"A true revolution of values will lay hand on the world order and say of war, 'This way of settling differences is not just.' This business of burning human beings with napalm, of filling our nation's homes with orphans and widows, of injecting poisonous drugs of hate into the veins of peoples normally humane, of sending men home from dark and bloody battlefields physically handicapped and psychologically deranged, cannot be reconciled with wisdom, justice, and love."
So said the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. on April 4, 1967, at the Riverside Church in New York City, exactly one year before his assassination in Memphis. This speech condemning the Viet Nam War is at least as amazing as the "I Have a Dream" speech of August 1963. In one sense it is more amazing because of the wrenching debate then raging in the nation regarding that horrible and unjust war, a war for which the United States has never apologized.
And in this speech Dr. King speaks about economics as the great oppressor in America.
Neither of these topics is preferred by today's commentators on the life of Dr. King. Yet, the 1967 speech is part of his legacy just as much as the earlier speech.
I am very happy to commend the speech referenced here to you. Simply click on the title above or cut and paste the link below.
http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/mlkatimetobreaksilence.htm
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