Happy Martin Luther King Day everyone. I know, the official holiday is tomorrow, but today is the actual day. And every so often, MLK Sunday is aligned with January 20th, the Presidential Inauguration Day, which is why President Obama will be the only Prez to take the oath of office 4 times!
Last time he said the words “I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States” twice because a fledgling Justice named Roberts mixed up the “faithfully execute” part. There should be no tripping over the words this time, since the charming pair of oaths will be executed today in a private ceremony and then again tomorrow for public consumption.
But this is only the 7th time in history a President has been sworn in on a Sunday, making the alignment of this particular President with MLK Day historical in another way. When President Obama said that a mere sixty years ago his father “…might not have been served” at a restaurant a block from where he was standing, I had one of those Aha moments.
My nephew grew up in Memphis. One of his first writing assignments was about asking his mother what a certain sign meant over a water fountain, the sign said “Whites Only.” The Flapper was visiting at the time and copied that paper and sent it to me. I was in college, in Boston in 1968, when Dr King was shot. I marched on the state capital for the first time with a black armband, but I had never personally witnessed the kind of apartheid our country was carrying out on so many different levels.
I lived most of my young life in New Jersey, I still had not experienced teaching at a Head Start Preschool in the projects of Jersey City (now colloquially called ‘public housing’). I, like most of us back then, didn’t even know any African Americans precisely because we were separated in a not-so-subtle way, by schools and geography. There were no blatant signs of racism in the north, like the water fountain sign in Memphis, but ignorance could only take us so far after seeing women and children being attacked by dogs, bombs exploding in churches, and the assassination of Dr Martin Luther King.
You were wrong Mr President, it wouldn’t have been sixty years ago that your Kenyan father may not have been able to sit down in a certain restaurant in DC. King was gunned down less than fifty years ago in April. He was still tirelessly working for social justice even though the Civil Rights Act had been passed 4 years before his death, and wasn’t fully enacted by the states until the late 1970s.
This weekend makes it personal for me. For the first time in my sixty plus years I came face to face with a sign in an antique shop. It was a Pennsylvania Railroad sign welcoming passengers to VA. I felt sick, wondering who would buy such a thing. Bob said we should never forget, and I know that he’s right. Living in the south now makes it all the more personal. Congratulations Mr President, know that we all admire and respect you…and that Martin would be so very proud
“No Blacks in the Front 4 Cars”
It’s amazing how far we’ve come and yet have so far still to go. I still object that MLK Day is a national holiday – for too many it’s just another 3 day weekend to ski or shop. Schools should be open– learning about a great man.
Oh yes, the old 3 day HOLIDAY strikes again… effectively obliterating the reason we remember. I agree with you, Lisa – cyclinggrandma. And, yes, we’ve made tremendous strides forward, but still so far to go. Remembering Dr. King and all the people who supported him and the movement is something we all need to do, whether we have a Federal holiday or not. Thanks for sharing your memories and thoughts, Chris.
Thanks ladies. When I was working in Jersey City we would always wait to see if the state made MLK day a holiday and we never knew until very close to the date. Just listening to a piece about Gandhi, and learned that his activism started when he was thrown off a train (as a young lawyer) in South Africa for being in the white car. Nonviolent resistance has deep roots.
My children are now middle-aged adults, but we always made sure they participated in some type of cultural or service project related to the life and teachings of Dr. King. The three of them currently work together in our family-owned business, since opening the business 17 years ago, our medical facility closes to observe the MLK Holiday. Employees are given the time off with pay. The grandchildren, following the tradition of their parents, know this is a day of service and/or participation in an activity that honors Dr. King.
Thank you for reading my post Yvonne. I agree, as parents we need to model service opportunities if we want to grow kind and caring children. When my son was in middle school, I helped to develop this as a part of the curriculum. We can both be proud that ‘giving back’ was a lesson our adult children took to heart, and I’m looking forward to passing it on to my 5 month old Love Bug. Dr King’s life was cut short, and he left many jobs for us to finish. This is one I’m particularly interested in, the “Protect Children, Not Guns” initiative of the Children’s Defense Fund – an agency my daughter volunteered with.