martin luther king jr vietnam war speech transcript martin luther king jr vietnam war speech transcript

A true revolution of values will soon look uneasily on the glaring contrast of poverty and wealth. I come to this platform tonight to make a passionate plea to my beloved nation. What liberators? A Comparative Study of Martin Luther King Jr & Malcolm X. by. Some 250,000 people gathered at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., for the March on Washington. The authoritative record of NPRs programming is the audio record. These are days which demand wise restraint and calm reasonableness. 0000040748 00000 n And that's just the Times and the Post. But it ends up being the most controversial speech. But they didn't stay for the speech in its entirety. When we ask why they do not leap to negotiate, these things must be remembered. A few years ago there was a shining moment in that struggle. Though the cause of evil prosper, Yet tis truth alone is strong; Though her portion be the scaffold, And upon the throne be wrong: Yet that scaffold sways the future, And behind the dim unknown, Standeth God within the shadow Keeping watch above his own. And that is precisely what concerned Dr. King so much, that these young boys were being sent halfway around the world to fight a war that was unwinnable, that resources were being used there that should've been used here at home. 3. His wife, Coretta Scott King, on the other hand, critiqued the war publicly for years before her husband did. Before long they must know that their government has sent them into a struggle among Vietnamese, and the more sophisticated surely realize that we are on the side of the wealthy and the secure while we create hell for the poor. In this unfolding conundrum of life and history there is such a thing as being too late. Procrastination is still the thief of time. A few years ago there was a shining moment in that. Over the past two years, as I have moved to break the betrayal of my own silences and to speak from the burnings of my own heart, as I have called for radical departures from the destruction of Vietnam, many persons have questioned me about the wisdom of my path. At the time, civil rights leaders publicly condemned him for it. Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence . "It basically ruins their relationship," says Smiley. Screenshots are considered by the King Estate a violation of this notice. Our only hope today lies in our ability to recapture the revolutionary spirit and go out into a sometimes hostile world declaring eternal hostility to poverty, racism, and militarism. And Walt's with us from Cortez in Colorado. When he saw those pictures, there's a very famous picture, Neal, that we all know of a Vietnamese girl running naked in the streets who had just been, you know, had been victimized as had her village by these napalm attacks. The march was organized by the Spring Mobilization Committee to End the War in Vietnam and initiated by its chairman, James Bevel. 0000004621 00000 n He had fallen off already the list, as you mentioned, had already fallen off the list of the most admired Americans as tallied by Gallup every year. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. led the 1955 Montgomery bus boycott, organized the 1963 March on Washington, advocated for civil disobedience and. 0000004834 00000 n What do they think of our condoning the violence which led to their own taking up of arms? [citation needed]. So it was a great turnout. Let's get Howard(ph) on the line. And secondly, so many civil rights leaders were opposed to him giving it because LBJ had been the best president to black people on civil rights. "[14][15], The "Beyond Vietnam" speech reflected King's evolving political advocacy in his later years, which paralleled the teachings of the progressive Highlander Research and Education Center, with which he was affiliated. 0000005696 00000 n Recently one of them wrote these words: Each day the war goes on the hatred increases in the heart of the Vietnamese and in the hearts of those of humanitarian instinct. Martin Luther King Jr. was deeply troubled by the Vietnam War for years, but the "Beyond Vietnam" speech was his first major policy statement on the issue. The film is the second episode of Tavis Smiley Reports. Mr. SMILEY: Well, I think the question is whether or not - I hear your point, Neal, and I take it. I just wanted to say that I was an 18-year-old Marine in Vietnam when the speech was given, and I didn't hear it until three or four years ago. War is not the answer. And so the question was, Martin, why would you antagonize the president who has been our friend? We must be prepared to match actions with words by seeking out every creative means of protest possible. King Scores Poverty Budget, New York Times, 16 December 1966. We have supported the enemies of the peasants of Saigon. We must find new ways to speak for peace in Vietnam and justice throughout the developing world a world that borders on our doors. On April 4, 1967, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. delivered a controversial sermon opposing the Vietnam War at Riverside Church in Morningside Heights, then helped lead a large antiwar march from Central Park to the United Nations later that month. ml.K-x1x*tcSO p[ endstream endobj 62 0 obj 720 endobj 63 0 obj << /Filter /FlateDecode /Length 62 0 R >> stream Carson and Holloran, 1998. In so many words, powerful interests told him: "Mind your own business.". If it is, let us trace its movement well and pray that our own inner being may be sensitive to its guidance, for we are deeply in need of a new way beyond the darkness that seems so close around us. And they are surely right to wonder what kind of new government we plan to help form without them the only party in real touch with the peasants. My third reason moves to an even deeper level of awareness, for it grows out of my experience in the ghettoes of the North over the last three years especially the last three summers. CONAN: Howard, thanks very much for the call. King Leads Chicago). If we do not stop our war against the people of Vietnam immediately the world will be left with no other alternative than to see this as some horribly clumsy and deadly game we have decided to play. CONAN: Walt, thank you. His house was bombed. And what really got him to the point of figuring that he really, really had to address this again back to the children, he couldn't say to young folks in this country who were being denied, that they should engage nonviolence as a philosophy when he saw the children, when he saw these pictures of these Vietnamese children being bombed and the impact - the effect that napalm was having on their bodies. The truth of these words is beyond doubt but the mission to which they call us is a most difficult one. capitalism, and the Vietnam War. In order to atone for our sins and errors in Vietnam, we should take the initiative in bringing a halt to this tragic war. It comes to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring. Can I threaten them with death or must I not share with them my life? For it occurs to me that what we are submitting them to in Vietnam is not simply the brutalizing process that goes on in any war where armies face each other and seek to destroy. 0000011437 00000 n 0000008326 00000 n This Hindu-Moslem-Christian-Jewish-Buddhist belief about ultimate reality is beautifully summed up in the first epistle of Saint John: Let us love one another; for love is God and everyone that loveth is born of God and knoweth God. Excuse me. On April 15, 1967, King participated and spoke at an anti-war march from Manhattan's Central Park to the United Nations. The only change came from America as we increased our troop commitments in support of governments which were singularly corrupt, inept and without popular support. 0000005717 00000 n Although the peace community lauded Kings willingness to take a public stand against the war in Vietnam, many within the civil rights movement further distanced themselves from his stance. We must speak for them and raise the questions they cannot raise. The situation is one in which we must be ready to turn sharply from our present ways. MARTIN LUTHER KING JR.: I speak as a child of God and brother to the suffering poor of Vietnam. Martin Luther King Jr. held his acceptance speech in the auditorium of the University of Oslo on 10 December 1964. Martin Luther King's Beyond Vietnam Speech is in many ways even more relevant today than in 1967. . And he starts out in the opening line at Riverside Church by saying: I am here tonight because my conscience leaves me no other choice. So even McNamara eventually comes around to that point. 0000006536 00000 n Hundreds of folks listened outside on loudspeakers. Martin Luther King's Speech Against the Vietnam War by David Bromwich May 16, 2008 O ne of the greatest speeches by Martin Luther King, Jr., "A Time to Break Silence," was delivered at Riverside Church, New York City, on April 4, 1967. All over the globe men are revolting against old systems of exploitation and oppression and out of the wombs of a frail world new systems of justice and equality are being born. JwNt YHiA:{p . [28], A portion of this speech is used in the track "Wisdom, Justice, and Love" by Linkin Park, from their 2010 album A Thousand Suns. I say we must enter the struggle, but I wish to go on now to say something even more disturbing. (1997). Jazmyn Ford. James L. Bevel dies at 72; civil rights activist and top lieutenant to King", "Martin Luther King Jr. made our nation uncomfortable", "The Uncompromising Anti-Capitalism of Martin Luther King Jr", "Why Martin Luther King Didn't Run for President", "Thich Nhat Hanh, Zen Master and Political Reformer, Dies at 95", "The Story Of King's 'Beyond Vietnam' Speech", "Dragons, legos, and solitary: Ai Weiwei's transformative Alcatraz exhibition", Full transcript of the speech from Commondreams.org. And so he does in New York City. Finally, as I try to delineate for you and for myself the road that leads from Montgomery to this place I would have offered all that was most valid if I simply said that I must be true to my conviction that I share with all men the calling to be a son of the living God. It tells why American helicopters are being used against guerrillas in Colombia and why American napalm and green beret forces have already been active against rebels in Peru. "[10], King also criticized American opposition to North Vietnam's land reforms. Now let us rededicate ourselves to the long and bitter but beautifulstruggle for a new world. Meanwhile we in the churches and synagogues have a continuing task while we urge our government to disengage itself from a disgraceful commitment. 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. Ho Chi Minh has watched as America has spoken of peace and built up its forces, and now he has surely heard of the increasing international rumors of American plans for an invasion of the north. It makes for an excellent teaching tool for a unit on the Civil Rights Movement, Cold War and Vietnam, or as a bridge to combine the two! We were taking the black young men who had been crippled by our society and sending them eight thousand miles away to guarantee liberties in Southeast Asia which they had not found in southwest Georgia and East Harlem. There is nothing, except a tragic death wish, to prevent us from reordering our priorities, so that the pursuit of peace will take precedence over the pursuit of war. This quote is from a sermon by Dr. King on April 30, 1967 at Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, Georgia, drawing from his infamous April 4 sermon at Riverside Church. The war in Vietnam is but a symptom of a far deeper malady within the American spirit, and if we ignore this sobering reality we will find ourselves organizing clergy- and laymen-concerned committees for the next generation. Others, including James Bevel, King's partner and strategist in the Civil Rights Movement, called it King's most important speech. P: (650) 723-2092 | F: (650) 723-2093 | kinginstitute@stanford.edu| Campus Map. Benjamin Hedin on Martin Luther King, Jr.'s, anti-Vietnam War speech at Riverside Church in New York, which risked King's relationship with Lyndon Johnson. Of course, again, that philosophy, when the papers got a hold of him the next day, that strategy didn't work so well. A complete unit of instruction - include ALL answer documents - comparing and contrasting Dr. Martin Luther King Jr and Malcom X's early lives & speeches.This unit of study, which can be taught as a complete unit, or separated into 13 distinct activities . Let us not join those who shout war and through their misguided passions urge the United States to relinquish its participation in the United Nations. American Rhetoric: Martin Luther King, Jr: A Time to Break Silence (Declaration Against the Vietnam War) M artin L uther K ing, J r. Beyond Vietnam -- A Time to Break Silence Delivered 4 April 1967, Riverside Church, New York City [Photo Credit: John C. Goodwin] [AUTHENTICITY CERTIFIED: Text version below transcribed directly from audio. All the while the people read our leaflets and received regular promises of peace and democracy and land reform. And Tavis, nice to have you back in the program. Dr. W. E. B. I've always argue that Dr. King is the greatest American we've ever produced. CONAN: Indeed. Less than two weeks after leading his first Vietnam demonstration, on 4 April 1967, King made his best known and most comprehensive statement against the war. "[24] King quoted a United States official who said that from Vietnam to Latin America, the country was "on the wrong side of a world revolution. 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. If you remember the speech, tell us what it meant at that time, and does the principle of nonviolence apply in the age of al-Qaida? It was they who led a second struggle against French domination at tremendous costs, and then were persuaded to give up the land they controlled between the thirteenth and seventeenth parallel as a temporary measure at Geneva. 0000044282 00000 n Have they forgotten that my ministry is in obedience to the one who loved his enemies so fully that he died for them? The Vietnamese people proclaimed their own independence in 1945 after a combined French and Japanese occupation, and before the Communist revolution in China. We must not call everyone a Communist or an appeaser who advocates the seating of Red China in the United Nations and who recognizes that hate and hysteria are not the final answers to the problem of these turbulent days. dH(*b(jGB@'k1zTR~{dA9|\b. And as I ponder the madness of Vietnam and search within myself for ways to understand and respond to compassion my mind goes constantly to the people of that peninsula. Speeches, writings, movements, and protests, Opposition to United States involvement in the Vietnam War, Spring Mobilization Committee to End the War in Vietnam. As that noble bard of yesterday, James Russell Lowell, eloquently stated: Once to every man and nation Comes the moment to decide, In the strife of truth and falsehood, For the good or evil side; Some great cause, Gods new Messiah, Offring each the bloom or blight, And the choice goes by forever Twixt that darkness and that light. 0000002784 00000 n Why are you joining the voices of dissent? There are people who have come to see the moral imperative of equality, but who cannot yet see the moral imperative of world brotherhood. Communism will never be defeated by the use of atomic bombs or nuclear weapons. 0000011739 00000 n The Reverend Martin Luther King Jr ., head of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, delivers a speech entitled "Beyond Vietnam" in front of 3,000 people at Riverside Church in. It will become clear that our minimal expectation is to occupy it as an American colony and men will not refrain from thinking that our maximum hope is to goad China into a war so that we may bomb her nuclear installations. I join with you in this meeting because I am in deepest agreement with the aims and work of the organization which has brought us together: Clergy and Laymen Concerned about Vietnam. But they asked and rightly so what about Vietnam? Mr. SMILEY: He'd wanted to give it two years earlier and had attempted a dry run at this speech, to your appoint, Neal, a couple of years prior to when he gave it. One of the things, I hope, Neal, will happen here is that when people get a chance to see the special, they will be moved - I think they will be - to Google or Bing, whatever search engine you use, to go online, because the speech is so readily available, Neal, as you know. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. A genuine revolution of values means in the final analysis that our loyalties must become ecumenical rather than sectional. There were experiments, hopes, new beginnings. The tide in the affairs of men does not remain at the flood; it ebbs. Could we blame them for such thoughts? He summed up this aspect by saying, "A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death. King, Remaining Awake Through a Great Revolution, in A Knock at Midnight, ed. The question is, is it a war of necessity or a war of choice at this point? Somehow this madness must cease. Q%F70%iR! (2)] A small donation would help us keep this available to all. To speak for them is to explain this lack of confidence in Western words, and especially their distrust of American intentions now. 800-989-8255. Therefore, communism is a judgment against our failure to make democracy real and follow through on the revolutions we initiated. King linked his anti-war and civil rights work in speeches throughout the country, where he described the three problems he saw plaguing the nation: racism, poverty, and the war in Vietnam. They see the children, degraded by our soldiers as they beg for food. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., is known for being one of the greatest orators of the twentieth century, and perhaps in all of American history. Estate of Martin Luther King, Jr., Inc. v. CBS, Inc. Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), African American founding fathers of the United States, Statue of Martin Luther King Jr. (Pueblo, Colorado), Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial, San Francisco. Please c, ontact Intellectual Properties Management (IPM), the exclusive licensor of the Estate of Martin Luther King, Jr., Inc. at. He passed the Voting Rights Act. They question our political goals and they deny the reality of a peace settlement from which they will be excluded. As we all know, Neal, before he died, Robert McNamara, the Defense secretary that had Walt and others over in Vietnam, before he died, of course, announced that he was wrong. A true revolution of values will soon cause us to question the fairness and justice of many of our past and present policies. CONAN: And one thing that I was unaware of was the timing of the speech in that he had wanted to say something along these lines. King contemplated but ultimately decided against the proposal on the grounds that he felt uneasy with politics and considered himself better suited for his morally unambiguous role as an activist.[25]. I speak as a citizen of the world, for the world as it stands aghast at the path we have taken. CONAN: And the place - choice of place is very interesting too. And King had preached at this church any number of times before, of course. But for those who presently choose but one, I would hope they will finally come to see the moral roots common to both. King had read Marx while at Morehouse, but while he rejected "traditional capitalism", he also rejected communism because of its "materialistic interpretation of history" that denied religion, its "ethical relativism", and its "political totalitarianism. Increasingly, by choice or by accident, this is the role our nation has taken the role of those who make peaceful revolution impossible by refusing to give up the privileges and the pleasures that come from the immense profits of overseas investment. Here is the true meaning and value of compassion and nonviolence when it helps us to see the enemys point of view, to hear his questions, to know his assessment of ourselves. Our government felt then that the Vietnamese people were not ready for independence, and we again fell victim to the deadly Western arrogance that has poisoned the international atmosphere for so long. ) fuG {*pZ//e,QTx)%TuS%@^2j/?Nf7nx!]OvqJG=_oD3?VUMs+tM95X )G~1b'g])!`]:|OwHh-J6ZHg{Z9N3b!\#9"zhT\]sp2WtTal =YvkO8yu 6^,n,v$+u$|^1wUF}GGc=p!e#F\]xx6l~NTYSmc /ut^*WTPO Cp =-FQW.]y#F6NsQ2Qzqz=|v94+JC?w4,|yi4T0eIaaeD2-Y1 And number two, at what cost? It is with such activity in mind that the words of the late John F. Kennedy come back to haunt us. On this Wikipedia the language links are at the top of the page across from the article title. [27], In 2010, PBS commentator Tavis Smiley said that the speech was the most controversial speech of King's career, and the one he "labored over the most". King's "Beyond Vietnam" speech was delivered at the Riverside Church in New York exactly one year before his assassination. What then can I say to the Vietcong or to Castro or to Mao as a faithful minister of this one? Do you find this information helpful? There is at the outset a very obvious and almost facile connection between the war in Vietnam and the struggle I and others have been waging in America. Some civil rights leaders urged King not to speak out on the Vietnam War, but he said he could not separate issues of economic injustice, racism, war, and militarism. Of course, the Nobel Peace Laureate, a man who clearly believed in nonviolence down to his very soul CONAN: but he'd wanted to give that speech two years earlier. Tavis Smiley joins us today from the Sheryl Flowers Studios in Los Angeles. Now let us begin. Perhaps a new spirit is rising among us. What must they be thinking when they know that we are aware of their control of major sections of Vietnam and yet we appear ready to allow national elections in which this highly organized political parallel government will have no part? [6], King delivered the speech, sponsored by the group Clergy and Laymen Concerned About Vietnam, after committing to participate in New York's April 15, 1967 anti-Vietnam war march from Central Park to the United Nations, sponsored by the Spring Mobilization to End the War in Vietnam. A few other Americans know, of course, the "Mountaintop" speech given the night before he's assassinated in Memphis. 16, 1967 in New York. It is curious that the Americans, who calculate so carefully on the possibilities of military victory, do not realize that in the process they are incurring deep psychological and political defeat. Keep in mind now that 1967, Neal, as you know, is the same year that Muhammad Ali, the world champion, decides to not accept that draft to go and fight in Vietnam. Vietnam War | The Martin Luther King, Jr., Research and Education Institute Vietnam War Event May 11, 1961 to April 30, 1975 Four years after President John F. Kennedy sent the first American troops into Vietnam, Martin Luther King, Jr., issued his first public statement on the war. HT0WJ3 O$L And King gives a great speech out of that hospital called "If I Had Sneezed." complaining of what he described as a double standard that applauded his nonviolence at home, but deplored it when applied "toward little brown Vietnamese children. Martin Luther King, Jr. believed that peace and economic justice were critical to his fight for human rights. Declare a unilateral cease-fire in the hope that such action will create the atmosphere for negotiation. Four years after President John F. Kennedy sent the first American troops into Vietnam, Martin Luther King, Jr., issued his first public statement on the war. Check your local listings. Nevertheless, I am in a different position as the president of the United States. How are you, sir? In "People and Peace, not Profits and War," Shirley Chisholm repeats the words "two more years" (42). CONAN: We (unintelligible) to see it. 0000012541 00000 n They must see Americans as strange liberators. This has driven many to feel that only Marxism has the revolutionary spirit. The New York Times calls it wasteful and self-defeating. 0000013309 00000 n This is the calling of the sons of God, and our brothers wait eagerly for our response. As we counsel young men concerning military service we must clarify for them our nations role in Vietnam and challenge them with the alternative of conscientious objection. His speech appears below. Moreover I would encourage all ministers of draft age to give up their ministerial exemptions and seek status as conscientious objectors. No, Howard, I thank you for your phone call. Opposes Vietnam War, New York Times, 11 November 1965. The war in Vietnam is but a symptom of a far deeper malady within the American spirit, and if we ignore this sobering reality we will find ourselves organizing clergy- and laymen . How do they judge us when our officials know that their membership is less than twenty-five percent Communist and yet insist on giving them the blanket name? With righteous indignation, it will look across the seas and see individual capitalists of the West investing huge sums of money in Asia, Africa and South America, only to take the profits out with no concern for the social betterment of the countries, and say: "This is not just. 2/QB(yQVz^*oU.FW Soon the only solid physical foundations remaining will be found at our military bases and in the concrete of the concentration camps we call fortified hamlets. These too are our brothers. Mr. SMILEY: Yeah. I have tried to offer them my deepest compassion while maintaining my conviction that social change comes most meaningfully through nonviolent action. Watch a newsfilm clip of the speech . So all that we have is less than 10 minutes of video of the speech. So practically everybody was opposed to him giving this speech. When the Rev. "[24] King condemned America's "alliance with the landed gentry of Latin America", and said that the U.S. should support "the shirtless and barefoot people" in the Third World rather than suppressing their attempts at revolution. We're talking with Tavis Smiley. How can they believe in our integrity when now we speak of aggression from the north as if there were nothing more essential to the war? Forego a bottle of soda and donate its cost to us for the information you just learned, and feel good about helping to make it available to everyone. In Hanoi are the men who led the nation to independence against the Japanese and the French, the men who sought membership in the French commonwealth and were betrayed by the weakness of Paris and the willfulness of the colonial armies. [16][17] King began to speak of the need for fundamental changes in the political and economic life of the nation, and more frequently expressed his opposition to the war and his desire to see a redistribution of resources to correct racial and economic injustice. On the evening of April 4, 1967, civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King lent his full-throated oratory to a growing chorus of opposition to the rapidly expanding American role in the Vietnam War.