gain it. Consciously and unconsciously, he has been swept in by what the Germans call the Zeitgeist, and with his black brothers of Africa, and his brown and yellow brothers of Asia, South America, and the Caribbean, he is moving with a sense of cosmic urgency toward the promised land of racial justice. Recognizing this vital urge that has engulfed the Negro community, one should readily understand public demonstrations. The Negro has many pent-up resentments and latent frustrations. He has to get them out. So let him march sometime; let him have his prayer pilgrimages to the city hall; understand why he must have sit-ins and freedom rides. If his repressed emotions do not come out in these nonviolent ways, they will come out in ominous expressions of violence. This is not a threat; it is a fact of history. So I have not said to my people, "Get rid of your discontent." But I have tried to say that this normal and healthy discontent can be channeled through the creative outlet of nonviolent direct action. Now this approach is being dismissed as extremist. I must admit that I was initially disappointed in being so categorized.

 

But as I continued to think about the matter I gradually gained a bit of satisfaction from being considered an extremist. Was not Jesus an extremist in love? "Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, pray for them that despitefully use you." Was not Amos an extremist for justice – "Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream." Was not Paul an extremist for the gospel of Jesus Christ – "I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus." Was not Martin Luther an extremist – "Here I stand; I can do none other so help me God." Was not John Bunyan an extremist – "I will stay in jail to the end of my days before I make a butchery of my conscience." Was not Abraham Lincoln an extremist – "This nation cannot survive half slave and half free." Was not Thomas Jefferson an extremist – "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal." So the question is not whether we will be extremist but what kind of extremist will we be. Will we be extremists for hate or will we be extremists for love? Will we be extremists for the preservation of injustice – or will we be extremists for the cause of justice? In that dramatic scene on Calvary's hill three men were crucified. We must never forget that all three were crucified for the same crime – the crime of extremism. Two were extremists for immorality, and thus fell below their environment. The other, Jesus Christ, was an extremist for love, truth, and goodness, and thereby rose above His environment. So, after all, maybe the South, the nation, and the world are in dire need of creative extremists.

 

I had hoped that the white moderate would see this. Maybe I was too optimistic. Maybe I expected too much. I guess I should have realized that few members of a race that has oppressed another race can understand or appreciate the deep groans and passionate yearnings of those that have been oppressed, and still fewer have the vision to see that injustice must be rooted out by strong, persistent, and determined action. I am thankful, however, that some of our white brothers have grasped the meaning of this social revolution and committed themselves to it. They are still all too small in quantity, but they are big in quality. Some like Ralph McGill, Lillian Smith, Harry Golden, and James Dabbs have written about our struggle in eloquent, prophetic, and understanding terms. Others have marched with us down nameless streets of the South. They have languished in filthy, roach-infested jails, suffering the abuse and brutality of angry policemen who see them as "dirty nigger lovers." They, unlike so many of their moderate brothers and sisters, have recognized the urgency of the moment and sensed the need for powerful "action" antidotes to combat the disease of segregation.

 

Let me rush on to mention my other disappointment. I have been so greatly disappointed with the white Church and its leadership. Of course there are some notable exceptions. I am not unmindful of the fact that each of you has taken some significant stands on this issue. I commend you, Rev. Stallings, for your Christian stand on this past Sunday, in welcoming Negroes to your worship service on a non-segregated basis. I commend the Catholic leaders of this state for integrating Spring Hill College several years ago.

 

But despite these notable exceptions I must honestly reiterate that I have been disappointed with the Church. I do not say that as one of those negative critics who can always find something wrong with the Church. I say it as a minister of the gospel, who loves the Church; who was nurtured in its bosom; who has been sustained by its spiritual blessings and who will remain true to it as long as the cord of life shall lengthen.

 

I had the strange feeling when I was suddenly catapulted into the leadership of the bus protest in Montgomery several years ago that we would have the support of the white Church. I felt that the white ministers, priests, and rabbis of the South would be some of our strongest allies. Instead, some have been outright opponents, refusing to understand the freedom movement and misrepresenting its leaders; all too many others have been more cautious than courageous and have remained silent behind the anesthetizing security of the stained glass windows.

 

In spite of my shattered dreams of the past, I came to Birmingham with the hope that the white religious leadership of this community would see the justice of our cause and with deep moral concern, serve as the channel through which our just grievances could get to the power structure. I had hoped that each of you would understand. But again I have been disappointed.

 

I have heard numerous religious leaders of the South call upon their worshippers to comply with a desegregation decision because it is the law, but I have longed to hear white ministers say follow this decree because integration is morally right and the Negro is your brother. In the midst of blatant injustices inflicted upon the Negro, I have watched white churches stand on the sideline and merely mouth pious irrelevancies and sanctimonious trivialities. In the midst of a mighty struggle to rid our nation of racial and economic injustice, I have heard so many ministers say, "Those are social issues with which the gospel has no real concern," and I have watched so many churches commit themselves to a completely other-worldly religion which made a strange distinction between body and soul, the sacred and the secular.

 

So here we are moving toward the exit of the twentieth century with a religious community largely adjusted to the status quo, standing as a tail-light behind other community agencies rather than a headlight leading men to higher levels of justice.

 

I have travelled the length and breadth of Alabama, Mississippi and all the other southern states. On sweltering summer days and crisp autumn mornings I have looked at her beautiful churches with their spires pointing heavenward. I have beheld the impressive outlay of her massive religious education buildings. Over and over again I have found myself asking: "Who worships here? Who is their God? Where were their voices when the lips of Governor Barnett dripped with words of interposition and nullification? Where were they when Governor Wallace gave the clarion call for defiance and hatred? Where were their voices of support when tired, bruised, and weary Negro men and women decided to rise from the dark dungeons of complacency to the bright hills of creative protest?"

 

Yes, these questions are still in my mind. In deep disappointment, I have wept over the laxity of the church. But be assured that my tears have been tears of love. There can be no deep disappointment where there is not deep love. Yes, I love the Church; I love her sacred walls. How could I do otherwise? I am in the rather unique position of being the son, the grandson, and the great-grandson of preachers. Yes, I see the Church as the body of Christ. But, oh! How we have blemished and scarred that body through social neglect and fear of being nonconformist.

 

There was a time when the Church was very powerful. It was during that period when the early Christians rejoiced when they were deemed worthy to suffer for what they believed. In those days the Church was not merely a thermometer that recorded the ideas and principles of popular opinion; it was a thermostat that transformed the mores of society. Wherever the early Christians entered a town the power structure got disturbed and immediately sought to convict them for being "disturbers of the peace" and "outside agitators." But they went on with the conviction that they were "a colony of heaven" and had to obey God rather than man. They were small in number but big in commitment. They were too God-intoxicated to be "astronomically intimidated." They brought an end to such ancient evils as infanticide and gladiatorial contest.

 

Things are different now. The contemporary Church is so often a weak, ineffectual voice with an uncertain sound. It is so often the arch-supporter of the status quo. Far from being disturbed by the presence of the Church, the power structure of the average community is consoled by the Church's silent and often vocal sanction of things as they are.

 

But the judgment of God is upon the Church as never before. If the Church of today does not recapture the sacrificial spirit of the early Church, it will lose its authentic ring, forfeit the loyalty of millions, and be dismissed as an irrelevant social club with no meaning for the twentieth century. I am meeting young people every day whose disappointment with the Church has risen to outright disgust.

 

Maybe again I have been too optimistic. Is organized religion too inextricably bound to the status quo to save our nation and the world? Maybe I must turn my faith to the inner spiritual Church, the church within the Church, as the true ecclesia and the hope of the world. But again I am thankful to God that some noble souls from the ranks of organized religion have broken loose from the paralyzing chains of conformity and joined us as active partners in the struggle for freedom. They have left their secure congregations and walked the streets of Albany, Georgia, with us. They have gone through the highways of the South on torturous rides for freedom. Yes, they have gone to jail with us. Some have been kicked out of their churches and lost the support of their bishops and fellow ministers. But they have gone with the faith that right defeated is stronger than evil triumphant. These men have been the leaven in the lump of the race. Their witness has been the spiritual salt that has preserved the true meaning of the Gospel in these troubled times. They have carved a tunnel of hope through the dark mountain of disappointment.

 

I hope the Church as a whole will meet the challenge of this decisive hour. But even if the Church does not come to the aid of justice, I have no despair about the future. I have no fear about the outcome of our struggle in Birmingham, even if our motives are presently misunderstood. We will reach the goal of freedom in Birmingham and all over the nation, because the goal of America is freedom. Abused and scorned though we may be, our destiny is tied up with the destiny of America. Before the pilgrims landed at Plymouth, we were here. Before the pen of Jefferson etched across the pages of history the majestic words of the Declaration of Independence, we were here. For more than two centuries our foreparents labored in this country without wages; they made cotton "king"; and they built the homes of their masters in the midst of brutal injustice and shameful humiliation – and yet out of a bottomless vitality they continued to thrive and develop. If the inexpressible cruelties of slavery could not stop us, the opposition we now face will surely fail. We will win our freedom because the sacred heritage of our nation and the eternal will of God are embodied in our echoing demands.

 

I must close now. But before closing I am impelled to mention one other point in your statement that troubled me profoundly. You warmly commend the Birmingham police force for keeping "order" and "preventing violence." I don't believe you would have so warmly commended the police force if you had seen its angry violent dogs literally biting six unarmed, nonviolent Negroes. I don't believe you would so quickly commend the policemen if you would observe their ugly and inhuman treatment of Negroes here in the city jail; if you would watch them push and curse old Negro women and young Negro girls; if you would see them slap and kick old Negro men and young Negro boys; if you will observe them, as they did on two occasions, refuse to give us food because we wanted to sing our grace together. I'm sorry that I can't join you in your praise for the police department.

 

It is true that they have been rather disciplined in their public handling of the demonstrators. In this sense they have been rather publicly "nonviolent." But for what purpose? To preserve the evil system of segregation. Over the last few years I have consistently preached that nonviolence demands the means we use must be as pure as the ends we seek. So I have tried to make it clear that it is wrong to use immoral means to attain moral ends. But now I must affirm that it is just as wrong or even more so to use moral means to preserve immoral ends. Maybe Mr. Connor and his policemen have been rather publicly nonviolent, as Chief Pritchett was in Albany, Georgia, but they have used the moral means of nonviolence to maintain the immoral end of flagrant injustice. T. S. Eliot has said that there is no greater treason than to do the right deed for the wrong reason.

 

I wish you had commended the Negro sit-inners and demonstrators of Birmingham for their sublime courage, their willingness to suffer, and their amazing discipline in the midst of the most inhuman provocation. One day the South will recognize its real heroes. They will be the James Merediths, courageously and with a majestic sense of purpose, facing jeering and hostile mobs and the agonizing loneliness that characterizes the life of the pioneer. They will be old, oppressed, battered Negro women, symbolized in a seventy-two year old woman of Montgomery, Alabama, who rose up with a sense of dignity and with her people decided not to ride the segregated buses, and responded to one who inquired about her tiredness with ungrammatical profundity: "My feets is tired, but my soul is rested." They will be the young high school and college students, young ministers of the gospel and a host of their elders courageously and nonviolently sitting-in at lunch counters and willingly going to jail for conscience sake. One day the South will know that when these disinherited children of God sat down at lunch counters they were in reality standing up for the best in the American dream and the most sacred values in our Judaeo-Christian heritage, and thus carrying our whole nation back to great wells of democracy which were dug deep by the founding fathers in the formulation of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence.

 

Never before have I written a letter this long (or should I say a book?). I'm afraid it is much too long to take your precious time. I can assure you that it would have been much shorter if I had been writing from a comfortable desk, but what else is there to do when you are alone for days in the dull monotony of a narrow jail cell other than write long letters, think strange thoughts, and pray long prayers?

 

If I have said anything in this letter that is an overstatement of the truth and is indicative of an unreasonable impatience, I beg you to forgive me. If I have said anything in this letter that is an understatement of the truth and is indicative of my having a patience that makes me patient with anything less than brotherhood, I beg God to forgive me.

 

I hope this letter finds you strong in the faith. I also hope that circumstances will soon make it possible for me to meet each of you, not as an integrationist or a civil rights leader, but as a fellow clergyman and a Christian brother. Let us all hope that the dark clouds of racial prejudice will soon pass away and the deep fog of misunderstanding will be lifted from our fear-drenched communities and in some not too distant tomorrow the radiant stars of love and brotherhood will shine over our great nation with all their scintillating beauty.

 

Yours for the cause of

Peace and Brotherhood,

 

Martin Luther King, Jr.