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Martin Luther King Jr.

Related Excerpts

Seeing Martin Luther King as a Human Being

King should be appreciated in his full complexity.

Martin Luther King’s Radical Anti-Capitalism

As King’s attention drifted to the problems of the urban north, his critiques came to focus on the economic system itself.
Martin Luther King Jr. speaking into news microphones.

Martin Luther King Jr. Spent the Last Year of His Life Detested by the Liberal Establishment

King was roundly denounced for his stances against the Vietnam War and injustices north of the Mason-Dixon line.
Martin Luther King Jr.

MLK Now

The canonical image of Martin Luther King Jr. neglects many of his most important intellectual, ethical, and political critiques.

The Strike That Brought MLK to Memphis

In his final days, King stood by striking sanitation workers. We returned to the city to see what has changed—and what hasn’t.
Reagan signing the bill establishing Martin Luther King Day.

The Sanitizing of Martin Luther King and Rosa Parks

On the uses and abuses of civil rights heroes.
Caricature of Martin Luther King's head

The House of the Prophet

Martin Luther King Jr. was the galvanizing voice of the civil rights struggle, an uncompromising, complicated figure who soared in the pulpit.
Martin Luther King, Jr. being arrested in Montgomery, 1958.

Martin Luther King Was a Law Breaker

On the second anniversary of MLK's assassination, political prisoner Martin Sostre wrote a tribute emphasizing his radical disobedience.
A 1963 photo of Martin Luther King Jr. addressing the thousands of people gathered at the Lincoln Memorial during the March on Washington.
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Campus Protests Are Called Disruptive. So Was the Civil Rights Movement

Like student protesters today, Martin Luther King Jr. and other 1960s civil rights activists were criticized as disruptive and disorderly.
Student protesters at Columbia University in April 1968.

Reviving the Language of Empire

On revisiting the anti-imperialism of the 1960s and ’70s amid the return of left internationalism.
James Baldwin.

What James Baldwin Saw

A documentary that follows the writer’s late-in-life journey to the South chronicles his vision for Black politics in a post–Civil Rights era world.
J. Edgar Hoover

J. Edgar Hoover Shaped US History for the Worse

As director of the FBI for decades, J. Edgar Hoover helped build a massive, professionalized national security state and hounded leftists out of public life.
J. Edgar Hoover in front of a stained glass church window

One Bureau Under God

On the white Christian legacy of J. Edgar Hoover’s FBI.
An overhead view of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom.

An Oral History of the March on Washington, 60 Years After MLK’s Dream

The Post interviewed March on Washington participants and voices from younger generations to tell the story of Aug. 28, 1963 and what it means now.
Black and white photo of Civil Rights protests with crowds picketing.

The Ambitions of the Civil Rights Movement Went Far Beyond Affirmative Action

We should find inspiration in their goals today.
Martin Luther King Jr., left, and Malcolm X, right.

MLK’s Famous Criticism of Malcolm X Was a ‘Fraud,’ Author Finds

Alex Haley’s transcript of his famous 'Playboy' interview with Martin Luther King Jr. does not match what was published.
15 women involved in the Montgomery Bus Boycott; Rosa Parks's mugshot is the center.

The Women Behind the Montgomery Bus Boycott

We've heard about Rosa Parks and her crucial role, but Parks was just one of many women involved.
J. Edgar Hoover and two other men pose with guns.

The Cult of J. Edgar Hoover

A zealot through and through, he ran the FBI like a religious sect.
A newly registered voter fills out a sample ballot for sheriff in Lowndes County. The ballot has the logo of the Black Panther Party formed by Stokely Carmichael of SNCC.

How Stokely Carmichael and the Black Panthers Changed the Civil Rights Movement

Much of what's happening in American race relations traces back to 1966, the year the Black Panthers were formed.
Tourists taking photos at the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial on the National Mall in Washington, D.C.
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Martin Luther King Jr. and the Coca Cola Strategy: Selling King’s Dream to the World

Martin Luther King’s words are available publicly — for a price.