WASHINGTON   –  “Forty years ago, on April 4th, 1968, a deliberate act of violence robbed America, and the world, of one of its brightest minds, one of its purest thinkers, one of its bravest revolutionaries.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s importance to the American civil rights movement and his commitment to nonviolence cannot be overstated.  His teachings and influence live on in our nation – not just in textbooks and speeches, but in the very fabric of our society.  Social justice in American institutions, tolerance on American streets, civil discourse and, when necessary, civil disobedience.  We can attribute a great deal of today’s social consciousness to the great man whose life was cut short 40 years ago.

Dr. King’s way was elegant and intelligent.

In its simplicity, Dr. King’s logic was not only beautiful and sensible, but it was also easy to understand, absorb and adopt.  Love your neighbor.  Do not accept injustice.  Overcome evil with patience and fortitude.  See the world in terms of wrong and right, not black and white.  One equals one; it is the simple math of equality.

Dr. King was determined that the lessons of our faiths and our responsibilities as free people not be undermined or lost by the unnatural laws of segregation and suppression.  He saw clearly through the human excuses to grant exceptions to the laws of both God and man.  When, like our Founders, we say we believe in liberty and justice for all, we cannot equivocate on the basis of color or creed.  When we commit to live as our God commands us, we cannot also submit our own exceptions based on modern stereotypes and mean prejudice.

 
On April 9 that year, Rev. Benjamin Mays, Morehouse College’s president emeritus, gave the final eulogy for his friend.  He said: “Too bad, you say, that Martin Luther King Jr. died so young.  I feel that way, too.  But, as I have said many times before, it isn’t how long one lives, but how well.  It’s what one accomplishes for mankind that matters.”

By every measure, Dr. King’s accomplishments for mankind are a humbling reflection upon each of his 39 years.  If he were alive today, Dr. King would be 79 years of age.  Who knows what he might have accomplished in his next 40 years.  We can only speculate on the future of his nonviolent civil rights crusade for all people.  His assassination was a great tragedy for our country, but as he died his dream broke free.  Today, it lives on.

Before he perished, Dr. King had done the most difficult of his work.  He had budged the stone from its place and the wheel of great change started to turn for America.  What he started, we must see through.

Equality, civil rights, liberty, and freedom are not just words; they are the cornerstones on which our country is founded.  Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. knew that in order to be a great nation, we Americans must not be content to defend those concepts – we must always work to expand them.”