From the Chair: 62 Years Later, Dr. King’s Letter from Birmingham Jail Speaks

Michelle Deatrick, Chair of the DNC Council on the Environment and Climate Crisis, discusses the continued power and relevance of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s Letter from Birmingham Jail.

62 years ago this week, Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Junior smuggled his landmark letter out of the Birmingham, Alabama City Jail, where he was imprisoned as a participant in nonviolent, peaceful demonstrations against segregation. 

Source: Creative Commons, Dr. Martin Luther King Speaks at “I Have a Dream Rally”, 28 August 1963

Today, reading that letter again, I am struck by how it speaks to our time now, just as it did 62 years ago: eloquently, powerfully and with deep relevance. 

In his letter, Dr. King was responding to white pastors in the area, who had issued a statement that called his activities as an organizer and protestor of injustice “unwise and untimely.” They characterized him as an “outsider”, a disruptor. They said it wasn’t time yet to demand justice, equality or equity in the streets by the people. To instead let leaders negotiate. To press the case in the courts. 

Dr. King writes to those pastors: 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… Anyone who lives in the United States can never be considered an outsider.

And he goes on to remind those pastors - and us - “of the interrelatedness of all communities and states.”

There is no such thing as an outsider. We all live here together. In our communities, in our states, in our country and on this Earth. 

In response to the white pastors’ urging to stay out of the streets, Dr. King emphasizes the necessity of action: We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.

That’s right. Progress is not inevitable. Justice comes through the tireless efforts of men and women. Of people. People like us. People who with hope and courage put their hearts and hands and heads to work, to organize: For justice, for fairness, for good will. For the good of the world and all the people in it. 

On this day, we need that kind of hope and courage. We will need that hope and courage for many days, and weeks to come. We therefore must have hope, and courage - and fortitude. 

It is going to take millions of us. Millions of us on the streets and on the sidewalks. Millions of us raising our voices and making ourselves heard outside the state houses, outside the Capitol and outside the White House. 

We must also keep fighting in the courts. And in the halls of power. But that is not enough. Not nearly enough. Without we - we the people - gathering and peacefully resisting, we will not win. And so when I am asked if rallies matter, if marches matter, if the signs and the chants and the speeches matter: My answer is a resounding yes. 

Just over four months after Dr. King’s letter was smuggled out in bits and pieces from that Birmingham jail cell, more than a quarter of a million people gathered near the Lincoln Memorial in the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. Soon after, LBJ signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964 into law, and a year later, he signed the National Voting Rights Act. 

We can make a difference. We must.