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    << Back to the Martin Luther King page



    - Martin Luther King Junior -
    "I have a dream" (August 28th 1963)

    Martin Luther King at the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom

    "I Have a Dream"

    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.

    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.

    But 100 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 an exile in his own
    land. And so we've come here today to dramatize a shameful condition.

    In a sense we've come to our nation's 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 a
    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.

    It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note
    insofar as her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this
    sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check, a
    check that has come back marked "insufficient funds."

    But 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've come to cash this check, a check
    that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and security of justice.
    We have also come to his 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 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 to 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's children.

    It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment.
    This sweltering summer of the Negro's 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. Those who hoped 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. There 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.

    But there is something that I must say to my people who stand on the
    warm 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 protest 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 is 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. There are those who are asking the
    devotees of civil rights, "When will you be satisfied?" 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's
    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 "for whites only." We cannot be satisfied as
    long as a Negro in Mississippi cannot vote and a 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 justice rolls down like waters and
    righteousness like a mighty stream.

    I am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great
    trials and tribulations. Some 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 storms of persecution and 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.

    Let us not wallow in the valley of despair. I say to you today my
    friends - so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I
    still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.

    I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the
    true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all
    men are created equal."

    I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of
    former slaves and the sons of former slave owners 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.

    I have a dream today.

    I have a dream that one day down in Alabama, with its vicious racists,
    with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition
    and nullification - one 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.

    I have a dream today.

    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 made plain,
    and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord
    shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together.

    This is our hope. This is the faith that I go back to the South with.
    With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a
    stone of hope. With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling
    discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With 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.

    This will be the day, this will be the day when all of God's children will
    be able to sing with new meaning "My country 'tis of thee, sweet land of
    liberty, of thee I sing. Land where my father's died, land of the Pilgrim's
    pride, from every mountainside, let freedom ring!"

    And if America is to be a great nation, this must become true. And 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 molehill of Mississippi - from
    every mountainside.


    Let freedom ring. And when this happens, and when we allow
    freedom 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's 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: "Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty,
    we are free at last!"


    ---

    Distribution statement: Accepted as part of the Douglass Archives of American Public Address (http://douglass.speech.nwu.edu) on May 26, 1999. Prepared by D. Oetting (http://nonce.com/oetting).

    Permission is hereby granted to download, reprint, and/or otherwise redistribute this file, provided this distribution statement is included and appropriate point of origin credit is given to the preparer and Douglass.