Martin Luther King`S

“I Have A Dream” Essay, Research Paper

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Martin Luther King, “I Have a Dream,” 28 August 1963

Occasion: The keynote speech at the 1963 March on Washington for

Jobs and Freedom, King gave the address from the steps of the

Lincoln Memorial to about 250,000 people assembled before him. The

speech was also broadcast on TV and published in newspapers. Since

1963, King’s “I Have a Dream” speech has become the most famous

public address of 20th century America. The immediate effect of the

speech also shaped American history. Julian Bond, a fellow

participant in the civil rights movement and student of King, would

write, “King’s dramatic 1963 ‘I Have a Dream’ speech before the

Lincoln Memorial cemented his place as first among equals in civil

rights leadership; from this first televised mass meeting, an American

audience saw and heard the unedited oratory of America’s finest

preacher, and for the first time, a mass white audience heard the

undeniable justice of black demands” (Seattle Times, 4 April 1993).

“I Have a Dream”

I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the

greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation.

Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we

stand today, signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree

came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had

been seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous

daybreak to end the long night of their captivity.

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But 100 years later, the Negro still is not free. One hundred years later,

the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation

and the chains of discrimination. One hundred years later, the Negro lives

on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material

prosperity. One hundred years later, the Negro is still languished in the

corners of American society and finds himself an exile in his own land. And

so we’ve come here today to dramatize a shameful condition.

In a sense we’ve come to our nation’s capital to cash a check. When

the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the

Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a

promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a

promise that all men – yes, black men as well as white men – would be

guaranteed the unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note

insofar as her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this

sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check, a check

that has come back marked “insufficient funds.”

But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse

to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity

of this nation. And so we’ve come to cash this check, a check that will give

us upon demand the riches of freedom and security of justice. We have also

come to his hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of now.

This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the

tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is the time to make real the promises

of democracy. Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of

segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice. Now is the time to lift our

nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to the solid rock of

brotherhood. Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God’s

children.

It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment.

This sweltering summer of the Negro’s legitimate discontent will not pass

until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality. Nineteen

sixty-three is not an end but a beginning. Those who hoped that the Negro

needed to blow off steam and will now be content will have a rude

awakening if the nation returns to business as usual. There will be neither

rest nor tranquility in America until the Negro is granted his citizenship

rights. The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our

nation until the bright day of justice emerges.

But there is something that I must say to my people who stand on the

warm threshold which leads into the palace of justice. In the process of

gaining our rightful place we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not

seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness

and hatred. We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of

dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate

into physic

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