Hillary Clinton and Martin Luther King, Jr.
Hillary Clinton, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama have been fighting over Martin Luther King, Jr. like junk yard dogs over a bone. No disrespect to Rev. King for the bone reference, but much disrespect to Hillary and Bill for their insincere pandering efforts. Obama, in his defense, has only pointed out their invocation and predatory self serving rhetoric concerning Rev. King, albeit using the situation to convert Black voters.
The first verbal shot was fired by Clinton when she stated, “Dr King’s dream began to be realized when President Lyndon Johnson passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964. It took a president to get it done.”
She has since tried to diffuse her statement by saying it was taken out of context. She went on to say that, “Both Sen. Obama and I know that we are where we are today because of leaders like Dr. King.” I am certainly not an expert on Rev. King, but I can say, with prejudice, that his civil rights efforts and the abuse he received, were not conducted to render from tyranny upper middle class white women who attended Wellesley College and Yale Law School. This remark is exponentially more offensive than the statement that started this fracas.
Hillary Clinton along with other students and staff who attended über-liberal, elite universities circa the 1960’s took up the plight of the oppressed. They either had no experience with oppression or the oppressed or were completely void of a working knowledge of the oppressed–they did it because it was fashionable at the time. The resourceful graduates have moved from ignorant defenders to exploiters of the plight of the oppressed to further their careers, as Clinton is doing to further her political career.
One of the most compelling and passionate speeches of the 20th century was Rev. King’s “I Have A Dream.” A few highlights from that speech:
- “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 which has come back marked ‘insufficient funds.’”
- “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 hope 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.”
- “The marvelous new militancy which has engulfed the Negro community, must not lead us to a distrust of all white people. For many of our white brothers as evident by their presence here today have come to realize that their freedom is bound to our freedom.”
- “I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.’”
- “I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.”
- “I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will they be able to sit down together at a table of brotherhood.”
- “This is our hope. This is the faith that I go back to the South with. With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.”
- “Let freedom ring. And when this happens, and when we allow freedom ring-when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God’s children-black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics-will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual: “Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!
- “Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksand of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood. Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God’s children.”
Hillary Clinton witnessed one of Rev. King’s speeches. She describes how she was moved by his words, “As a young girl, I had the great privilege of hearing Dr. King speak in Chicago. The year was 1963. My youth minister from our church took a few of us down on a cold January night to hear King speak. And he called on us, he challenged us that evening to stay awake during the great revolution that the civil rights pioneers were waging on behalf of a more perfect union.”
She was so moved by the speech that the next year she became involved in the Young Republicans then became a Goldwater girl. She then became President of the College Republicans. Goldwater was the standard bearer for 20th century conservatism. He also voted against the 1964 Civil Rights Act.
Rev. King’s “I Have A Dream” is a moving and emotional oratory about racial equality–not legislated equality, but genuine equality. Rev. King spoke about the rights given to all Americans by the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. What he did not do in that speech was wring his hands and beg the government to force people to feel a certain way.
Enter Hillary Clinton’s unadulterated political mindset. She, along with anyone, who believes the 1964 Civil Rights Act was going to, or has, validated or consummated Rev. King’s dream is a functional illiterate in the civil rights arena. The political mindset that you can legislate morality, thoughts and attitudes has a long history of being full of failure and empty of success. Unfortunately, all that can be legislated is punitive action if you are non-compliant. It breeds resentment and is inheritably incapable of producing nothing positive.
Vote for Hillary and she will make every considerable thing better through legislation.
The first problem with the 1964 Civil Rights Act was the illegitimate methodology of its enactment. If left on its own accord, it would have suffered the same fate the 1866 Civil Rights Act would have if it had not been converted into the 14th Amendment. The 1964 Congress took a cue from FDR’s unprincipled methods–if Congress does not have the power to pass it, tie it to the Commerce Clause. Congress passed the 1964 Civil Rights Act by tying it to the Commerce Clause of the Constitution. The reason it was tied to the Commerce Clause was to circumvent the limitations on the government by the 14th Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause.
The second problem is the most problematic. The 1964 Civil Rights Act has caused more harm to Black America than any conceivable amount of good it may have caused. If morality, acceptance and thought processes are not produced organically, they have no legs to stand on.
The 1964 Civil Rights Act and its perpetual burgeoning entitlements have done as much damage to Black America as treaties, broken treaties, reservations, European disease, and alcohol did and and continues to do to this day to the American Indian.
Rev. King’s approach to change was non-violent direct action. He orchestrated a one year boycott of city buses in Montgomery. 17,000 Black citizens did not ride the buses for a year. The revenue loss and a Supreme Court ruling against the Montgomery Bus Company caused the bus company to accept Black patrons on the bus. This method was a very effective method to achieve organic change, but lost its appeal and momentum with Rev. King’s endorsement of a Civil Rights Act and having legislative measures put in place to force it. It is a more effective method than voting. Voting for a candidate that is running on a “change” platform, as Clinton is, only leads to ineffective and counter productive legislation.
What if:
If the civil rights act had not been passed and if the civil rights movement had not deviated from its course and if Blacks continued to use their economic power to make change–as with the Montgomery bus situation–and if race opportunist like Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson and their ilk had never been involved, the state of Black equality in this country, while not a perfect vision of Rev. King’s dream, would arguably have advanced farther than its current status.
The only reason for Clinton to invoke Rev. King and the 1964 Civil Rights Act is to continue her use of demagoguery with Black voters. Obama, in a political move, has assailed Clinton only to take the Black vote away from her. Nothing more and nothing less for either one.
Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, et al have put Rev. King high on a pedestal and are portraying him as god-like as they use his legacy to further the advancement of their own agendas. They are doing him a grave disservice. Rev. King does not deserve to be portrayed as god-like, a savior or put on a pedestal. No man does. He would probably be the first to say this. He was a man with great dreams and ideas and the ability to motivate people to bring them to life. He had human frailties, faults, and vices as does any person. The difference is that a man can get his point across in spite of his shortcomings and a god does not have that luxury.
Well I agree with some of what you’ve written, stating that forcing states to allow blacks to vote, for example, has not done anything to advance civil rights is not true. It’s true you can’t legislate people’s attitudes. But legislation affects behavior and new behavior leads to new attitudes. Our attitudes on everything from racial equality to copyright law to property to corporations are not the same as generations past, and many of these changes were brought about initially with legislation. Also, I highly doubt that Obama is insincere in his commitment to racial equality. Assuming he is sincere, his respect for MLK is something more than trying to take the black vote.
Blacks Learning ‘Goldwater Girl’ Hillary Was AGAINST
the Civil Rights Act of 1964….Feel Deceived !
A March 12, 2007 article written by acclaimed Washington columnist Robert Novak sheds a very revealing light on the true sentiment of Hillary Clinton during the peak of the Civil Rights Movement. Clinton recently was found to have minimized the great and monumental strides taken by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. by stating that it was Lyndon B. Johnson, then president, who should receive the credit for civil rights progress including the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
In an attempt to attract black support Hillary Clinton regularly shares her ‘civil rights experience’ during every speech given to blacks audiences. Novak writes of one such speech at Selma’s First Baptist Church on the 42nd anniversary of the “bloody Sunday” freedom march there, where Sen. Clinton declared: “As a young woman, I had the great privilege of hearing Dr. King speak in Chicago. The year was 1963. My youth minister from our church took a few of us down on a cold January night to hear [King]. . . . And he called on us, he challenged us that evening to stay awake during the great revolution that the civil rights pioneers were waging on behalf of a more perfect union.” But Novak’s article states that there’s a big problem with her statement.
The fact is, in 1963, the same period of time she speeks of at all black church appearances, not only was Hillary Clinton a republican, but she was also a staunch supporter of republican Senator Barry Goldwater, well known as a segregationist and one of the most vocal senators adamently against the passing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which is why he lost in his presidential bid to Lyndon B. Johnson. Novak writes “…how then could she be a ‘Goldwater Girl’ in the next year’s presidential election?” He continues, “…she described herself in her memoirs as ‘an active Young Republican’ and ‘a Goldwater girl, right down to my cowgirl outfit.’ (Hillary worked on Golwater’s presidential campaign)
Novak adds, “As a politically attuned honor student, she must have known that Goldwater was one of only six Republican senators who joined Southern Democratic segregationists opposing the historic voting rights act of 1964 inspired by King. Hillary headed the Young Republicans at Wellesley College.
The incompatibility of those two positions of 40 years ago was noted to me (Novak) by Democratic old-timers who were shocked by Sen. Clinton’s temerity in pursuing her presidential candidacy.” Novak adds, “What Hillary Clinton said at Selma is significant because it betrays her campaign’s panicky reaction to the unexpected rise of Sen. Obama as a serious competitor for the Democratic nomination.
Clinton’s plans were transformed by the advent of Obama, an African-American threatening the hard allegiance of black voters forged by Bill Clinton. On one hand, the Clinton campaign has attacked Obama and his supporters. On the other hand, she has sought to solidify her civil rights credentials.
While Clinton was re-inventing her past, her road to the White House is not going as planned. Instead of a steady procession to coronation at the Denver convention, she is involved in a real struggle against credible opponents led by Obama. No wonder she and her handlers were tempted to imply the existence long ago of a young lady in Chicago’s suburbs who never really existed.”
Blacks are stating their feeling of betrayment now that these truths are being exposed as they come to the conclusion that the fact is, Hillary was AGAINST the passing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 that Dr. King died for and as a ‘Goldwater Girl’ she was even against Lyndon B. Johnson, the very person she now gives the credit to for Dr. King getting to the mountaintop. !
Greg ‘Peace Song’ Jones