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We know that King sought a world free of the “triple evils” of racism, economic exploitation and war – that his was a global vision that looked far beyond the battles against Jim Crow, which were all but won by 1968. King’s last public address was, in fact, a post-civil rights speech. But the defeat of legal segregation and whites-only ballots was just one leg in a long journey to “the promised land.” The movement had much more work to do. “Let us rise up tonight with a greater readiness,” King urged the crowd at Mason Temple. “Let us stand with a greater determination. And let us move on in these powerful days, these days of challenge to make America what it ought to be.”
“Contrary to current mythology, the Black Church never was a great fountain of social activism”
Never for a moment did King believe that the mass movement he led had outlived its usefulness. The human and labor rights of 1,300 Memphis sanitation workers hung in the balance, and mass action and sacrifice were necessary to set things right. He specifically challenged the many local ministers in his audience “to develop a kind of dangerous unselfishness.”
”That’s the question before you tonight. Not, ‘If I stop to help the sanitation workers, what will happen to all of the hours that I usually spend in my office every day and every week as a pastor?’ The question is not, ‘If I stop to help this man in need, what will happen to me?’ ‘If I do not stop to help the sanitation workers, what will happen to them?’ That’s the question.”
King knew his fellow preachers well. Contrary to current mythology, the Black church was never a great fountain of social activism. More often, suspicious and small minded clergy shut their doors against the winds of change. As King remarked in Memphis, “so often, preachers aren’t concerned about anything but themselves. And I’m always happy to see a relevant ministry.” In the years following the 1955 Montgomery bus boycott, church doors were slammed shut in King’s face throughout the South. As a preacher-led organization, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) required a local church base in order to set up operations. The same problems of Jim Crow and brutality existed in every southern city, yet in town after town, King could not find a single church that would open its doors to the SCLC. The “movement” was sputtering. Rather than mounting a grand sweep through the region, King found himself hemmed in by the endemic fear and even hostility of Black clergymen.