A true revolution of values will lay hands on the world order and say of war: This way of settling differences is not just. This business of burning human beings with napalm, of filling our nations homes with orphans and widows, of injecting poisonous drugs of hate into veins of people normally humane, of sending men home from dark and bloody battlefields physically handicapped and psychologically deranged, cannot be reconciled with wisdom, justice and love. Love is somehow the key that unlocks the door which leads to ultimate reality. They question our political goals and they deny the reality of a peace settlement from which they will be excluded. Mr. SMILEY: That's right. And they, as news crews tend to do, they stayed to get just enough B-roll, as we call it Mr. SMILEY: for the news that night. Soon we would be paying almost the full costs of this tragic attempt at recolonization. They brought in extra chairs. He did say he was going to increase troop levels in Afghanistan, so he's kept that promise. So all that we have is less than 10 minutes of video of the speech. 0000001427 00000 n The Reverend Martin Luther King Jr ., head of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, delivers a speech entitled "Beyond Vietnam" in front of 3,000 people at Riverside Church in. Legendary civil rights leader Rev. Over the past two years, as I have moved to break the betrayal of my own silences and to speak from the burnings of my own heart, as I have called for radical departures from the destruction of Vietnam, many persons have questioned me about the wisdom of my path. 0000002605 00000 n Fifty years ago in 1967, Martin Luther King, Jr.. They asked if our own nation wasnt using massive doses of violence to solve its problems, to bring about the changes it wanted. 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. Perhaps the more difficult but no less necessary task is to speak for those who have been designated as our enemies. It comes to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring. I would like to suggest five concrete things that our government should do immediately to begin the long and difficult process of extricating ourselves from this nightmarish conflict: 1. A call for equality and freedom, it became one of the defining moments of the civil rights movement and one of the most iconic speeches in American history. At this point I should make it clear that while I have tried in these last few minutes to give a voice to the voiceless on Vietnam and to understand the arguments of those who are called enemy, I am as deeply concerned about our troops there as anything else. "[14][15], The "Beyond Vietnam" speech reflected King's evolving political advocacy in his later years, which paralleled the teachings of the progressive Highlander Research and Education Center, with which he was affiliated. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., is known for being one of the greatest orators of the twentieth century, and perhaps in all of American history. CONAN: Walt, thank you. Martin Luther King, Jr. believed that peace and economic justice were critical to his fight for human rights. 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. Delivered by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. at Manhattan's Riverside Church, April 4, 1967 . CONAN: Well, take us back to 1967. 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. Keep in mind now that 1967, Neal, as you know, is the same year that Muhammad Ali, the world champion, decides to not accept that draft to go and fight in Vietnam. What of the National Liberation Front that strangely anonymous group we call VC or Communists? 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. 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. Mr. SMILEY: He'd wanted to give it two years earlier and had attempted a dry run at this speech, to your appoint, Neal, a couple of years prior to when he gave it. 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 could not be silent in the face of such cruel manipulation of the poor. This speech is not addressed to Hanoi or to the National Liberation Front. Tonight, however, I wish not to speak with Hanoi and the NLF, but rather to my fellow Americans, who, with me, bear the greatest responsibility in ending a conflict that has exacted a heavy price on both continents. I join with you in this meeting because I am in deepest agreement with the aims and work of the organization which has brought us together: Clergy and Laymen Concerned about Vietnam. Had the president stopped by giving Martin King his just respect - as he did, to his credit - it would have been okay. Let's get Howard(ph) on the line. 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. 0000004855 00000 n America, the richest and most powerful nation in the world, can well lead the way in this revolution of values. Therefore, communism is a judgment against our failure to make democracy real and follow through on the revolutions we initiated. These too are our brothers. We must speak for them and raise the questions they cannot raise. The United States got involved in the Vietnam War because they wanted to stop the spread of communism. The Vietnamese people proclaimed their own independence in 1945 after a combined French and Japanese occupation, and before the Communist revolution in China. 0000008347 00000 n How can they believe in our integrity when now we speak of aggression from the north as if there were nothing more essential to the war? Copyright 2010 NPR. On April 4, 1967 Martin Luther King Jr. wrote a speech named, "Beyond Vietnam- A Time to Break Silence" addressing the Vietnam War. King, Excerpts, Address at mass rally on 12 August 1965, 13 August 1965, MLKJP-GAMK. Cypress Hall D, 466 Via Ortega, Stanford, CA 94305-4146 My third reason moves to an even deeper level of awareness, for it grows out of my experience in the ghettoes of the North over the last three years especially the last three summers. Part of our ongoing commitment might well express itself in an offer to grant asylum to any Vietnamese who fears for his life under a new regime which included the Liberation Front. As the head of state, I cannot necessarily embrace the same principles that, as you point out, Martin Luther King, a prophet, an outsider could embrace. And about a month after that speech was given, I was wounded. 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. PBS talk show host Tavis Smiley's new documentary, MLK: A Call to Conscience explores King's speech. Speeches, writings, movements, and protests, Opposition to United States involvement in the Vietnam War, Spring Mobilization Committee to End the War in Vietnam. So 60 year(ph) is really, really a hot year here around this particular issue. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. led the 1955 Montgomery bus boycott, organized the 1963 March on Washington, advocated for civil disobedience and. (AFP via Getty Images) "Why are you speaking about the war, Dr. King? The speech and its echoes for Afghanistan and Iraq are the subject of "Tavis Smiley Reports MLK: A Call to Conscience.". 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. Indeed, their questions suggest that they do not know the world in which they live. How can they trust us when now we charge them with violence after the murderous reign of Diem and charge them with violence while we pour every new weapon of death into their land? Therefore the first hope in our inventory must be the hope that love is going to have the last word.. Surely we must understand their feelings even if we do not condone their actions. On April 15, 1967, King participated and spoke at an anti-war march from Manhattan's Central Park to the United Nations. Mr. SMILEY: Yeah. ml.K-x1x*tcSO p[ endstream endobj 62 0 obj 720 endobj 63 0 obj << /Filter /FlateDecode /Length 62 0 R >> stream The New York Times calls it wasteful and self-defeating. King to Weigh Civil Disobedience). 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. As Arnold Toynbee says : Love is the ultimate force that makes for the saving choice of life and good against the damning choice of death and evil. So far we may have killed a million of them mostly children. And as I ponder the madness of Vietnam and search within myself for ways to understand and respond to compassion my mind goes constantly to the people of that peninsula. We can no longer afford to worship the god of hate or bow before the altar of retaliation. These are the times for real choices and not false ones. But the entire speech, of course, thankfully, was recorded on audio. There is something seductively tempting about stopping there and sending us all off on what in some circles has become a popular crusade against the war in Vietnam. Beyond the calling of race or nation or creed is this vocation of sonship and brotherhood, and because I believe that the Father is deeply concerned especially for his suffering and helpless and outcast children, I come tonight to speak for them. or 404 526-8968. In order to atone for our sins and errors in Vietnam, we should take the initiative in bringing a halt to this tragic war. It seemed as if there was a real promise of hope for the poor both black and white through the poverty program. We must stop now. 0000004621 00000 n So he was no longer on that particular list. But there was a great turnout for the speech.

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