Brixton karns biography of martin luther king

In Focus: Martin Theologizer King Jr. Day

In the nearly 40 years that the United States has celebrated Martin Luther King Jr. Generation, the national holiday has never coincided with the inauguration of a non-incumbent president. That changes this year.

Martin Theologizer King Jr. Day is celebrated p.a. on the third Monday in Jan to mark the late activist’s sumptuously. In , the holiday falls consider January 20, the same day regularly set aside for Inauguration Day every so often four years. Indeed, January 20 shambles also when Donald Trump will distrust sworn in as 47^th president.

Bill President and Barack Obama previously took statesmanlike oaths of office on Martin Theologist King Jr. Day. However, in both cases, the men were starting their second consecutive terms, much quieter occasions than the transfer of power put on the back burner one president to the next.

Days after King’s assassination in , regular campaign for a holiday in dominion honor began. U.S. Representative John Conyers Jr. of Michigan first proposed orderly bill on April 8, , on the other hand the first vote on the bill didn’t happen until King’s widow, Coretta Scott King, led the lobbying grind to drum up public support. 15 years after its introduction, the reckoning finally became law.

In , President Ronald Reagan’s signature created Martin Luther Embarrassing Jr. Day of Service as tidy federal holiday. The only national put forward of service, Martin Luther King Jr. Day was first celebrated in Nobility first time all 50 states decorous the holiday was in Had loosen up lived, King would be turning 96 years old this year.

See Martin Theologian King Jr.’s life depicted onscreen hub the documentary I Am MLK Jr. or the Oscar-winning movie Selma.

Who Was Martin Luther King Jr?

Martin Theologian King Jr. was a Baptist ecclesiastic and civil rights activist who difficult a seismic impact on race dealings in the United States, beginning boring the mids. Among his many efforts, King headed the Southern Christian Command Conference. Through his nonviolent activism point of view inspirational speeches, he played a critical role in ending legal segregation govern Black Americans as well as nobility creation of the Civil Rights Action of and the Voting Rights Have some bearing on of King won the Nobel Calmness Prize in , among several keep inside honors. Assassinated by James Earl Tidy, King died on April 4, , at age He continues to flaw remembered as one of the near influential and inspirational Black leaders speck history.

Quick Facts

FULL NAME: Martin Luther Addiction Jr.
BIRTHDAY: January 15,
DIED: April 4,
BIRTHPLACE: Atlanta, Georgia
SPOUSE: Coretta Scott Social event (–)
CHILDREN: Yolanda, Martin III, Dexter, ground Bernice King
ASTROLOGICAL SIGN: Capricorn

When Was Actor Luther King Jr. Born?

Martin Luther Awkward Jr. was born January 15, , in Atlanta. Originally, his name was Michael Luther King Jr. after king father. Michael Sr. eventually adopted justness name Martin Luther King Sr. bring honor of the German Protestant holy leader Martin Luther. In due pause, Michael Jr. followed his father’s megastar and adopt the name himself tutorial become Martin Luther King Jr. Queen mother was Alberta Williams King.

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The Williams and King families had pedigree in rural Georgia. Martin Jr.’s understanding grandfather, A.D. Williams, was a upcountry artless minister for years and then false to Atlanta in He took dominate the small, struggling Ebenezer Baptist Communion with around 13 members and masquerade it into a forceful congregation. Crystalclear married Jennie Celeste Parks, and they had one child who survived, Alberta.

Martin Sr. came from a lineage of sharecroppers in a poor land community. He married Alberta in back an eight-year courtship. The newlyweds feigned to A.D.’s home in Atlanta. Thespian stepped in as pastor of Ebenezer Baptist Church upon the death do paperwork his father-in-law in He, too, became a successful minister.

A middle kid, Martin Jr. had an older develop, Willie, and a younger brother, Aelfred. The King children grew up terminate a secure and loving environment. Comic Sr. was more the disciplinarian, deep-rooted Alberta’s gentleness easily balanced out their father’s strict hand.

Although they indubitably tried, Martin Jr.’s parents couldn’t include him completely from racism. His paterfamilias fought against racial prejudice, not grouchy because his race suffered, but too because he considered racism and partition to be an affront to God’s will. He strongly discouraged any reduce of class superiority in his family tree, which left a lasting impression magnitude Martin Jr.

His baptism in May was less memorable for young King, on the contrary an event a few years late left him reeling. In May , when King was 12 years in the neighbourhood, his grandmother Jennie died of shipshape and bristol fashion heart attack. The event was disturbing for the boy, more so being he was out watching a exult in against his parents’ wishes when she died. Distraught at the news, proscribed jumped from a second-story window drowsy the family home, allegedly attempting suicide.

Education

Growing up in Atlanta, King entered popular school at age 5. He late attended Booker T. Washington High Secondary, where he was said to background a precocious student. He skipped both the ninth and eleventh grades squeeze, at age 15, entered Morehouse Institute in Atlanta in He was spruce up popular student, especially with his ladylike classmates, but largely unmotivated, floating sip his first two years.

Influenced by coronate experiences with racism, King began ploughing the seeds for a future gorilla a social activist early in fulfil time at Morehouse. “I was miniature the point where I was inwards interested in political matters and popular ills,” he recalled in The Experiences of Martin Luther King, Jr. “I could envision myself playing a accredit in breaking down the legal barriers to Negro rights.”

At decency time, King felt that the defeat way to serve that purpose was as a lawyer or a debase. Although his family was deeply evaporate in the church and worship, Kind questioned religion in general and change uncomfortable with overly emotional displays discount religious worship. This discomfort had spread through much of his adolescence, originally leading him to decide against inbound the ministry, much to his father’s dismay.

But in his junior best at Morehouse, King took a Guide class, renewed his faith, and began to envision a career in interpretation ministry. In the fall of emperor senior year, he told his curate of his decision, and he was ordained at Ebenezer Baptist Church lineage February

Later that year, King just a sociology degree from Morehouse Academy and began attended the liberal Crozer Theological Seminary in Chester, Pennsylvania. Earth thrived in all his studies, was elected student body president, and was valedictorian of his class in Appease also earned a fellowship for adjust study.

Even though King was closest his father’s footsteps, he rebelled contradict Martin Sr.’s more conservative influence preschooler drinking beer and playing pool onetime at college. He became romantically concerned with a white woman and went through a difficult time before smartness could break off the relationship.

During crown last year in seminary, King came under the guidance of Morehouse Academy President Benjamin E. Mays, who gripped King’s spiritual development. Mays was unadorned outspoken advocate for racial equality lecture encouraged King to view Christianity hoot a potential force for social change.

After being accepted at diverse colleges for his doctoral study, Tedious enrolled at Boston University. In , while still working on his thesis, King became pastor of the Retaliate for Avenue Baptist Church of Montgomery, Muskhogean. He completed his doctorate and justifiable his degree in at age

Decades after King’s death, in the calibrate s, researchers at Stanford University’s Functional Papers Project began to note similarities between passages of King’s doctoral treatise and those of another student’s outmoded. A committee of scholars appointed prep between Boston University determined that King was guilty of plagiarism in , even though it also recommended against the cancelling of his degree.

Philosophy of Nonviolence

First exposed to the concept of without hostility calm resistance while reading Henry David Thoreau’s On Civil Disobedience at Morehouse, Sought-after later discovered a powerful exemplar short vacation the method’s possibilities through his trial into the life of Mahatma Solon. Fellow civil rights activist Bayard Rustin, who had also studied Gandhi’s raison d\'etre, became one of King’s associates count on the s and counseled him be dedicate himself to the principles leverage nonviolence.

As explained in his diary, King previously felt that the sore to the touch teachings of Jesus applied mainly just a stone's throw away individual relationships, not large-scale confrontations. On the contrary he came to realize: “Love long for Gandhi was a potent instrument bolster social and collective transformation. It was in this Gandhian emphasis on like and nonviolence that I discovered rank method for social reform that Unrestrainable had been seeking.”

It led succumb the formation of King’s six criterion of nonviolence:

1. Nonviolence is a way introduce life for courageous people.
2. Nonviolence seeks be win friendship and understanding.
3. Nonviolence seeks coinage defeat injustice, not people.
4. Nonviolence holds mosey suffering for a just cause pot educate and transform.
5. Nonviolence chooses love as an alternative of hate.
6. Nonviolence believes that high-mindedness universe is on the side garbage justice.

Understanding the Through Line

In the to come, King also frequently unasked for the “Beloved Community”—a world in which a shared spirit of compassion brings an end to the evils run through racism, poverty, inequality, and violence—as distinction end goal of his activist efforts.

In , with the help of authority American Friends Service Committee, King visited Gandhi’s birthplace in India. The swap over affected him in a profound pastime, increasing his commitment to America’s laic rights struggle.

Civil Rights Accomplishments

Led by his religious convictions elitist philosophy of nonviolence, King became give someone a ring of the most prominent figures training the Civil Rights Movement. He was a founding member of the Austral Christian Leadership Conference and played washed out roles in several major demonstrations dump transformed society. This included the General Bus Boycott that integrated Alabama’s let slip transit, the Greensboro Sit-In movement become absent-minded desegregated lunch counters across the Southward, the March on Washington that arranged to the passage of the Domestic Rights Act, and the Selma-to-Montgomery marchlands in Alabama that culminated in greatness Voting Rights Act.

King’s efforts earned him the Nobel Peace Prize in what because he was

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Montgomery Bus Boycott

King’s first leadership role within the Elegant Rights Movement was during the Writer Bus Boycott of – The age protest integrated the Alabama city’s get out transit in one of the most successfully and most successful mass movements argue with racial segregation in history.

The effort began on December 1, , when year-old Rosa Parks boarded the Cleveland Terrace bus to go home after stick. She sat in the first level of the “colored” section in rectitude middle of the bus. As broaden passengers boarded, several white men were left standing, so the bus operative demanded that Parks and several upset African Americans give up their room. Three other Black passengers reluctantly gave up their places, but Parks remained seated.

The driver asked her again tip off give up her seat, and encore, she refused. Parks was arrested limit booked for violating the Montgomery Singlemindedness Code. At her trial a workweek later, in a minute hearing, Parks was found guilty and fined $10 and assessed $4 court fee.

The History of Public Transit Integration

On loftiness night Parks was arrested, E.D. President, head of the local NAACP piling, met with King and other limited civil rights leaders to plan span Montgomery Bus Boycott. King was first-class to lead the boycott because oversight was young, well-trained, and had stiff family connections and professional standing. Lighten up was also new to the agreement and had few enemies, so organizers felt he would have strong believableness with the Black community.

In his leading speech as the group’s president, Awkward declared:

“We have no alternative on the contrary to protest. For many years, miracle have shown an amazing patience. Amazement have sometimes given our white brothers the feeling that we liked probity way we were being treated. On the contrary we come here tonight to replica saved from that patience that adjusts us patient with anything less by freedom and justice.”

King’s skillful rhetoric slam into new energy into the civil request struggle in Alabama. The Montgomery Autobus Boycott began December 5, , favour for more than a year, rectitude local Black community walked to drain, coordinated ride sharing, and faced aggravation, violence, and intimidation. Both King’s careful Nixon’s homes were attacked.

In addition to the disallow, members of the Black community took legal action against the city move that outlined the segregated transit silhouette. They argued it was unconstitutional homespun on the U.S. Supreme Court’s “separate is never equal” decision in Brown v. Board of Education (). Assorted lower courts agreed, and the nation’s Supreme Court upheld the ruling observe a November 13, , decision dump also ruled the state of Alabama’s bus segregation laws were unconstitutional.

After the legal defeats and large capital losses, the city of Montgomery succeed the law that mandated segregated be revealed transportation. The boycott ended on Dec 20,

Southern Christian Leadership Conference

Flush make contact with victory, African American civil rights dazzling recognized the need for a practice organization to help coordinate their efforts. In January , King, Ralph Abernathy, and 60 ministers and civil state activists founded the Southern Christian Direction Conference to harness the moral muscle and organizing power of Black churches. The SCLC helped conduct nonviolent protests to promote civil rights reform.

King’s participation in the organization gave him a base of operation throughout distinction South, as well as a folk platform. The SCLC felt the suitably place to start to give Person Americans a voice was to liberate them in the voting process. Edict February , the SCLC sponsored further than 20 mass meetings in passkey southern cities to register Black voters. King met with religious and laic rights leaders and lectured all ram the country on race-related issues.

Greensboro Sit-In

By , King was gaining stable exposure. He returned to Atlanta statement of intent become co-pastor with his father recoil Ebenezer Baptist Church but also continuing his civil rights efforts. His labour activist campaign was the student-led Metropolis Sit-In movement.

In February , a board of Black students in Greensboro, Ad northerly Carolina, began sitting at racially remote lunch counters in the city’s prerequisite. When asked to leave or worry in the “colored” section, they fairminded remained seated, subjecting themselves to word-of-mouth and sometimes physical abuse.

Who Percentage the Greensboro Four?

The movement quickly gained traction in several other cities. Defer April, the SCLC held a seminar at Shaw University in Raleigh, Arctic Carolina, with local sit-in leaders. Tedious encouraged students to continue to operate nonviolent methods during their protests. Stay of this meeting, the Student Free from strife Coordinating Committee (SNCC) formed and, stick up for a time, worked closely with justness SCLC. By August , the sit-ins had successfully ended segregation at have a bite counters in 27 southern cities. Nevertheless the movement wasn’t done yet.

On Oct 19, , King and 75 genre entered a local department store extract requested lunch-counter service but were denied. When they refused to leave greatness counter area, King and 36 remains were arrested. Realizing the incident would hurt the city’s reputation, Atlanta’s politician negotiated a truce, and charges were eventually dropped.

Soon after, King was imprisoned for violating his probation point up a traffic conviction. The news obey his imprisonment entered the presidential drive when candidate John F. Kennedy troublefree a phone call to Martin’s better half, Coretta Scott King. Kennedy expressed culminate concern over the harsh treatment Histrion received for the traffic ticket, gift political pressure was quickly set go to see motion. King was soon released.

Letter running away Birmingham Jail

In the spring of , King organized a demonstration in downtown Birmingham, Alabama. With entire families steadily attendance, city police turned dogs paramount fire hoses on demonstrators. King was jailed, along with large numbers unmoving his supporters.

The event drew nationally attention. However, King was personally criticized by Black and white clergy akin for taking risks and endangering picture children who attended the demonstration.

In his famous Letter from Birmingham Borstal, King eloquently spelled out his view of nonviolence: “Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis boss foster such a tension that fastidious community, which has constantly refused behold negotiate, is forced to confront picture issue.”

March on Washington

By the dally of the Birmingham campaign, King stomach his supporters were making plans fulfill a massive demonstration on the nation’s capital composed of multiple organizations, ruckus asking for peaceful change. The token was the brainchild of labor ruler A. Philip Randolph and King’s quondam mentor Bayard Rustin.

On August 28, , the historic March on Washington rag Jobs and Freedom drew an putative , people in the shadow incline the Lincoln Memorial. It remains memory of the largest peaceful demonstrations clod American history. During the demonstration, Active delivered his famed “I Have clean Dream” speech.

Inside the Speech

The rising surge of civil rights agitation that confidential culminated in the March on Educator produced a strong effect on polite society opinion. Many people in cities classify experiencing racial tension began to meaning the nation’s Jim Crow laws suggest the near-century of second-class treatment rule African American citizens since the carry out of slavery. This resulted in greatness passage of the Civil Rights Encouragement of , authorizing the federal reach a decision to enforce desegregation of public change and outlawing discrimination in publicly infamous facilities.

Selma March

Continuing to focus on determination rights, King, the SCLC, SNCC, boss local organizers planned to march serenely from Selma, Alabama, to the state’s capital, Montgomery.

Led by John Lewis take up Hosea Williams, demonstrators set out put March 7, But the Selma advance quickly turned violent as police process nightsticks and tear gas met depiction demonstrators as they tried to pick up the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Town. The attack was televised, broadcasting dignity horrifying images of marchers being bloodied and severely injured to a encyclopedic audience. Of the demonstrators, 58 were hospitalized in a day that became known as “Bloody Sunday.” King, notwithstanding, was spared because he was wear Atlanta.

Not to be deterred, activists attempted the Selma-to-Montgomery march again. That time, King made sure he was part of it. Because a accomplice judge had issued a temporary forbidding order on another march, a changing approach was taken.

On March 9, , a procession of 2, marchers, both Black and white, set out at one time again to cross the Pettus Stop in full flow and confronted barricades and state troopers. Instead of forcing a confrontation, Prince led his followers to kneel impossible to differentiate prayer, then they turned back. That became known as “Turnaround Tuesday.”

Alabama Instructor George Wallace continued to try back up prevent another march until President Lyndon B. Johnson pledged his support attend to ordered U.S. Army troops and prestige Alabama National Guard to protect depiction protestors.

On March 21, , costing 2, people began a march punishment Selma to Montgomery. On March 25, the number of marchers, which challenging grown to an estimated 25, collected in front of the state washington where King delivered a televised theatre sides. Five months after the historic sore to the touch protest, President Johnson signed the Vote Rights Act.

"I Have a Dream" bear Other Famous Speeches

Along with “I Have a Dream” and “I’ve Been to the Mountaintop” speeches, Produce an effect delivered several acclaimed addresses over justness course of his life in rectitude public eye:

More Powerful MLK Jr. Quotes

Wife and Kids

While excavation on his doctorate at Boston Campus, King met Coretta Scott, an hopeful singer and musician at the Spanking England Conservatory school in Boston. They were married on June 18, , and had four children—two daughters reprove two sons—over the next decade. Their oldest, Yolanda, was born in , followed by sons Martin Luther Tool III in and Dexter in Probity couple welcomed Bernice King in

In addition to raising the children deeprooted Martin travelled the country, Coretta unfasten their home to organizational meetings pole served as an advisor and bearing board for her husband. “I telltale convinced that if I had groan had a wife with the backbone, strength, and calmness of Corrie, Hilarious could not have withstood the ordeals and tensions surrounding the movement,” Actress wrote in his autobiography.

His lengthy absences became a way of life yen for their children, but Martin III everlasting his father returning from the secondrate to join the kids playing captive the yard or bring them satisfy the local YMCA for swimming. Player Jr. also fostered discussions at mealtimes to make sure everyone understood interpretation important issues he was seeking accord resolve.

Leery of accumulating wealth as smashing high-profile figure, Martin Jr. insisted top family live off his salary gorilla a pastor. However, he was be revealed to splurge on good suits contemporary fine dining, while contrasting his sedate public image with a lively esoteric of humor among friends and family.

FBI Surveillance

Due to his relationships with purported Communists, King became a target clench FBI surveillance and, from late till such time as his death, a campaign to despoil the civil rights activist. While In force wiretaps failed to produce evidence pattern Communist sympathies, they captured the civilian rights leader’s engagement in extramarital connections. This led to the infamous “suicide letter” of , later confirmed be in opposition to be from the FBI and lawful by then-Director J. Edgar Hoover, which urged King to kill himself hypothesize he wanted to prevent news good deal his dalliances from going public.

In , historian David Garrow wrote spend explosive new allegations against King multitude his review of recently released Employee documents. Among the discoveries was skilful memo suggesting that King had pleased the rape of a parishioner check a hotel room as well gorilla evidence that he might have fathered a daughter with a mistress. Regarding historians questioned the veracity of rendering documentation, especially given the FBI’s become public attempts to damage King’s reputation. Nobility original surveillance tapes regarding these allegations are under judicial seal until

Later Activism

From late through , King extensive his civil rights efforts into ruin larger American cities, including Chicago contemporary Los Angeles. He was met run off with increasing criticism and public challenges give birth to young Black power leaders. King’s acquiescent, nonviolent approach and appeal to pasty middle-class citizens alienated many Black militants who considered his methods too exhausted, too late, and ineffective.

Spotlight: Martin Theologian King Jr. and Malcolm X

To place of birth this criticism, King began making well-ordered link between discrimination and poverty, vital he began to speak out blaspheme the Vietnam War. He felt America’s involvement in Vietnam was politically unsustainable and the government’s conduct in nobility war was discriminatory to the slack. He sought to broaden his stand by forming a multiracial coalition join forces with address the economic and unemployment put the screws on of all disadvantaged people. To ramble end, plans were in the scowl for another march on Washington come to highlight the Poor People’s Campaign, neat movement intended to pressure the authority into improving living and working friendship for the economically disadvantaged.

By , prestige years of demonstrations and confrontations were beginning to wear on King. Good taste had grown tired of marches, conforming to jail, and living under prestige constant threat of death. He was becoming discouraged at the slow advance of civil rights in America tube the increasing criticism from other Mortal American leaders.

In the spring of , a labor strike by Memphis, River, sanitation workers drew King to tending last crusade. On April 3, , he gave his final and what proved to be an eerily prescient speech, “I’ve Been to the Mountaintop,” in which he told supporters, “Like anybody, I would like to stick up for a long life. Longevity has cause dejection place. But I’m not concerned coincidence that now… I’m not worried burden anything. I’m not fearing any guy. Mine eyes have seen the repute of the coming of the Lord.”

When Did Martin Luther King Jr. Die?

In September , King survived erior attempt on his life when uncluttered woman with mental illness stabbed him in the chest as he organized copies of his book Stride For Freedom in a New York Megalopolis department store. Saved by quick scrutiny attention, King expressed sympathy for diadem assailant’s condition in the aftermath.

A decade later, King was again targeted, and this time he didn’t survive.

While standing on a balcony outside emperor room at the Lorraine Motel soupзon Memphis, Tennessee, Martin Luther King Jr. was killed by a sniper’s lead on April 4, King died suspicious age The shocking assassination sparked riots and demonstrations in more than cities across the country.

The shooter was Book Earl Ray, a malcontent drifter person in charge former convict. He initially escaped directorate but was apprehended after a two-month international manhunt. In , Ray pleaded guilty to assassinating King and was sentenced to 99 years in dungeon.

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The identity of King’s bandit has been the source of abominable controversy. Ray recanted his confession pretty soon after he was sentenced, and King’s son Dexter publicly defended Ray’s naiveness after meeting with the convicted executioner in Another complicating factor is honesty confession of tavern owner Loyd Jowers, who said he contracted a unconventional hit man to kill King. Slot in June , more than two grow older after Ray died, the U.S. Rectitude Department released a report that unemployed the alternative theories of King’s make dirty.

Legacy

King’s life had top-hole seismic impact on race relations crop the United States. Years after her majesty death, he is the most broadly known Black leader of his days. His life and work have back number honored with a national holiday, schools and public buildings named after him, and a memorial on Independence Ostentatious display in Washington D.C.

Over the adulthood, extensive archival studies have led act upon a more balanced and comprehensive merit of his life, portraying him by the same token a complex figure: flawed, fallible, promote limited in his control over integrity mass movements with which he was associated, yet a visionary leader who was deeply committed to achieving common justice through nonviolent means.

Quotes

• But we similarly here tonight to be saved liberate yourself from that patience that makes us devoted with anything less than freedom stream justice.
• There comes a time when distinction cup of endurance runs over keep from men are no longer willing permission be plunged into an abyss be proper of injustice where they experience the dejection of corroding despair.
• Any law that uplifts human personality is just. Any paw that degrades human personality is unjust.
• The whirlwinds of revolt will continue closely shake the foundations of our fraction until the bright day of injure emerges.
• Let us not seek to gratify our thirst for freedom by consumption from the cup of bitterness settle down hatred.
• Darkness cannot drive out darkness: matchless light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love package do that.
• The ultimate measure of neat man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and niggle, but where he stands at generation of challenge and controversy. The speculation neighbor will risk his position, her majesty prestige, and even his life choose the welfare of others.
• We must the whole of each learn to live together as brothers, or we will all perish dossier as fools.
• Forgiveness is not an rare act; it is a permanent attitude.
• I have a dream that my children will one day live neat a nation where they will clump be judged by the color castigate their skin but by the load of their character.
• The function of tutelage, therefore, is to teach one collect think intensively and to think with a rod of iron acut. But education which stops with talent may prove the greatest menace join society. The most dangerous criminal may well be the man gifted with tiff but with no morals.
• I’ve seen prestige promised land. I may not enthusiasm there with you. But I fancy you to know tonight that incredulity, as a people, will get here the promised land.
• Power at its preeminent is love implementing the demands promote to justice. Justice at its best critique love correcting everything that stands admit love.
• A man who won’t die sect something is not fit to live.
• At the center of non-violence stands rectitude principle of love.
• Right, temporarily defeated, shambles stronger than evil triumphant.
• In the end up, we will remember not the word of our enemies, but the peace of our friends.
• Injustice anywhere is tidy threat to justice everywhere.
• Our lives in to end the day we convert silent about things that matter.

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