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In most of our German school textbooks Martin Luther King's I have a dream- speech
is printed only in parts. But the following text renders his whole speech, as he delivered it to more than 200,000
people at the March on Washington at the Lincoln Memorial on August 28, 1963. Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated
on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee on April 4, 1968. He was 39 years old. Today the
Lorraine Motel has been made into an excellent Civil Rights Museum to commemorate the outstanding influence
which King exerted on the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 60s.
I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest demonstration
for freedom in the history od our nation.
Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today, signed the Emancipation
Proclamation (i.e. abolition of slavery). 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 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 menacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination; one hundred years alter,
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 still is still languished in the corners
of American society and finds himself in exile in his own land.
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 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.
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 '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 have come to cash this check, a check that will give us upon demand the riches
of freedom and the security of justice.
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 tranqilizing drug of gradualism.
Now is the time to make the real 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.
1963 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.
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 plain 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 talk,
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 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 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 the Negro in Missdissippi 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 justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like
a mighty stream.
I am not unmindful that some of you have cone here out of great trials and tribulations. Some
of you have come from areas where your quest for freedom left you battered by the 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 Geargia; Go back to
Louisiana; Go back to the slums and ghettos of Northern cities, knowing that somehow this situation
can and will be changed. Let us not wallow in the valley of despair.
So 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, 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, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the
rough places will be made plain and the crooked places will be made staight, and the glory of the Lord
shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.
This is our hope. This is the 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.
And 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 fathers died, land of the pilgrim's pride, from every mountain side, let freedom
ring. And if America is to be a great nation, this must become true.
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 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
Lokkout Mountain of Tennessee; let freedom ring from every hill and mole hill of Mississippi.
From every mountain side, let freedom ring.
And when this happens, 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 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. Thank God Almighty, we are
free at last.'
Possible assignments:
1. Pick three metaphors and explain them in your own words.
2. Which other stylistic devices does M.L. King employ in his speech and explain their functions.
3. Describe the situation of African-Americans before and after 1953 with the beginning
of the civil rights movement.
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