![\"Screen](\"http:\/\/devonshanorphotography.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/01\/Screen-Shot-2014-01-20-at-4.35.52-PM.png\")
<\/a><\/p>\nI am so thankful to live in this country and to have the freedom to love whom I want and share life with whomever I choose. \u00a0We may have a very sordid past, but we don’t have to live there anymore! \u00a0With people like Dr. King, we have the opportunity to CHANGE our world. \u00a0While we can’t rewrite our past we can learn from it and make our future better!<\/h4>\nWe have started a new tradition of reading Dr. Kings “I Have a Dream” speech every MLK jr. day. \u00a0If you haven’t read it, I hope you will now. \u00a0It’s a great way to remember where we came from, see how far we have come, and look for ways to better our future! \u00a0I have attached it here for those who want to read it!<\/h4>\n\u201cI Have a Dream\u201d Speech<\/a><\/h2>\n\nMartin Luther King, Jr.<\/p>\n
August 28, 1963<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation.<\/em><\/p>\nFive score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today, signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of their captivity.<\/em><\/p>\nBut one hundred years later, the Negro still is not free; one hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination; one hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity; one hundred years later, the Negro is still languished in the corners of American society and finds himself in exile in his own land.<\/em><\/p>\nSo we\u2019ve come here today to dramatize a shameful condition. In a sense we\u2019ve come to our nation\u2019s capital to cash a check. When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was the promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be guaranteed the unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.<\/em><\/p>\nIt is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note in so far as her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check, a check which has come back marked \u201cinsufficient funds.\u201d\u00a0But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation. And so we have come to cash this check,\u00a0a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom\u00a0and the security of justice.<\/em><\/p>\nWe have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of now. This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is the time to make the real the promises of democracy; now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice; now is the time\u00a0to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood; now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God\u2019s children. It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment. This sweltering summer of the Negro\u2019s legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality. Nineteen sixty-three is not an end, but a beginning. And those who hope that the Negro needed to blow off steam and will now be content, will have a rude awakening if the nation returns to business as usual.\u00a0There will be neither rest nor tranquility in America until the Negro is granted his citizenship rights. The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.<\/em><\/p>\nBut there is something that I must say to my people, who stand on the worn threshold which leads into the palace of justice. In the process of gaining our rightful place, we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred. We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protests to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force. The marvelous new militancy, which has engulfed the Negro community, must not lead us to a distrust of all white people. For many of our white brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny\u00a0is tied up with our destiny. And they have come to realize that their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom. We cannot walk alone. And as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall always march ahead. We cannot turn back.<\/em><\/p>\nThere are those who are asking the devotees of Civil Rights, \u201cWhen will you be satisfied?\u201d We can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is the victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality; we can never be satisfied as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities; we cannot be satisfied as long as the Negro\u2019s basic mobility is from a smaller ghetto to a larger one; we can never be satisfied as long as our children are stripped of their selfhood and robbed of their dignity by signs stating \u201cFor Whites Only\u201d;\u00a0we cannot be satisfied as long as the Negro in Mississippi cannot vote, and the Negro in New York believes he has nothing for which to vote. No! no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until \u201cjustice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\nI am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great trials and tribulations. \u00a0Some of you have come fresh from narrow jail cells. Some of you have come from areas where your quest for freedom left you battered by the storms of persecution\u00a0and staggered by the winds of police brutality. You have been the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that unearned suffering is redemptive. Go back to Mississippi. Go back to Alabama. Go back to South Carolina. Go back to Georgia. Go back to Louisiana. Go back to the slums and ghettos of our Northern cities, knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed. \u00a0Let us not wallow in the valley of despair.<\/em><\/p>\nI say to you today, my friends, so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream.\u00a0It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream. I have a dream that one day this nation\u00a0will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed, \u201cWe hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.\u201d\u00a0I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, sons of former slaves and the sons of former slaveowners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood. I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice. I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.<\/em><\/p>\nI HAVE A DREAM TODAY!<\/em><\/p>\nI have a dream that one day down in Alabama \u2014 with its vicious racists, with its Governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification \u2014\u00a0one day right there in Alabama, little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.<\/em><\/p>\nI HAVE A DREAM TODAY!<\/em><\/p>\nI have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, and every hill and mountain shall be made low. The rough places will be plain and the crooked places will be made straight,\u00a0\u201cand the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\nThis is our hope. This is the faith that I go back to the South with.\u00a0With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. \u00a0With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brother-hood.\u00a0With this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day. \u00a0And this will be the day. This will be the day when all of God\u2019s children will be able to sing with new meaning, \u201cMy country \u2019tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing. Land where my father died, land of the pilgrim\u2019s pride, from every mountainside, let freedom ring.\u201d And if America is to be a great nation, this must become true.<\/em><\/p>\nSo let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire; let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York; let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania; let freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado; let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California. But not only that. Let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia; let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee; let freedom ring from every hill and mole hill of Mississippi. \u201cFrom every mountainside, let freedom ring.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\nAnd when this happens, and when we allow freedom to ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God\u2019s children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual: \u201cFree at last.\u00a0Free at last.\u00a0Thank God Almighty, we are free at last.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\nSource: Martin Luther King, Jr.,\u00a0I Have A Dream: Writings and Speeches that Changed the World, ed. James Melvin Washington (San Francisco: Harper, 1986), 102-106.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"One of my historical heros will always be Martin Luther King Jr. \u00a0I am so very proud of him and all the civil rights leaders who fought for equal rights between the races. Today, I take a look around MY life and believe that if Dr. King were alive today to see my life, he […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-594","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-personal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/devonshanorphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/594","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/devonshanorphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/devonshanorphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devonshanorphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devonshanorphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=594"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/devonshanorphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/594\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/devonshanorphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=594"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devonshanorphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=594"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devonshanorphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=594"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\u201cI Have a Dream\u201d Speech<\/a><\/h2>\n\nMartin Luther King, Jr.<\/p>\n
August 28, 1963<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation.<\/em><\/p>\nFive score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today, signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of their captivity.<\/em><\/p>\nBut one hundred years later, the Negro still is not free; one hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination; one hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity; one hundred years later, the Negro is still languished in the corners of American society and finds himself in exile in his own land.<\/em><\/p>\nSo we\u2019ve come here today to dramatize a shameful condition. In a sense we\u2019ve come to our nation\u2019s capital to cash a check. When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was the promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be guaranteed the unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.<\/em><\/p>\nIt is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note in so far as her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check, a check which has come back marked \u201cinsufficient funds.\u201d\u00a0But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation. And so we have come to cash this check,\u00a0a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom\u00a0and the security of justice.<\/em><\/p>\nWe have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of now. This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is the time to make the real the promises of democracy; now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice; now is the time\u00a0to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood; now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God\u2019s children. It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment. This sweltering summer of the Negro\u2019s legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality. Nineteen sixty-three is not an end, but a beginning. And those who hope that the Negro needed to blow off steam and will now be content, will have a rude awakening if the nation returns to business as usual.\u00a0There will be neither rest nor tranquility in America until the Negro is granted his citizenship rights. The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.<\/em><\/p>\nBut there is something that I must say to my people, who stand on the worn threshold which leads into the palace of justice. In the process of gaining our rightful place, we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred. We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protests to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force. The marvelous new militancy, which has engulfed the Negro community, must not lead us to a distrust of all white people. For many of our white brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny\u00a0is tied up with our destiny. And they have come to realize that their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom. We cannot walk alone. And as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall always march ahead. We cannot turn back.<\/em><\/p>\nThere are those who are asking the devotees of Civil Rights, \u201cWhen will you be satisfied?\u201d We can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is the victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality; we can never be satisfied as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities; we cannot be satisfied as long as the Negro\u2019s basic mobility is from a smaller ghetto to a larger one; we can never be satisfied as long as our children are stripped of their selfhood and robbed of their dignity by signs stating \u201cFor Whites Only\u201d;\u00a0we cannot be satisfied as long as the Negro in Mississippi cannot vote, and the Negro in New York believes he has nothing for which to vote. No! no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until \u201cjustice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\nI am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great trials and tribulations. \u00a0Some of you have come fresh from narrow jail cells. Some of you have come from areas where your quest for freedom left you battered by the storms of persecution\u00a0and staggered by the winds of police brutality. You have been the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that unearned suffering is redemptive. Go back to Mississippi. Go back to Alabama. Go back to South Carolina. Go back to Georgia. Go back to Louisiana. Go back to the slums and ghettos of our Northern cities, knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed. \u00a0Let us not wallow in the valley of despair.<\/em><\/p>\nI say to you today, my friends, so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream.\u00a0It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream. I have a dream that one day this nation\u00a0will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed, \u201cWe hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.\u201d\u00a0I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, sons of former slaves and the sons of former slaveowners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood. I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice. I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.<\/em><\/p>\nI HAVE A DREAM TODAY!<\/em><\/p>\nI have a dream that one day down in Alabama \u2014 with its vicious racists, with its Governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification \u2014\u00a0one day right there in Alabama, little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.<\/em><\/p>\nI HAVE A DREAM TODAY!<\/em><\/p>\nI have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, and every hill and mountain shall be made low. The rough places will be plain and the crooked places will be made straight,\u00a0\u201cand the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\nThis is our hope. This is the faith that I go back to the South with.\u00a0With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. \u00a0With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brother-hood.\u00a0With this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day. \u00a0And this will be the day. This will be the day when all of God\u2019s children will be able to sing with new meaning, \u201cMy country \u2019tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing. Land where my father died, land of the pilgrim\u2019s pride, from every mountainside, let freedom ring.\u201d And if America is to be a great nation, this must become true.<\/em><\/p>\nSo let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire; let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York; let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania; let freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado; let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California. But not only that. Let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia; let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee; let freedom ring from every hill and mole hill of Mississippi. \u201cFrom every mountainside, let freedom ring.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\nAnd when this happens, and when we allow freedom to ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God\u2019s children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual: \u201cFree at last.\u00a0Free at last.\u00a0Thank God Almighty, we are free at last.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\nSource: Martin Luther King, Jr.,\u00a0I Have A Dream: Writings and Speeches that Changed the World, ed. James Melvin Washington (San Francisco: Harper, 1986), 102-106.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"One of my historical heros will always be Martin Luther King Jr. \u00a0I am so very proud of him and all the civil rights leaders who fought for equal rights between the races. Today, I take a look around MY life and believe that if Dr. King were alive today to see my life, he […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-594","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-personal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/devonshanorphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/594","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/devonshanorphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/devonshanorphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devonshanorphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devonshanorphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=594"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/devonshanorphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/594\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/devonshanorphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=594"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devonshanorphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=594"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devonshanorphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=594"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
Martin Luther King, Jr.<\/p>\n
August 28, 1963<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation.<\/em><\/p>\n Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today, signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of their captivity.<\/em><\/p>\n But one hundred years later, the Negro still is not free; one hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination; one hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity; one hundred years later, the Negro is still languished in the corners of American society and finds himself in exile in his own land.<\/em><\/p>\n So we\u2019ve come here today to dramatize a shameful condition. In a sense we\u2019ve come to our nation\u2019s capital to cash a check. When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was the promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be guaranteed the unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.<\/em><\/p>\n It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note in so far as her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check, a check which has come back marked \u201cinsufficient funds.\u201d\u00a0But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation. And so we have come to cash this check,\u00a0a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom\u00a0and the security of justice.<\/em><\/p>\n We have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of now. This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is the time to make the real the promises of democracy; now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice; now is the time\u00a0to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood; now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God\u2019s children. It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment. This sweltering summer of the Negro\u2019s legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality. Nineteen sixty-three is not an end, but a beginning. And those who hope that the Negro needed to blow off steam and will now be content, will have a rude awakening if the nation returns to business as usual.\u00a0There will be neither rest nor tranquility in America until the Negro is granted his citizenship rights. The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.<\/em><\/p>\n But there is something that I must say to my people, who stand on the worn threshold which leads into the palace of justice. In the process of gaining our rightful place, we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred. We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protests to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force. The marvelous new militancy, which has engulfed the Negro community, must not lead us to a distrust of all white people. For many of our white brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny\u00a0is tied up with our destiny. And they have come to realize that their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom. We cannot walk alone. And as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall always march ahead. We cannot turn back.<\/em><\/p>\n There are those who are asking the devotees of Civil Rights, \u201cWhen will you be satisfied?\u201d We can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is the victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality; we can never be satisfied as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities; we cannot be satisfied as long as the Negro\u2019s basic mobility is from a smaller ghetto to a larger one; we can never be satisfied as long as our children are stripped of their selfhood and robbed of their dignity by signs stating \u201cFor Whites Only\u201d;\u00a0we cannot be satisfied as long as the Negro in Mississippi cannot vote, and the Negro in New York believes he has nothing for which to vote. No! no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until \u201cjustice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n I am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great trials and tribulations. \u00a0Some of you have come fresh from narrow jail cells. Some of you have come from areas where your quest for freedom left you battered by the storms of persecution\u00a0and staggered by the winds of police brutality. You have been the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that unearned suffering is redemptive. Go back to Mississippi. Go back to Alabama. Go back to South Carolina. Go back to Georgia. Go back to Louisiana. Go back to the slums and ghettos of our Northern cities, knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed. \u00a0Let us not wallow in the valley of despair.<\/em><\/p>\n I say to you today, my friends, so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream.\u00a0It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream. I have a dream that one day this nation\u00a0will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed, \u201cWe hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.\u201d\u00a0I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, sons of former slaves and the sons of former slaveowners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood. I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice. I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.<\/em><\/p>\n I HAVE A DREAM TODAY!<\/em><\/p>\n I have a dream that one day down in Alabama \u2014 with its vicious racists, with its Governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification \u2014\u00a0one day right there in Alabama, little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.<\/em><\/p>\n I HAVE A DREAM TODAY!<\/em><\/p>\n I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, and every hill and mountain shall be made low. The rough places will be plain and the crooked places will be made straight,\u00a0\u201cand the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n This is our hope. This is the faith that I go back to the South with.\u00a0With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. \u00a0With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brother-hood.\u00a0With this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day. \u00a0And this will be the day. This will be the day when all of God\u2019s children will be able to sing with new meaning, \u201cMy country \u2019tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing. Land where my father died, land of the pilgrim\u2019s pride, from every mountainside, let freedom ring.\u201d And if America is to be a great nation, this must become true.<\/em><\/p>\n So let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire; let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York; let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania; let freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado; let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California. But not only that. Let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia; let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee; let freedom ring from every hill and mole hill of Mississippi. \u201cFrom every mountainside, let freedom ring.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n And when this happens, and when we allow freedom to ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God\u2019s children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual: \u201cFree at last.\u00a0Free at last.\u00a0Thank God Almighty, we are free at last.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n Source: Martin Luther King, Jr.,\u00a0I Have A Dream: Writings and Speeches that Changed the World, ed. James Melvin Washington (San Francisco: Harper, 1986), 102-106.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" One of my historical heros will always be Martin Luther King Jr. \u00a0I am so very proud of him and all the civil rights leaders who fought for equal rights between the races. Today, I take a look around MY life and believe that if Dr. King were alive today to see my life, he […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-594","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-personal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/devonshanorphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/594","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/devonshanorphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/devonshanorphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devonshanorphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devonshanorphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=594"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/devonshanorphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/594\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/devonshanorphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=594"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devonshanorphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=594"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devonshanorphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=594"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}