Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s Letter From Birmingham Jail

I interpreted it as King trying to get the clergymen to acknowledge these issues by viewing it from the blacks perspective. When a person is told to look at a situation from a point of view that differs from their own, it opens doors to new perspective and understanding. Also, most people tend to lead by emotion, possibly providing King’s desired outcome of understanding and action.

Letter from the Birmingham City Jail by Martin Luther King, Jr argues about how defending the use of nonviolent civil disobedience brings out legal change. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. led a boycott defending racism and later on becoming the prime spokesman for the American civil rights movement. However, during the 1960s, many public businesses were segregated and blacks experienced acts of discrimination and violence. In 1963, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was arrested and sent to jail for practicing nonviolent disobedience acts that blacks encountered. While Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was in jail, he wrote an open letter that was intentionally meant to his clergymen using a pen that was smuggled in by his lawyers along with sheets of paper that was lying around. After time past, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated in the year of 1968. Surprisingly, his letter became the most famous document during the movement and printed nearly a million copies.

Letter from Birmingham Jail was a letter written by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. from a solitary confinement cell in Birmingham, Alabama. Some portions of the letter were written and gradually smuggled out by King 's lawyer on scraps of paper including, by some reports, rough jailhouse toilet paper. Violent racist terror against African Americans was so horrible in Birmingham in the summer of 1963 that the city was being referred to by some locals as “Bombingham”. King had been arrested while participating in a peaceful anti-segregation march on the grounds that he did not have a parade permit. He had been called to Birmingham by one of the affiliates of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, a group of which King was president, to help in the protests of the extreme racism present in Alabama. Segregation laws and policies were part of the Jim Crow system of separate schools; restaurants, bathrooms, etc. for blacks and whites that existed far beyond the era of slavery, especially in the American South. Several local religious figures Dr. King had counted on for support simultaneously published a letter entitled A Call for Unity, which was critical of King and his supporters. King 's letter, in turn, identified and responded to each of the specific criticisms that he understands are being made by these men, specifically, and by the white church and its leadership, more generally; however, this letter was also deliberately written for a national audience.

Dr. Martin Luther King wrote a letter from Birmingham jail on April 16, 1963. The letter was written in response to his “fellow clergymen,” stating that Dr. King’s present activities was “unwise and untimely.” The peaceful protest in Birmingham was perceived as being extreme. The letter from Birmingham Jail was a letter of grievance to the white clergy, and their lack of support in the civil rights movement. Dr. King explained in his letter the difference between what is just and what is unjust and his reasons being in jail at Birmingham. He believed clergymen are men of genuine good will and that they deserve a response, so Martin Luther king wrote a letter from Birmingham Jail.

The similarities between these two are most evident in their desire for freedom. Martin Luther King Jr. wanted freedom from segregation and Plato wanted freedom from ignorance. They both wanted justice, and knew that it was immoral to take deny another being justice. For example, Plato has said,

Martin Luther King, Jr.’s, “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” emphasizes the need for civil disobedience when faced with unjust laws. This idea contradicts Socrates’ claim made in Crito, that one must follow the law under all circumstances. In this paper, I will argue that Socrates is not a proponent of civil disobedience based on King’s definition of civil disobedience and Socrates’ charges. Moreover, I will argue that both Socrates and King disagree with one another based on the concept of civil disobedience—breaking the law and rejecting certain ideals.

Aristotle, a famous philosopher once said: “ It is absurd to hold that a man ought to be ashamed of being unable to defend himself with his limbs but not of being unable to defend himself with speech and reason, when the use of reason is more distinctive of a human being than the use of his limbs” (Aristotle). He believed that rhetoric was more powerful than fists would ever be. Another man, a very influential social activist, shared the same ideals, preaching to his people to fight for their freedom with words and not their fists. Martin Luther King Jr. used the power of rhetoric during the civil rights movement to gain equality for the black community. MLK was a master of rhetoric and used his knowledge of proper arguments to sway the

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s “A Letter From Birmingham Jail,” depicts the fight for equality by African Americans during the civil rights movement. In this letter, King uses tone, rhetorical questions, and allusions to discuss the racial segregation sweeping the nation. King’s letter is a response to “A Call For Unity,” a condemning message written by eight white clergymen who frowned upon the peaceful protests conducted by many African Americans. Although Dr. King is presently seen as an American hero, during the civil rights movement he was simply seen as just another negro attempting to break the social norm. “A Letter From Birmingham Jail,” counters the arguments made by the clergymen in a very effective way by appealing to their

In Martin Luther King Jr.’s , “ Letter from Birmingham Jail”, King responds to the judgments of a group of clergymen , after King 's arrest, by writing a letter explaining why the clergymen 's judgments were wrong. In his letter, king brings very reasonable and valid points that challenge the judgments of the ministers. The main arguments that king makes would be the reason of his existence in Birmingham, white power structure and its racial injustice, and finally why negotiation has brought up impatience and little to no solutions. The overall structure of King’s letter was well organized and the letter delivered valid explanations as to why the clergymen 's judgments were wrong and why it is that action had to be taken in order to grasp the attention needed to settle the conflicts of racial injustice the black community in Birmingham was facing.

Martin Luther King created an archive that might start the defining moment of the Civil Rights development furthermore provides of the battle for genetic equity. King’s “Letter From Birmingham Jail,” aims to defend those who are frantic for peaceful immediate action, the outright shamelessness for unfair laws is very disgraceful and it needed to be exposed for what it really was. Also the expanding likelihood of falling back on amazing confusion and fighting, the utter frustration for those who lie within the chapel who, in King's opinion, required not to live up to their obligations as individuals for the lord. Those activities of the African-American race needed aid and support as the lord required demonstrated in King's Letter. Likewise, King explains, “past promises have been broken by the politicians and merchants of Birmingham and now is the time to fulfill the natural right of all people to be treated equal”. Secondly, King's solution for those clergymen's declarations that separating the law may not be the path to accomplish the effects the African-American is searching for. King feels that the chapel has bypassed its responsibilities to the African-American people, concealing behind “anesthetizing security of stained-glass windows”. King sums up his letter by making a side point that he trusts that the chapel will view its duty and intend as Concerning illustration individuals of the lord and comprehend to have immediate action, those who support unfair/one sided laws and the looming risk of the African-American climbing dependent upon Previously, savagery if they would not listen. King does this all in a diplomatic, ardent

The Civil Rights movement has aimed to gain rights for African-Americans for decades. Over the course of the semester we have looked at movement’s that have helped advocate for civil rights. One of the movements of that we looked at specifically in class was Martin L. King Jr’s movement and his “Letter from the Birmingham Jail”. In this letter, we hear Dr. King's honest opinion about the criticism he received from his opponents of timely protest. We gain a lot of insight about King's honest opinion about his political motivations of his movements and why he felt that it was critical to act when he did. Another movement that we discussed but didn’t directly look at was the Black Panther Party. An outside article that discusses the Black

The two philosophical pieces I decided to work with included John Rawls' Theory of Justice and Martin Luther King Jr.'s Letter From a Birmingham Jail. The reasoning behind pairing the two were the way the two approaches intertwined and could support each other. Rawls's and King's cases for justice had careful consideration of the human condition and could easily be applied to American society. Ultimately, the notion that justice could be achieved through means of questioning authority and preconceived ideas had the most appeal to me.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was a protester and leader in the African-American Civil Rights Movement, greatly known for his use of nonviolent forms of demonstration. On a specific occasion, King was arrested for leading a peaceful protest as part of the Birmingham Campaign, which attempted to bring national awareness to the gruesome treatment endured by blacks. While in jail, King replies to the clergyman’s remarks of him being a foreign agitator in his “Letter from a Birmingham jail,” passionately defending the actions he took. The clergymen accused King of being an extremist, as they saw his relentless protesting and civil disobedience as a threat to a stable political and social system. In paragraphs 27-32, King attempts to persuade the

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” I could not help but sit in amazement as I read his prolonged letter written from inside a jail cell. His letter, in black and white responding to “A Call for Unity,” an note written by eight, Caucasian, Alabama clergymen, was to serve as a response to those who believed that King acted wrongly for coming to Birmingham, Alabama, as an outcast, for building massive pressure with his protest march, and for the unfortunate timing of said marches. As I read over the letter at hand King’s letter, I couldn’t help but be captivated with his broad awareness. In the time and day that King was in, with any assistance from the internet or anything because in today’s times, we as people will use

King combines the use of ethos and pathos as he compares himself and the rights of men to religious backgrounds. His first comparison is with the Apostle Paul, where Paul had “carried the gospel of Jesus Christ,” as to Kings carrying of “the gospel of freedom.” King addresses this similarity to show why he felt committed to go to Birmingham, because like Paul, he needed to respond as an aid to his people. Towards the end of Kings letter; he exemplifies courageousness in the Negro demonstrations by relating them to the actions of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego when they refused to follow what they believed to be unjust laws. Saying that if they are supposed heroes by going against unjust laws, why shouldn't the people see Negro demonstrators the same way? They are also God's children and by those disobedience’s, they were really showing the grace of God. These connections to religion supports their fighting against unjust laws as a divine cause.