Senator John Kennedy (R-La.) Reads Letter from Birmingham Jail

senator from Louisiana Madam President with me today is one of my colleagues from my office mr. Blaine callus and president the words of dr. King letter from a Birmingham jail April 16 1963 My dear fellow clergymen while confined here in the Birmingham City Jail I came across your recent statement calling my present activities unwise and untimely seldom do I pause to answer criticism of my working ideas if I sought to answer all of the criticisms that crossed my desk my secretaries would have little time for anything other than such correspondence in the course of a day and I would have no time for constructive work but since I feel you are men of genuine goodwill and that your criticisms are sincerely set forth I will try to answer your statement and what I hope will be patient and reasonable terms I think I should indicate why I am here in Birmingham since you have been influenced by the view which argues against 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 85 affiliated organizations across the south and one of them is the Alabama Christian movement for Human Rights frequently we share staff educational and financial resources with our affiliates several months ago the affiliate here in Birmingham asked us to be on call to engage in a non-violent direct action program if such were deemed and necessary we readily consented and when the hour came we lived up to our promise so I along with several members of my staff and here because I was invited here I am here because I have organizational ties here but more basically I am in Birmingham because injustice is here just as the prophets of the eighth century BC left their villages and carried their thus saith the Lord far beyond the boundaries of their hometowns and just as the Apostle Paul left his village of Tarsus and carried the gospel of Jesus Christ to the far corners of the greco-roman world so am i compelled to carry the gospel of freedom beyond my hometown Mike Paul 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 a narrow provincial outside agitator idea anyone who lives inside the United States can never be considered an outsider anywhere within its bounds now you deplore the demonstrations taking place in Birmingham but your statement I am sorry to say fails to express a similar concern for the conditions that brought about the demonstrations I am sure that none of you would want to rest content with the superficial kind of social analysis that deals merely with effects and does not grapple with underlying causes it is unfortunate the demonstrations are taking place in Birmingham but it is even more unfortunate that the city's white power structure left the African American community with no alternative in any nonviolent campaign there are four basic steps collection of the facts to determine whether injustice exists negotiation self purification and direct action we have gone through all these steps in Birmingham there can be no gainsaying the fact that racial injustice engulfs this community Birmingham is probably the most thoroughly segregated city in the United States its ugly record of brutality is widely known african-americans have experienced mostly unjust treatment in the courts there have been more unsolved bombings of african-american homes and churches in Birmingham than in any other city in the nation these are the hard brutal facts of the case on the basis of these conditions african-american leaders sought to negotiate with the city fathers but the latter consistently refused to engage in good faith negotiation then last September came the opportunity to talk with leaders of the Birmingham's economic community in the course of the negotiations certain promises were made by the merchants for example to remove the stores humiliating racial signs on the basis of these promises the Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth and the leaders of the Alabama Christian movement for Human Rights agreed to a moratorium on all demonstrations as the weeks and months went by we realized that we were the victims of a broken promise a few signs a few signs briefly removed returned the others remained as in so many past experiences our hopes had been blessed and the shadow of deep disappointment settled upon us we had no alternative except to prepare for direct action whereby we would present our very bodies as a means of laying our case before the conscience of the local and the national community mindful of the difficulties involved we decided to undertake a process of self purification we began a series of workshops on non-violence and we repeatedly ask ourselves are you able to accept the blows without retaliation are you able to endure the ordeal of jail we decided to schedule our direct action program for the Easter season realizing that except for Christmas this is the main shopping period of the year knowing that a strong economic withdrawal program would be the byproduct of direct action we felt that this would be the best time to bring pressure to bear on the merchants for the needed change then it occurred to us that birmingham's mayoral election was coming up in March and we speedily decided to postpone action until action after election day when we discovered that the Commissioner of Public Safety Eugene Bull Connor had piled up enough votes to be in the runoff we decided to gain to postpone action until the day after the runoff so that the demonstrations could not be used to cloud the issues like many others we waited to see mr. Connor defeated and to this end we endured postponement after postpone having aided in this community need we felt our direct action could be delayed no longer the words of dr. King a letter from a Birmingham jail April 16 1963

Channel: Senator Doug Jones

Views: 1,371

Rating: 4.8571429 out of 5

Keywords:

Id: YbKns2tVI4o

Length: 10min 40sec (640 seconds)

Published: Tue Jun 16 2020