martin luther king jr vietnam war speech transcript

0000043425 00000 n 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. 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. And number two, at what cost? 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. Du Bois to Coretta Scott King: The Untold History of the Movement to Ban the Bomb. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, for example, issued a statement against merging the civil rights and peace movements. Perhaps the more tragic recognition of reality took place when it became clear to me that the war was doing far more than devastating the hopes of the poor at home. But most Americans, I think, do not know this speech, "Beyond Vietnam.". On this Wikipedia the language links are at the top of the page across from the article title. He turned that into a great speech when he got out of the hospital. 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. 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. Read The Full Text And Listen To Martin Luther King, Jr.'s "Beyond Vietnam" Speech. Stanford University, Stanford, California 94305. Do you find this information helpful? We can no longer afford to worship the god of hate or bow before the altar of retaliation. So King understood violence. Martin Luther King's Acceptance Speech, on the occasion of the award of the Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo, 10 December 1964 Your Majesty, Your Royal Highness, Mr. President, Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen: This call for a world-wide fellowship that lifts neighborly concern beyond ones tribe, race, class and nation is in reality a call for an all-embracing and unconditional love for all men. So it is that those of us who are yet determined that America will be are led down the path of protest and dissent, working for the health of our land. . He gave a famous speech about the fact that he - when stabbed in New York at a book signing, the blade was just a scintilla away from his aorta. In his last Sunday sermon, delivered at the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C., on 31 March 1968, King said that he was convinced that [Vietnam] is one of the most unjust wars that has ever been fought in the history of the world (King, Remaining Awake, 219). In 1957 a sensitive American official overseas said that it seemed to him that our nation was on the wrong side of a world revolution. 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. I think of them too because it is clear to me that there will be no meaningful solution there until some attempt is made to know them and hear their broken cries. Smiley continues, "it was the most controversial speech he ever gave. Surely we must see that the men we supported pressed them to their violence. 0000007161 00000 n The truth of these words is beyond doubt but the mission to which they call us is a most difficult one. This is Howard, which you know me. Nor is it an attempt to overlook the ambiguity of the total situation and the need for a collective solution to the tragedy of Vietnam. I speak as an American to the leaders of my own nation. "[10], King also criticized American opposition to North Vietnam's land reforms. However, you argue strongly in the film that it was completely consistent with the nature and the character of Dr. King and something he needed to say. So even McNamara eventually comes around to that point. 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. The first signs of opposition to King's tactics from within the civil rights movement surfaced during the March 1965 demonstrations in Selma, Alabama, which were aimed at dramatizing the need for a federal voting-rights law that would provide legal support for the enfranchisement of . So, too, with Hanoi. [27] Thich Nhat Hanh, who publicly held a news conference in Chicago with King in 1966, was acknowledged for urging King to oppose the Vietnam War. *];\n~~/iQ|h Q Now let us begin. So I was increasingly compelled to see the war as an enemy of the poor and to attack it as such. In this speech, he opposes violence and militarism, particularly the war in Vietnam. 0000002694 00000 n 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. 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. And King was prescient on this. Of course, again, that philosophy, when the papers got a hold of him the next day, that strategy didn't work so well. The United States Congress was spending more and more on the military and less and less on anti-poverty programs at the same time. Some, like civil rights leader Ralph Bunche, the NAACP, and the editorial page writers of The Washington Post[3] and The New York Times[4] called the Riverside Church speech a mistake on King's part. I must cry out when I see war escalated at any point (Opposes Vietnam War). In 1968, King was planning a national occupation of Washington, D., to be called the Poor People's Campaign, when he was assassinated on April 4 in . 0000011437 00000 n Soon we would be paying almost the full costs of this tragic attempt at recolonization. Some 250,000 people gathered at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., for the March on Washington. In Martin Luther King Jr.'s Vietnam speech, lines 413-416, he repeats the phrase "this is not just" (161). Kings opposition to the war provoked criticism from members of Congress, the press, and from his civil rights colleagues who argued that expanding his civil rights message to include foreign affairs would harm the black freedom struggle in America. What must they think of us in America when they realize that we permitted the repression and cruelty of Diem which helped to bring them into being as a resistance group in the south? 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. And I think most Americans know the "I Have A Dream" speech. 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. End all bombing in North and South Vietnam. And he said these three issues of racism and poverty and militarism are going to destroy this nation. They wander into the towns and see thousands of the children, homeless, without clothes, running in packs on the streets like animals. [1][5], King was long opposed to American involvement in the Vietnam War, but at first avoided the topic in public speeches in order to avoid the interference with civil rights goals that criticism of President Johnson's policies might have created. Exactly one year before his assassination, on April 4, 1967, Rev. (1947) Moranda Smith Addresses The Congress Of Industrial Organizations Annual Convention, Boston, (1974) Congresswoman Barbara Jordans Statement: The Richard Nixon Impeachment Hearings, African American History: Research Guides & Websites, Global African History: Research Guides & Websites, African American Scientists and Technicians of the Manhattan Project, Envoys, Diplomatic Ministers, & Ambassadors, http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/45a/058.html, Foundation, Organization, and Corporate Supporters. ml.K-x1x*tcSO p[ endstream endobj 62 0 obj 720 endobj 63 0 obj << /Filter /FlateDecode /Length 62 0 R >> stream 0000012562 00000 n (2)] In describing the ways in which the . Speeches, writings, movements, and protests, Opposition to United States involvement in the Vietnam War, Spring Mobilization Committee to End the War in Vietnam. Martin Luther King Jr. held his acceptance speech in the auditorium of the University of Oslo on 10 December 1964. We must stop now. During the past ten years we have seen emerge a pattern of suppression which now has justified the presence of U.S. military advisors in Venezuela. Every man of humane convictions must decide on the protest that best suits his convictions, but we must all protest. One of his great advisers and great admirers, Stanley Levison, who was always with Dr. King in his corner, was against Martin giving this speech. "[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. And so I think most Americans, Neal, know the "I Have A Dream" speech. 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. And so he does in New York City. 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. Paul A. Schuette, King Preaches on Non-Violence at Police-Guarded Howard Hall, Washington Post, 3 March 1965. I am pleased to say that this is the path now being chosen by more than seventy students at my own alma mater, Morehouse College, and I recommend it to all who find the American course in Vietnam a dishonorable and unjust one. So this was a huge, huge speech that got Martin King in more trouble than anything he had ever said or done. To me the relationship of this ministry to the making of peace is so obvious that I sometimes marvel at those who ask me why I am speaking against the war. P: (650) 723-2092 | F: (650) 723-2093 | kinginstitute@stanford.edu| Campus Map. What liberators? Mr. SMILEY: Indeed, he did. So 60 year(ph) is really, really a hot year here around this particular issue. The New York Times editorial suggested that conflating the civil rights movement with the Anti-war movement was an oversimplification that did justice to neither, stating that "linking these hard, complex problems will lead not to solutions but to deeper confusion." The United States got involved in the Vietnam War because they wanted to stop the spread of communism. The message directly challenged the president who'd taken great political risks to support civil rights legislation and also challenged many of his colleagues in the movement who've called it a tactical mistake. But there was a great turnout for the speech. So far we may have killed a million of them mostly children. While they both may have justifiable reason to be suspicious of the good faith of the United States, life and history give eloquent testimony to the fact that conflicts are never resolved without trustful give and take on both sides. 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. Smiley spoke with both scholars and friends of King, including Cornel West, Vincent Harding and Susannah Heschel. 0000012541 00000 n And thank you for sharing what had to be a difficult story to tell. 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]. They see the children selling their sisters to our soldiers, soliciting for their mothers. ) 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 We must continue to raise our voices if our nation persists in its perverse ways in Vietnam. 0000002004 00000 n This is TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News in Washington. or 404 526-8968. 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. Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community? It seemed as if there was a real promise of hope for the poor both black and white through the poverty program. If Americas soul becomes totally poisoned, part of the autopsy must read Vietnam. It was the speech he labored over the most. They watch as we poison their water, as we kill a million acres of their crops. We must rapidly begin the shift from a thing-oriented society to a person-oriented society. In that address, he articulated his reasons for his opposition to the Southeast Asian conflict. 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. WALT (Caller): Yes. 0000023610 00000 n King delivered a speech entitled Beyond Vietnam, pointing out that the war effort was 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 (King, Beyond Vietnam, 143). Perhaps a new spirit is rising among us. 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. King, Remaining Awake Through a Great Revolution, in A Knock at Midnight, ed. And Walt's with us from Cortez in Colorado. We must not engage in a negative anti-communism, but rather in a positive thrust for democracy, realizing that our greatest defense against communism is to take offensive action in behalf of justice. Check your local listings. Even though they quoted the American Declaration of Independence in their own document of freedom, we refused to recognize them. CONAN: And there's an interesting point you also make in the film that - or at least some of the participants in your film make - that were he alive today and saying the kinds of things you would expect him to say, given that speech, he probably would not be invited to many Martin Luther King Day celebrations. For nine years we vigorously supported the French in their abortive effort to recolonize Vietnam. We may cry out desperately for time to pause in her passage, but time is deaf to every plea and rushes on. We are called to speak for the weak, for the voiceless, for victims of our nation and for those it calls enemy, for no document from human hands can make these humans any less our brothers. 0000002337 00000 n The cornerstones of his activism were based on non-violence and civil disobedience, both of which were inspired by his Christian faith and the teachings of Mahatma Gandhi. Dr. King is trying to get the point across that our country is being unfair to others. Martin built his speech that night, Neal, around three major points: around increasing militarism, around escalating poverty and around the issue of racism. This speech was written and basically read word for word so that they could have a copy to give to mainstream newspapers across the country for their consideration, because King did not want to be misquoted Mr. SMILEY: or misunderstood, although that didn't work. King Leads Chicago). We must speak for them and raise the questions they cannot raise. [12] And the last poll taken in his life by Harris, the Harris Poll, Neal, found that nearly three quarters of the American people, nearly three quarters, had turned against Martin on this issue, and 55 percent of his own people, black folk, had turned against him. Arent you hurting the cause of your people, they ask? Take immediate steps to prevent other battlegrounds in Southeast Asia by curtailing our military buildup in Thailand and our interference in Laos. He is best known for helping achieve civil equality for African Americans, but these speeches--selected because they were each presented at a turning point in the . "[9] He stated that North Vietnam "did not begin to send in any large number of supplies or men until American forces had arrived in the tens of thousands", and accused the U.S. of having killed a million Vietnamese, "mostly children. The world now demands a maturity of America that we may not be able to achieve. Procrastination is still the thief of time. As if the weight of such a commitment to the life and health of America were not enough, another burden of responsibility was placed upon me in 1964; and I cannot forget that the Nobel Prize for Peace was also a commission a commission to work harder than I had ever worked before for the brotherhood of man. This is a calling that takes me beyond national allegiances, but even if it were not present I would yet have to live with the meaning of my commitment to the ministry of Jesus Christ. 0000040748 00000 n Since I am a preacher by trade, I suppose it is not surprising that I have seven major reasons for bringing Vietnam into the field of my moral vision. We are now faced with the fact that tomorrow is today. Email us: talk@npr.org. Mr. SMILEY: Well, I think the question is whether or not - I hear your point, Neal, and I take it. Others, including James Bevel, King's partner and strategist in the Civil Rights Movement, called it King's most important speech. I'm Neal Conan. And that's just the Times and the Post. The moving finger writes, and having writ moves on We still have a choice today; nonviolent coexistence or violent co-annihilation. But I'm hoping that people will get a chance, once they see the speech, they'll be moved to go read the speech and to make comparisons, Neal. Thank you. I feel that Martin Luther King and Muhammad Ali are two of the, you know, greatest Americans we've ever had. King, Beyond Vietnam, in A Call to Conscience, ed. Then we must make what reparations we can for the damage we have done. So practically everybody in his inner circle was against him giving it - one, because they knew the kind of pushback he was going to get. 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. 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. They question our political goals and they deny the reality of a peace settlement from which they will be excluded. We appreciate that. Jazmyn Ford. 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. 0000003996 00000 n When Diem was overthrown they may have been happy, but the long line of military dictatorships seemed to offer no real changeespecially in terms of their need for land and peace. Not only that, but then-President Lyndon Johnson disinvited King to the White House. A few days later, King made it clear that his peace work was not undertaken as the leader of the SCLC, but as an individual, as a clergyman, as one who is greatly concerned about peace (Dr. CONAN: Indeed. Please contact Intellectual Properties Management (IPM), the exclusive licensor of the Estate of Martin Luther King, Jr., Inc. atlicensing@i-p-m.comor 404 526-8968. "I've Been to the Mountaintop" is the popular name of the last speech delivered by Martin Luther King Jr. King spoke on April 3, 1968, at the Mason Temple (Church of God in Christ Headquarters) in Memphis, Tennessee. Perhaps the more difficult but no less necessary task is to speak for those who have been designated as our enemies. Because he received a letter from a little white girl who said, Dr. King, I read the newspaper that had you sneezed that blade would've moved, ruptured your aorta and you would've drowned in your own blood. "[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. We will be marching for these and a dozen other names and attending rallies without end unless there is a significant and profound change in American life and policy. Mr. SMILEY: Yeah. The speech and its echoes for Afghanistan and Iraq are the subject of "Tavis Smiley Reports MLK: A Call to Conscience.". So we watch them in brutal solidarity burning the huts of a poor village, but we realize that they would never live on the same block in Detroit. 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. It basically ruined their working relationship. So when the president suggests - and whether directly or indirectly, intentionally or unintentionally diminishes in that Nobel speech Martin's powerful, nonviolent philosophy, it tweaked some people, and you'll see that in the presentation Wednesday night. The New York Times calls it wasteful and self-defeating. ", In 1967, a year to the day before his death, Martin Luther King, Jr. departed from his message of civil rights to deliver a speech that denounced America's war in Vietnam. They brought in extra chairs. Now they languish under our bombs and consider us not their fellow Vietnamese the real enemy. Undeterred, King, Spock, and Harry Belafonte led 10,000 demonstrators on an anti-war march to the United Nations on 15 April 1967. 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 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. Let's get Howard(ph) on the line. He supported Johnsons calls for diplomatic negotiations and economic development as the beginnings of such a step. [18] He guarded his language in public to avoid being linked to communism by his enemies, but in private he sometimes spoke of his support for democratic socialism. 20072023 Blackpast.org. We must with positive action seek to remove those conditions of poverty, insecurity and injustice which are the fertile soil in which the seed of communism grows and develops. In the light of such tragic misunderstandings, I deem it of signal importance to try to state clearly, and I trust concisely, why I believe that the path from Dexter Avenue Baptist Church the church in Montgomery, Alabama, where I began my pastorate leads clearly to this sanctuary tonight. [29], Excerpts from this speech are used in the songs "Together" and "Spirit" by Nordic Giants. Martin Luther King Jr.'s "Beyond Vietnam" was a powerful and angry speech that raged against the war. I speak for those whose land is being laid waste, whose homes are being destroyed, whose. MARTIN LUTHER KING JR.: I speak as a child of God and brother to the suffering poor of Vietnam. And that's the issue that King was raising. The major speech at Riverside Church in New York City, followed several interviews[2] and several other public speeches in which King came out against the Vietnam War and the policies that created it. 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. That's my own personal assessment. U.S. House Select Committee on Assassinations, Martin Luther King Jr. Records Collection Act, King: A Filmed Record Montgomery to Memphis, The Witness: From the Balcony of Room 306, Martin Luther King and the Montgomery Story, Joseph Schwantner: New Morning for the World; Nicolas Flagello: The Passion of Martin Luther King. 0000001739 00000 n Beyond Vietnam: The MLK speech that caused an uproar. A genuine revolution of values means in the final analysis that our loyalties must become ecumenical rather than sectional. [11], King's opposition cost him significant support among white allies, including President Johnson, Billy Graham,[citation needed] union leaders and powerful publishers. 3. Cypress Hall D, 466 Via Ortega, Stanford, CA 94305-4146 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. 0000004855 00000 n 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? 0000004621 00000 n Twin towers were planned from Afghanistan. The recent statement of your executive committee are the sentiments of my own heart and I found myself in full accord when I read its opening lines: A time comes when silence is betrayal. That time has come for us in relation to Vietnam. On 4 April 1967 Martin Luther King, Jr., delivered his seminal speech at Riverside Church condemning the Vietnam War. And I think that if nothing else what we need to wrestle with in a contemporary sense, Neal, is the question of whether or not there is another way that King would have us consider were he allowed to do. There were a lot of people inside. 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. Mr. SMILEY: Yeah, Walt, I thank you for sharing that story as well, for being courageous to tell it, number one. On April 4, 1967, exactly one year before his assassination, Martin Luther King Jr. delivered a speech in New York City at Riverside Church on the occasion of his becoming co-chairperson of Clergy and Laymen Concerned About Vietnam (subsequently renamed Clergy and Laity Concerned ). BlackPast.org is a 501(c)(3) non-profit and our EIN is 26-1625373. "[23], King also stated in "Beyond Vietnam" that "true compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar it comes to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring. He did say he was going to increase troop levels in Afghanistan, so he's kept that promise. I would like to see the fervor of the civil-rights movement imbued into the peace movement to instill it with greater strength.

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