IN HONOR OF THE REV MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR

For a good part of the day 9yesterday), I'd been struggling to find a way to honor the Rev Martin Luther King, Jr, but, at the end of the day, I can think of no better way to honor him than to use his own eloquent words. His legacy includes a number of fine speeches and sermons. The words quoted below are from his address to the sanitation workers who were on strike in Memphis, Tennessee, on March 18, 1968.

Though there has been progress in civil rights movement, many of the words the Rev King spoke that day were prophetic and are still quite relevant today.

You've been demonstrating something here that needs to be demonstrated all over the country. You are demonstrating that we can stick together. You are demonstrating that we are all tied in a single garment of destiny, and that if one black person suffers, if one black person is down, we are all down.

If you will judge anything here in this struggle, you're commanding that this city will respect the dignity of labor. So often we overlook the worth and significance of those who are not in professional jobs, or those who are not in the so-called big jobs. But let me say to you tonight, that whenever you are engaged in work that serves humanity, and is for the building of humanity, it has dignity, and it has worth. One day our society must come to see this. One day our society will come to respect the sanitation worker if it is to survive. For the person who picks up our garbage, in the final analysis, is as significant as the physician. All labor has worth.
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Now the problem isn't only unemployment. Do you know that most of the poor people in our country are working everyday? They are making wages so low that they can not begin to function in the mainstream of the economic life of our nation. These are facts which must be seen. And it is criminal to have people working on a full-time basis and a full-time job getting part-time income.
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Now you're doing something else here. You are highlighting the economic issues. You are going beyond purely civil rights to questions of human rights. That is distinct…

Now our struggle is for genuine equality, which means economic equality. For we know now, that it isn't enough to integrate lunch counters. What does it profit a man to be able to eat at an integrated lunch counter if he doesn't have enough money to buy a hamburger? What does it profit a man to be able to eat at the swankest integrated restaurant when he doesn't even earn enough money to take his wife out to dine? What does it profit one to have access to the hotels of our cities, and the hotels of our highways, when we don't earn enough money to take our family on a vacation? What does it profit one to be able to attend an integrated school, when he doesn't earn enough money to buy his children school clothes?
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So in Memphis we have begun. We are saying, "Now is the time." Get the word across to everybody in power in this town that now is the time to make real the promises of democracy. Now is the time to make an adequate income a reality for all of God's children, now is the time to make the real promises of democracy. Now is the time to make an adequate income a reality for all of God's children, now is the time for city hall to take a position for that which is just and honest. Now is the time for justice to roll down like water, and righteousness like a mighty stream. Now is the time.

I don't think I'd ever read this speech before a couple of days ago when a Facebook friend posted quotes and the link. A few weeks later, the Rev King was back in Memphis to give his "I've Been to the Mountaintop" speech. The evening after the speech, he was assassinated.

Here is the link to full text of the address.

HAPPY LABOR (AND UNEMPLOYMENT) DAY

Why we even bother any longer to pay lip service by setting aside a day to honor those who work, I can't say. The workers, those who are lucky enough to have jobs, have been trampled upon time and again here in these United States. Thus the national day of honor seems ever more hypocritical each year when it rolls around. Who amongst the powerful gives a shit about the workers? Let them stand up and be counted and show us by deeds and not just by empty words.

The power of unions as a political force, except for the public employee unions, has been emasculated by laws which weakened them and allowed the giant global corporations to have their way. Even now, politicians are working overtime to destroy any power that the public service unions retain. So the Woody Guthrie video and the prayers for workers and for the unemployed that follow are all I have for you today, my readers. I'm flying on a wing and a prayer in the hope that, despite all evidence to the contrary, things will get better.

Almighty God, you have so linked our lives one with another that all we do affects, for good or ill, all other lives: So guide us in the work we do, that we may do it not for self alone, but for the common good; and, as we seek a proper return for our own labor, make us mindful of the rightful aspirations of other workers, and arouse our concern for those who are out of work; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Heavenly Father, we remember before you those who suffer want and anxiety from lack of work. Guide the people of this land so to use our public and private wealth that all may find suitable and fulfilling employment, and receive just payment for their labor; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.