By George Rolph
A letter from Birmingham Jail.
In April 1963 Martin Luther King was in Jail in Birmingham Alabama. Provoked by statements, made against his movement for freedom from segregation by white Church leaders, King wrote them a long letter. This letter became famous as a statement of King’s beliefs and justifications for his actions in the protest movement. As a Christian, King faced a difficult problem. He must fight unjust laws without violence but in doing so, he must break those laws. Squaring this with his Christian conscience was a difficult matter but his great mind not only managed to do so, but he was able to explain the reasons in words that were destined to go down in Church and world history.
King also decried those Churches who refused to back his campaign. He provoked them into action by reminding them of the actions of their founder, Jesus Christ and those followers of Christ down the centuries who followed in His footsteps.
Though this letter is long and contains a few errors in spelling, or miss-chosen words, it is nevertheless a letter that should be read by any person or persons trying to understand the need for direct non violent action and for those who wish to carry it out.
The whole letter is founded upon the four basic principles of non violent direct action that King and his associates developed over the years and that King lays out like this:
“In any nonviolent campaign there are four basic steps: collection of the facts to determine whether injustices exist; negotiation; self-purification; and direct action.”
Three of these steps are self explanatory, the other, (that of “self-purification”) is expanded upon by King later in the letter and forms a vital part of his strategy.
As I have said, the letter is a long one. However, it is also a vital document for those of us trying to build a movement for change in today’s world. As such, it is a letter that demands to be studied. Therefore, I make no apology for sending this out to those who aspire to be a part of such a movement.
I take the view that if we cannot be bothered to study those who have gone before us, then we have no right to walk in their footsteps.
I also commend this letter to the world wide men’s movement for other reasons. King was very clear about his aims and objectives. He was also clear about the nature of his enemy. However, — and in my view this is crucial — King was able to clearly articulate the injustices his people faced. The men’s movement world wide is very clear about it’s aims and objectives. However, it is less clear about the nature of it’s enemy (though this is changing rapidly) but the biggest weakness of the men’s movement is in the way it articulates the injustices faced by men today. As a movement, it is quick to speak about “big issues” but slow to mention those day to day issues that we all face. This is a weakness that needs to be addressed and the issues uncovered, published on the Internet clearly and coherently.
Kings says, in this letter; “We should never forget that everything Adolf Hitler did in Germany was “legal” and everything the Hungarian freedom fighters did in Hungary was “illegal.” It was “illegal” to aid and comfort a Jew in Hitler’s Germany. Even so, I am sure that, had I lived in Germany at the time, I would have aided and comforted my Jewish brothers. If today I lived in a Communist country where certain principles dear to the Christian faith are suppressed, I would openly advocate disobeying that country’s antireligious laws.”
King goes on to state where he stands in the fight for justice. A place I am convinced the world wide men’s movement must also occupy. King goes on;
“You speak of our activity in Birmingham as extreme. At fist I was rather disappointed that fellow clergymen would see my nonviolent efforts as those of an extremist. I began thinking about the fact that stand in the middle of two opposing forces in the Negro community. One is a force of complacency, made up in part of Negroes who, as a result of long years of oppression, are so drained of self-respect and a sense of “somebodiness” that they have adjusted to segregation; and in part of a few middle class Negroes who, because of a degree of academic and economic security and because in some ways they profit by segregation, have become insensitive to the problems of the masses. The other force is one of bitterness and hatred, and it comes perilously close to advocating violence. It is expressed in the various black nationalist groups that are springing up across the nation, the largest and best-known being Elijah Muhammad’s Muslim movement. Nourished by the Negro’s frustration over the continued existence of racial discrimination, this movement is made up of people who have lost faith in America, who have absolutely repudiated Christianity, and who have concluded that the white man is an incorrigible “devil.”
I have tried to stand between these two forces, saying that we need emulate neither the “do-nothingism” of the complacent nor the hatred and despair of the black nationalist. For there is the more excellent way of love and nonviolent protest. I am grateful to God that, through the influence of the Negro church, the way of nonviolence became an integral part of our struggle.”
Though this letter is concerned with the evils of racist segregation, there is much within it that we can all learn from. (In a similar way, we are men being segregated from our children and families by the evils of radical feminism. That enemy also uses the media to demonise us constantly while pushing the feminist vision of men unable to be trusted and therefore inferior. Exactly as the white southern media did to the blacks for 300 years). Chiefly, those lessons revolve around how to stand up and be counted and how to fight back against what can seem to be a massive, unbreakable system. History records that there is no such thing as a system that cannot be broken. The moment the people cease to give their consent to the system, no matter how massive and powerful that system seems to be, the system falls. Soviet style Communism learned this lesson well in the 1980′s. Therefore, we need not fear the size and power of our opponents. Nor should we fear those voices that try to undermine our courage by telling us we cannot win. The truth is, once the people have been educated, we cannot lose! If the BBC refuses to tell the truth and suppresses our voice; if your national press and media do the same in your country; then by pass them and expose them by going to the people directly.
As King says in this wonderful letter, ” Any law that uplifts human personality is just. Any law that degrades human personality is unjust.”
To which I say, Amen!
George Rolph
London
