
While understanding the oppression and unfair lifestyle that people of the black race went through during the 1960‘s, we can better understand the logic Martin Luther King Jr used while advocating for non-violent protests. “Letter from a Birmingham Jail” was written by MLK Jr, and in this letter he explains his reasoning behind not using violence. The letter connects to the era of the civil rights movement and also the history of oppression the black population dealt with because the lack of rights they had. MLK Jr led the way for the blacks in order to achieve their constitutional rights behind major protests that strictly involved no violence. After reading “Letter from a Birmingham Jail” by MLK Jr and looking at the events that occurred during the civil rights movement, it is evident that Martin Luther King Jr’s use of non-violence is the reason that the black population was successful in attaining equal rights. 

Throughout America’s history, the black race has never been truly treated equally to the white race. Back in the 1800’s, though mainly in the South, slavery existed all over America. Slaves were black African American’s who were owned by whites to do work. Slaves were not equal and were not even counted as a human being, they were counted as 3/5 of a human. The northern slaves were used in factories to produce manufactured goods, but the Southern slaves were used in plantations to do hard work. These slaves had no control over what work they did or how much work they would have to do each day. Many days were long and tiring for the slaves, and they were not rewarded anything for doing this manual labor.

Abraham Lincoln was president during the Civil War in the early 1860’s and this is when he introduced the Emancipation Proclamation. This document declared that all slaves in the South were pronounced free. By Lincoln doing this, the rest of the world thought the South was fighting for slavery. The South was viewed as a slave nation, and this caused them to end up losing their support from Great Britain. The South was then defeated, and the Civil War was over. The 13th amendment was then introduced afterwards to finally abolish slavery once and for all. 

However, even after the Emancipation Proclamation and the 13th amendment were put in place, segregation and oppression was still tremendously common in the United States. Due to the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in 1954, a “separate but equal” doctrine was formed. This meant there were separated restaurants, classrooms, bathrooms, and just about everything else, too. This was in favor of the whites, though, because the blacks had a lack of quality in all the separated areas. White’s also outnumbered the black’s by a substantial amount as well during this time period. This was unfortunate for the blacks because it meant that trying to use violence to fight for their rights was just not ever probable because of the deficiency in amount of black people. The black race had to come up with a different way to get their message across other than violence.

A theory was introduced by a sociologist, Hubert Blalock, after the civil rights era had ended. His theory hypothesizes how a majority group can be motivated to discriminate against a minority group because of both the competitions over economic resources and political power. This was extremely evident in the early 1900’s from the fact that whites did not allow the blacks to have any rights, especially voting or land owning rights because the whites did not want any competition from the blacks if they had any power.

Before the mid 1950’s, there had not been much major support for the blacks to follow. This very reason was why Dr. Martin Luther King Jr started to fight this injustice. He realized his race did not have much support, so MLK Jr became the primary leader of the U.S. civil rights movement and began advocating for the black race to join him in fighting for their rights. His major message for the blacks was to avoid the use of violence. This non-violent tactic is beneficial for a minority that does not have major authority within a society. MLK Jr urged the black citizens to have non-violent boycotts, sit-ins, and even reactions when faced with attack. During these protests police would fight the blacks with clubs, fire hoses, and police dogs. By not fighting back with violence, the black’s showed their strong will and integrity to keep protesting and fighting for what was right. 

Martin Luther King was put in jail during the Civil Rights era on April 16th, 1963 for leading a protest intended to bring national attention to the racist and violent treatment experienced by blacks in Birmingham, Alabama. Birmingham was one of the most discriminated and segregated cities in the country at this time. Shortly into his time in jail, MLK Jr was given a newspaper that contained an open letter by eight white clergymen who criticized the idea’s and belief’s behind MLK Jr’s entire non-violent movement. These men called MLK Jr and the whole movement toward civil rights “unwise and untimely”. This statement triggered MLK Jr to respond and explain the reasoning behind his ideas.

The eight men made a comment arguing that “It is not King’s place as an ‘outsider’ to interfere with the City of Birmingham”. MLK Jr first responds to this statement explaining that his national organization, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), was invited to Birmingham to gain support to continue their fight in the Civil Rights Movement. He also provides a famous point in response to this criticism saying that “injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere”. This powerful statement provides an insight to the idea that if injustice occurs to a certain person or race, then every other person has to think about what they would do if this injustice happened to them. This quote refers to the United States as a “system that targets some people while letting others escape”. This system is unjust and uneven and his quote in response to the eight men is demanding the country works toward being equal to attain justice for everyone.

Another piece of criticism by the eight white clergymen explained that “It is inappropriate for King to get his point across through public demonstrations”. The eight men question why MLK Jr is advocating direct action from sit-ins, protests, and marches because instead the men believe negotiation would be a better option. MLK Jr responds to this by agreeing that negotiation would be better, but using direct action in a non-violent way can establish a tension within a certain community that does not negotiate, and it forces them to confront the issue. Because certain extremely segregated communities refuse to comply with the idea of negotiation, MLK Jr is explaining that in these areas direct action is needed in order to bring the problem to their attention so it isn’t just ignored.

MLK Jr indicated that this letter was in response to the eight white clergymen who criticized him, but he never offered it to the men. Instead, he publically published the letter in hopes that people in the U.S. could understand the reasoning and hope that all the blacks and civil rights activists were fighting for in the, at the time, divided country during the Civil Rights era.

In a piece of writing by James W. Vander Zanden about non-violent resistance, an explanation arises that “a minority group withholding of its participation from certain essential areas of life, can exert considerable pressure upon the dominant group and extract concessions from them” (544). By MLK Jr advising the blacks to restrain from certain events peacefully, the whites then will feel pressured and compelled to ‘extract concessions’ or reduce the privileges within their own race to equal the blacks, and eventually causes the two groups (whites and blacks) to be equal. This method by Zanden is incredibly relevant to the struggle the blacks faced, and with the use of this non-violent tactic, the two races can eventually be equal from the use of non-violence. This is valuable for blacks because also the “non-violent resistance is less likely to bring direct retaliation from the dominant group (whites)” (Zanden 544). Peaceful and non-violent resistance by the blacks will not provoke violence from the whites because then the whites would be creating the violence. If violent protests were instead advised, then the whites would feel acceptable retaliating. and since the whites were the majority and had the power, the blacks would stand no chance in that fight. 

There were many significant events that involved non-violent protests during this movement. One of the first, major events was when Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat to a white bus rider. The act Rosa Parks used went against the southern custom of blacks giving their seats up for whites if needed. Rosa Parks was thrown in jail for this act of protest, and boycotts soon began. These boycotts were aimed at the city’s buses and made sure that no blacks would ride the buses until something was done to fix the discrimination with the southern customs. MLK Jr was the boycott leader and his idea of non-violent tactics were influenced from Gandhi, the Indian nationalist who believed in peace and nonviolence when protesting. This boycott lasted over a year and proved the determination of the blacks in this community to peacefully fight for what they believe in. MLK Jr realized that this method could be effective if he got all the blacks to follow it.

Many blacks during this time period were put in jail for these passive acts. This was not good for the whites because of the mass imprisonments and full jails. The circumstances would have differed if these protests had not been passive. In a novel about lynching’s by Stewart Tolnay, blacks were “lynched for nearly every conceivable reason” (Tolnay 606). The whites would have had reasons to lynch and kill the blacks if the blacks tried to use violence, causing mass killings of the blacks.

MLK Jr conducted a march from Selma to the state capitol of Montgomery in Alabama with the focus of the march to register black voters in the South. This march was not very long, though, because immediately police blocked the road and used tear gas and clubs to attack the protesters. The march was on national television which brought huge attention to the movement, and there were various new supporters because of the treatment the blacks received while non-violently marching. After a white supporter of the movement was killed by a group of whites from Selma, there was national outcry. MLK Jr was finally given permission by a U.S. district court judge to proceed with the march. With the help of the new supporters, the second March from Selma to Montgomery was planned and followed. The Selma to Montgomery march was a huge influence on the African-American struggle and the voting rights for blacks. Because of the march, Congress passed the Voting Rights Act of 1965, where more and more blacks could register to vote. This major turning point not only earned the right for blacks to vote, but it also helped the blacks get more support from the country. 

During a march that took place on Washington to express the need for blacks to have jobs and freedom, 200,000 Americans participated. This event was intended to express the political and social challenged the blacks continued to endure in America. This particular march is where MLK Jr had his famous “I have a Dream” speech, in which he described how he dreamt that one day blacks and whites would soon be equal. This march and MLK Jr’s notable speech helped to create the Civil Rights Act of 1964 in which segregation was outlawed in public facilities and racial discrimination was not allowed. 

Included in Martin Luther King Jr’s “Letter from a Birmingham Jail”, he explains his strategy of non-violent resistance. MLK Jr talks about how people have a moral responsibility to stop unjust laws. Meaning that it is not wrong for someone to break a law if it is discriminating toward a certain group of people. MLK Jr says that people have to take direct action in order to achieve their goal, instead of waiting for justice to come. When injustice occurs toward a certain group of people, then the justice is at fault because it is targeting certain people instead of dealing with every type of person. 

Martin Luther King Jr came up with four basic steps of non-violent direct action in his “Letter from a Birmingham Jail”. The first step is to collect the facts to determine whether injustices are alive. Reviewing the situation and judging the prejudice of the act to make sure it is immoral to continue with the next step. The second step involves negotiation. This step includes being persuasive and being a leader to guide supporters and help them understand how to follow through with the non-violent actions. The third step is self-purification. This step is significant because it is important to “acknowledge internally that personal sacrifices are needed for the sake of progress” (CoRR). MLK Jr needed supporters of the Civil Rights Movement to be tolerable with making personal sacrifices in order for success to occur with the entire movement. The fourth step is direct action. This is the step that involves taking action to solve or fix the problem. MLK Jr knew once all the previous three steps were in-tact, then the fourth step was to be completed by just using the information within the problem to go out and actually solve it. These steps made it easier for all the supporters of the black rights effort to know what they were doing and how it would help. Without these steps for supporters to follow, there would not have been a vast amount of people supporting the movement because there was not any other guidance or scheme for any of the supporters to follow.

Following the end of the civil rights movement, Martin Luther King Jr received the Nobel Peace Prize for his incredible leadership through the tough, racist ways of the country. Although laws were passed to give equality to blacks, there was still racial discrimination and repression in the country. Although MLK Jr was assassinated shortly following the end of the Civil Rights era, his supporters continued to fight toward equality in all ways of life. Throughout the decades following the Civil Rights era, violence toward blacks has declined throughout the country. However, there is still acts of anti-black violence going on in today’s world such as police brutality and racial profiling. The letter that MLK Jr wrote in the jail cell in Birmingham has become a prized American literature, emitting ideas that are still used in the country today. According to the Research and Education Institution at Stanford University, this letter has become the most cogent and influential defense on non-violent resistance ever written.

Martin Luther King Jr paved the way for the black race’s accomplishments during his tenure as leader of the Civil Rights movement. His influence on the public helped America resolve its stance on black equality as well as shaping the U.S. into a more unified country. Without MLK Jr’s practice of non-violent resistance or his letter in jail to gain attention and support, the black right activists during the Civil Rights era would have not been able to get their message across to the rest of the country. The message that the black race must be given equal rights, opportunities, and respect compared to every other race in the country. MLK Jr’s “Letter from a Birmingham Jail” became the center point for supporters to follow. This letter explained the reasoning behind his non-violent actions and it gave insight to many communities across the country on why this issue was so major and needed to be resolved. MLK Jr’s letter was the most essential piece in his effort to push the Civil Rights movement to achieve the success it deserved. The use of non-violence by MLK Jr was revolutionary for our countries chances of attaining equality for all races and all people in the United States.
