Address to First Montgomery Improvement Association
(MIA) Mass Meeting, at Holt Street Baptist Church
5 December 1955
Montgomery, Alabama
My friends, we are certainly very happy to see each of you out
this evening. We are here this evening for serious business. [Audience:]
(Yes) We are here in a general sense because first and
foremost we are American citizens (That's right), and we
are determined to apply our citizenship to the fullness of its meaning.
(Yeah. That's right) We are here also because of our love
for democracy (Yes), because of our deep-seated belief
that democracy transformed from thin paper to thick action (Yes)
is the greatest form of government on earth. (That's right)
But we are here in a specific sense because of the bus situation
in Montgomery. (Yes) We are here because we are determined
to get the situation corrected. This situation is not at all new.
The problem has existed over endless years. (That's right)
For many years now, Negroes in Montgomery and so many other areas
have been inflicted with the paralysis of crippling fear (Yes)
on buses in our community. (That's right) On so many occasions,
Negroes have been intimidated and humiliated and oppressed because
of the sheer fact that they were Negroes. (That's right)
I don't have time this evening to go into the history of these numerous
cases. Many of them now are lost in the thick fog of oblivion (Yes),
but at least one stands before us now with glaring dimensions. (yes)
Just the other day, just last Thursday to be exact, one of the
finest citizens in Montgomery--(Amen) not one of the finest
Negro citizens (That's right), but one of the finest citizens
in Montgomery--was taken from a bus (Yes) and carried to
jail and arrested (Yes) because she refused to get up to
give her seat to a white person. (yes, that's right) Now
the press would have us believe that she refused to leave a reserved
section for Negroes (Yes), but I want you to know this
evening that there is no reserved section. (All right)
The law has never been clarified at that point. (Hell no)
Now I think I speak with legal authority--not that I have any legal
authority, but I think I speak with legal authority behind me--(All
right) that the law, the ordinance, the city ordinance has
never been totally clarified. (That's right)
Mrs. Rosa Parks is a fine person. (Well,) And, since it
had to happen, I'm happy that it happened to a person like Mrs.
Parks, (Yes) for nobody can doubt the boundless outreach
of her integrity. (Sure enough) Nobody can doubt the height
of her character (Yes), nobody can doubt the depth of her
Christian commitment and devotion to the teachings of Jesus. (All
right) And I'm happy, since it had to happen, it happened to
a person that nobody can call a disturbing factor in the community.
(All right) Mrs. Parks is a fine Christian person, unassuming,
and yet there is integrity and character there. And just because
she refused to get up, she was arrested.
And you know, my friends, there comes a time when people get tired
of being trampled over by the iron feet of oppression. [sustained
applause] There comes a time, my friends, when people get tired
of being plunged across the abyss of humiliation, where they experience
the bleakness of nagging despair. (Keep talking) There
comes a time when people get tired of being pushed out of the glittering
sunlight of life's July and left standing amid the piercing chill
of an alpine November. (that's right) [applause]
There comes a time. (Yes sir teach) [applause continues]
We are here, we are here this evening because we are tired now.
(Yes) [applause] And I want to say that we are
not here advocating violence. (No) We have never done that.
(Repeat that, repeat that) [applause] I want it
to be known throughout Montgomery and throughout this nation (Well)
that we are Christian people. (Yes) [applause]
We believe in the Christian religion. We believe in the teachings
of Jesus. (Well) The only weapon that we have in our hands
this evening is the weapon of protest. (Yes) [applause]
That's all.
And certainly, certainly, this is the glory of America, with all
of its faults. (Yeah) This is the glory of our democracy.
If we were incarcerated behind the iron curtains of a Communistic
nation, we couldn't do this. If we were dropped in the dungeon of
a totalitarian regime, we couldn't do this. (All right)
But the great glory of American democracy is the right to protest
for right. (That's right) [applause] My friends,
don't let anybody make us feel that we are to be compared in our
actions with the Ku Klux Klan or with the White Citizens Council.
[applause] There will be no crosses burned at any bus stops
in Montgomery. (Well, that's right) There will be no white
persons pulled out of their homes and taken out on some distant
road and lynched for not cooperating. [applause] There
will be nobody among us who will stand up and defy the Constitution
of this nation. [applause] We only assemble here because
of our desire to see right exist. [applause] My friends,
I want it to be known that we're going to work with grim and bold
determination to gain justice on the buses in this city. [applause]
And we are not wrong; we are not wrong in what we are doing. (Well)
If we are wrong, the Supreme Court of this nation is wrong. (Yes
sir) [applause] If we are wrong, the Constitution
of the United States is wrong. (Yes) [applause]
If we are wrong, God Almighty is wrong. (That's right)
[applause] If we are wrong, Jesus of Nazareth was merely
a utopian dreamer that never came down to Earth. (Yes)
[applause] If we are wrong, justice
is a lie (Yes), love has no meaning. [applause]
And we are determined here in Montgomery to work and fight until
justice runs down like water (Yes), [applause] and righteousness
like a mighty stream. (Keep talking) [Applause]
I want to say that in all of our actions, we must stick together.
(That's right) [applause] Unity is the great need
of the hour (Well, that's right), and if we are united
we can get many of the things that we not only desire but which
we justly deserve. (Yeah) And don't let anybody frighten
you. (Yeah) We are not afraid of what we are doing (Oh
no), because we are doing it within the law. (All right)
There is never a time in our American democracy that we must ever
think we are wrong when we protest. (Yes, sir) We reserve that right.
When labor all over this nation came to see that it would be trampled
over by capitalistic power, it was nothing wrong with labor getting
together and organizing and protesting for its rights. (That's
right) We, the disinherited of this land, we who have been
oppressed so long, are tired of going through the long night of
captivity. And now we are reaching out for the daybreak of freedom
and justice and equality. [applause]
May I say to you, my friends, as I come to a close, and just giving
some idea of why we are assembled here, that we must keep--and I
want to stress this, in all of our doings, in all of our deliberations
here this evening and all of the week and while,
--whatever we
do--,
we must keep God in the forefront. (Yeah) Let us be Christian
in all of our actions. (That's right) But I want to tell
you this evening that it is not enough for us to talk about love,
love is one of the pivotal points of the Christian faith. There
is another side called justice. And justice is really love in calculation.
(All right) Justice is love correcting that which revolts
against love. (Well)
The Almighty God himself is not only, not the God just standing
out saying through Hosea, "I love you, Israel." He's also the God
that stands up before the nations and said: "Be still and know that
I'm God (Yeah), that if you don't obey me I will break
the backbone of your power (Yeah) and slap you out of the
orbits of your international and national relationships." (That's
right) Standing beside love is always justice, and we are only
using the tools of justice. Not only are we using the tools of persuasion,
but we've come to see that we've got to use the tools of coercion.
Not only is this thing a process of education, but it is also a
process of legislation. (Yeah) [applause]
And as we stand and sit here this evening and as we prepare ourselves
for what lies ahead, let us go out with the grim and bold determination
that we are going to stick together. [applause] We are
going to work together. [applause] Right here in Montgomery,
when the history books are written in the future (Yes),
somebody will have to say, "There lived a race of people (Well),
a black people (Yes sir), 'fleecy locks and black
complexion' (Yes), a people who had the moral courage to
stand up for their rights. [applause] And thereby they
injected a new meaning into the veins of history and of civilization."
And we're going to do that. God grant that we will do it before
it is too late. (Oh yeah) As we proceed with our program,
let us think of these things. (Yes) [applause]
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