Martin Luther King Explains the Three Evils of Society

Fifteen years after the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr., President Ronald Reagan signed the bill that would make the third Monday of January a holiday in his honor. Like many if not most Republicans, Reagan opposed the holiday. They believed that King was a communist. They didn’t like that he opposed the war in Vietnam and then of course there was all that business with the Civil Rights. The law almost passed in 1979, but it wasn’t until 1983 that it passed in both the House and Senate by veto-proof margins which forced right-wing hero President Reagan to sign it.

For that reason alone, I love this holiday. But every good thing has its unintended consequences. One of those is the commercialization of the holiday and the very successful attempt by corporations, the media, most of our elected officials, etc., to whitewash the memory of Martin Luther King. By focusing only on the speeches and actions that do not criticize Capitalism or US Imperialism, most Americans have no real understanding of the depth of King’s critique of the United States and its policies. Sure, overt bigotry is bad, and it’s kinda crazy to think of not sitting next to a Black person at a lunch counter or on the bus, but all that talk about poverty, his support for unions and the anti-war movement–do we really need to go there?

In the spirit of honoring Martin Luther King, Jr. in a manner that is true to his vision, here is one of his lesser-known speeches.

The Three Evils of Society: Racism, Poverty and War

King delivered this speech at The National Conference for New Politics, which took place in Chicago over Labor Day weekend in 1967. Around 3,000 people, from hundreds of organizations, attended the conference which featured MLK as the keynote speaker.  The goal was to unify political activists of all races who believed in civil rights and opposed the Vietnam War.  President Lyndon B. Johnson felt so threatened by the conference, he instructed the FBI to attempt to track the attendants’ movements and thwart any long-term plans of the NCNP. As the commentary Revisiting MLK’s speech, ‘The 3 Evils of Society, ‘ suggests that this speech is the most prophetic and revolutionary address to date on the questions of militarism, poverty, and racism.

The running time is 43 minutes. For those who prefer to read, a transcript of the speech can be found at the bottom of this post.