Martin Luther King, Jr. - a True Legend
Posted April 4, 2008 
40 years after his assassination, Martin Luther King is being remembered not only as a historical figure but a dynamic human being. Martin Luther King forever changed the landscape of American society, but the full scope of his views have been widely ignored since his passing. According to MSNBC, Rev. King felt backed into a corner regarding his stance on the Vietnam War, his relationship with the Black Power movement, and defense of the poor in the United States.
Four decades after his passing, several scholars have released reports documenting the nation's disproportionate social and economic progress since 1968. Ironically, war and poverty - two issues that were consuming him at the time of his death - are the prevelant issues of present day America.
In a 1967 speech at Riverside Church, NYC, King shared his position on the Vietnam War, and its' link to poverty. "Perhaps a more tragic recognition of reality took place when it became clear to me that the war was doing far more than devastating the hopes of the poor at home. It was sending their sons and their brothers and their husbands to fight and to die in extraordinarily high proportions relative to the rest of the population. So we have been repeatedly faced with the cruel irony of watching Negro and white boys on TV screens as they kill and die together for a nation that has been unable to seat them together in the same schools."
Today Martin Luther King can be remembered as a legend whose strength and courage indelibly shaped a nation. A true patriot who put his life on the line to make his vision of a better world a reality.
40 years after his assassination, Martin Luther King is being remembered not only as a historical figure but a dynamic human being. Martin Luther King forever changed the landscape of American society, but the full scope of his views have been widely ignored since his passing. According to MSNBC, Rev. King felt backed into a corner regarding his stance on the Vietnam War, his relationship with the Black Power movement, and defense of the poor in the United States.
Four decades after his passing, several scholars have released reports documenting the nation's disproportionate social and economic progress since 1968. Ironically, war and poverty - two issues that were consuming him at the time of his death - are the prevelant issues of present day America.
In a 1967 speech at Riverside Church, NYC, King shared his position on the Vietnam War, and its' link to poverty. "Perhaps a more tragic recognition of reality took place when it became clear to me that the war was doing far more than devastating the hopes of the poor at home. It was sending their sons and their brothers and their husbands to fight and to die in extraordinarily high proportions relative to the rest of the population. So we have been repeatedly faced with the cruel irony of watching Negro and white boys on TV screens as they kill and die together for a nation that has been unable to seat them together in the same schools."
Today Martin Luther King can be remembered as a legend whose strength and courage indelibly shaped a nation. A true patriot who put his life on the line to make his vision of a better world a reality.
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