Hail to the King
It is a scary thought that in all the years of MidnightRanter, there has never been a rant dedicated to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Today, we celebrate Martin Luther King Day here in the US. This year, it happens to fall on what would have been the 78th birthday. As many know, getting this day recognized throughout all states in the Union. It was recognized as a holiday in 1983, but it was celebrated in all states for the first time in 2000. The last county to sign off on it as a paid holiday was a year ago. Unsurprisingly, the last places to sign off on it were places that got their asses kicked in the Civil War. Yes, despite all the revisionists talking about how it wasn't about race or anything else, they still didn't want to honor the man. Arizona refers to it as "Civil Rights Day" and Virginia, unti recently, celebrated the day as Lee-Jackson-King Day. The day was supposed to celebrate the lives of Robert E. Lee, Thomas L. "Stonewall" Jackson and Martin Luther King, Jr. all at the same time, since it was unthinkable to honor a black man without honoring the heroes of the Confederacy. After all, nothing says sanity like honoring the LOSING side of a war against America.
Luckily, this is not about battles or defeat, but about how one man through non-violence changed a country. In forty years, we have gone from a country where lynchings happened and black people registering to vote was cause for riots to a black man running for president. There were federal troops stationed to make sure black people could get a fair shake at education, employment and access to all kinds of things a lot of people took for granted. While things are not perfect in terms of race relations in this country, they are pretty far along in so short a time. We overcame hundreds (if not thousands) of years of prejudices and bigotry in our legal system and put into place a real system of equality.
Of course, laws are not the end all of society. Now that the laws are equal, we have to work on enforcement of those laws, which is also, by many accounts, pretty equal. Yes, it is true more black men are arrested for felonies than white men and FAR more black men are executed than white men, it is also true far more serial killers are Caucasian. There are real consequences when a cop beats on a black man. The problem now is making that more rare, but we are on the right path for it. Think of it like this, if these things happened so often that no one even bothered to report it, that would be a real problem. Or, if when it did happen, there was no real recourse, THAT would also be a problem. Now, the family sues the bejeezus out of the police department, lives are ruined and there is justice.
Well, justice is not the right word, but it is the measured vengeance we as a society claim to hold dear as justice in our legal realm. We cannot really have any knid of justice, or as Dr. king himself said "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." He was right. We are, at the end of the day, all in this together. Any attempts to separate or divide humans from each other is what leads to the greatest tragedies and problems. After all, whenever someone says "we don't negotiate with terrorists", doesn't that mean they have no choice but to resort to violence? Well, Dr. King proved that you can both stand up for your rights and not be violent about it, but still be insistent about it. He staged sit ins, demonstrations and protest marches. For these, he was arrested, subjected to police brutality and otherwise treated badly for his efforts. But, they did work.
He worked hard and in 1964, the Civil Rights Act was passed, much to the consternation of many southern political figures. Many still don't like it since it enforces based on the Constitutional duties of the Congress to regulate interstate trade. Some say Congress overstepped its bounds telling businesses how to operate, but no one has proposed a more legal way to enforce non-state actions. When this was left to the states alone, they had Jim Crow laws. While the idea of states' rights is one of the most important things in our system of governance, the rights of all citizens equally across the country are more important than states' rights. Let me say this again so it's clear: States' rights end where they consistently and categorically deny the rights of individuals, whether singly or by group. I don't care how free Alabama is feeling, consistently denying the Constitutional rights of people is wrong and they deserve to get smacked.
But Dr. King didn't advocate smacking or even hating Whitey. He called on white people with a sense of conscience to help. Not that the white man was keeping the black man down, but all knids ofgood people need to come together to put things right. He put it all in terms of a moral argument, but not one that cast all of one group in a bad light. It was about the individual sense of morality and how all people can be a part, not an effort to separate and set one group above another. He truly saw an America where all people were truly equal before God and the law. He famously had a dream about all men eating at the same table together.
Of course, like all family dinners, squabbles are half the fun.
So it is written, so do I see it.
Luckily, this is not about battles or defeat, but about how one man through non-violence changed a country. In forty years, we have gone from a country where lynchings happened and black people registering to vote was cause for riots to a black man running for president. There were federal troops stationed to make sure black people could get a fair shake at education, employment and access to all kinds of things a lot of people took for granted. While things are not perfect in terms of race relations in this country, they are pretty far along in so short a time. We overcame hundreds (if not thousands) of years of prejudices and bigotry in our legal system and put into place a real system of equality.
Of course, laws are not the end all of society. Now that the laws are equal, we have to work on enforcement of those laws, which is also, by many accounts, pretty equal. Yes, it is true more black men are arrested for felonies than white men and FAR more black men are executed than white men, it is also true far more serial killers are Caucasian. There are real consequences when a cop beats on a black man. The problem now is making that more rare, but we are on the right path for it. Think of it like this, if these things happened so often that no one even bothered to report it, that would be a real problem. Or, if when it did happen, there was no real recourse, THAT would also be a problem. Now, the family sues the bejeezus out of the police department, lives are ruined and there is justice.
Well, justice is not the right word, but it is the measured vengeance we as a society claim to hold dear as justice in our legal realm. We cannot really have any knid of justice, or as Dr. king himself said "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." He was right. We are, at the end of the day, all in this together. Any attempts to separate or divide humans from each other is what leads to the greatest tragedies and problems. After all, whenever someone says "we don't negotiate with terrorists", doesn't that mean they have no choice but to resort to violence? Well, Dr. King proved that you can both stand up for your rights and not be violent about it, but still be insistent about it. He staged sit ins, demonstrations and protest marches. For these, he was arrested, subjected to police brutality and otherwise treated badly for his efforts. But, they did work.
He worked hard and in 1964, the Civil Rights Act was passed, much to the consternation of many southern political figures. Many still don't like it since it enforces based on the Constitutional duties of the Congress to regulate interstate trade. Some say Congress overstepped its bounds telling businesses how to operate, but no one has proposed a more legal way to enforce non-state actions. When this was left to the states alone, they had Jim Crow laws. While the idea of states' rights is one of the most important things in our system of governance, the rights of all citizens equally across the country are more important than states' rights. Let me say this again so it's clear: States' rights end where they consistently and categorically deny the rights of individuals, whether singly or by group. I don't care how free Alabama is feeling, consistently denying the Constitutional rights of people is wrong and they deserve to get smacked.
But Dr. King didn't advocate smacking or even hating Whitey. He called on white people with a sense of conscience to help. Not that the white man was keeping the black man down, but all knids ofgood people need to come together to put things right. He put it all in terms of a moral argument, but not one that cast all of one group in a bad light. It was about the individual sense of morality and how all people can be a part, not an effort to separate and set one group above another. He truly saw an America where all people were truly equal before God and the law. He famously had a dream about all men eating at the same table together.
Of course, like all family dinners, squabbles are half the fun.
So it is written, so do I see it.