Martin Luther King Jr. could almost be considered the modern day patron saint of Civil Disobedience. His election to the leadership of the ‘Southern Christian Leadership Conference’ catapulted him into what many consider to have been one of the most profound spiritual conflicts of the 20th Century. Racial segregation was embedded in American legislation, and he quickly understood that to struggle against one would be to defy the other. But the path MLK took in that defiance was far from obvious or uncontested. Others were vying for leadership in the civil rights movements of 1950’s America, and the ends they had in view - and the means by which they advocated pursuing those ends - were very different from King’s.
One such protagonist was Malcolm X. Looking out from the sectarianism of ‘Black Islam’, Malcolm X demanded racial separation, prophesied a ‘bloodbath’ and called for ‘coloured people to arm themselves with guns and rifles’. This, he declared, was the only way the African-American could be liberated from the oppresion of segregation. MLK looked across the same social, political, economic and spiritual landscape and it inspired a dream: ‘…that the sons of former slaves, and the sons of former slave owners will sit down together at the same table of brotherhood … that [people] will not be judged by the colour of their skin, but by the content of their character’. King knew that such a dream could never be realised through violence. The ends do not justfy the means. Rather, the ‘means’ determine the ‘end’. He knew he must choose hismeans wisely; that the only moral and practical route to integration would lie along the road of non-violence. Malcolm X spoke of King’s dream as a ‘tragic fantasy’. King, who once described himself as ‘an extremist for love’, recognised that ‘…violence is not going to solve our problem … [it] can reap nothing by grief’. Later in his thinking he would reflect that the way of non-violence (and therefore of love) required far more of its protaganists than those who walked the path of violence.
For King, much depends on what our goal is: domination or reconciliation. This is as true in personal as in political conflicts. His point is as simple as it is profound - if you want reconciliaiton, choose the means that lead to that end. And those ends will not include violence.
MLK experienced racism early in life, and it left him struggling to reconcile a growing hatred of the white man with the teaching of Christ to love his enemies. His refusal to simply deny the teaching of Jesus, or to justify his disregarding of it, is indicative of how influential that teaching was to become. It was at his father’s church the young Martin learned ‘God is not only love, but has the power to finally overcome all forces that operate contrary to that love’. It would prove to be a guiding priciple in his own ministry and political career. This belief in God’s ability did not make him passive. Rather it empowered him to fight for justice, through love…
When Martin Luther King was installed as pastor of Dexter Avenue Baptist Church, Montgomery in October 1954, he could little realise that he was about to be given America in which to test his belief.