The state of King's dream across the South on MLK Day
By Gary Reese
January 18, 2010 — What was the “State of the Dream” on Martin Luther King Day 2010? With an African American in the White House, an especially celebratory mood might have been expected as the national holiday was celebrated across the South. Yet mixed with the joy and pride, there seemed to be a cautionary or even admonitory tone in some of the messages commemorating what would have been King’s 81st birthday. In King’s own Atlanta, Dr. Cornel West of Princeton University, a celebrated author, glazed his social and political message with evangelical passion as he urged the congregation at Ebenezer Baptist Church not to molder MLK’s memory and legacy by relegating the slain civil rights leader to the status of a museum piece. He cited the continuing presence of social oppression as a reason to “correct” President Obama when and if he strays from the mission of helping blacks and disadvantaged people. --Several thousand marched at the South Carolina State House in Columbia. Speakers and marchers called for removal of the Confederate battle flag from the capitol grounds, and called for more help for Haitian earthquake victims. --A similar theme was painted in Richmond, Va., where Mayor Dwight Jones cautioned more than a thousand people at the Arthur Ashe Center to end the exuberance over Obama’s election and instead re-adopt a working attitude towards political activism if Dr. King’s dreams are ever to be fully realized. --Some blacks in Kentucky are expressing the first hints of disappointment in Obama’s first-year performance in office. Most admit that unrealistic high expectations account for much of it. Others say the president simply has not fulfilled his pledges to end racial disaparities, provide health care for all, close the Guantanamo Bay prison, and more. Nine out of 10 blacks nationally still approve of Obama’s job performance, however. That’s about double the approval that comes from whites. --And in New Orleans, King Day celebrations didn’t prevent controversy over how some city contracts are let. One group of mostly whites complain that the mayor’s office is not transparent in how it awards contracts. A group of mostly blacks argues that the disgruntled group is just trying to circumvent a legitimate process because their candidates can’t win on Election Day. |
