…. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. Never again can we afford to live with the narrow, provincial “outside agitator” idea. Anyone who lives inside the United States can never be considered an outsider anywhere within its bounds.
You deplore the demonstrations taking place in Birmingham. But your statement, I am sorry to say, fails to express a similar concern for the conditions that brought about the demonstrations. I am sure that none of you would want to rest content with the superficial kind of social analysis that deals merely with effects and does not grapple with underlying causes. It is unfortunate that demonstrations are taking place in Birmingham, but it is even more unfortunate that the city’s white power structure left the Negro community with no alternative….
Martin Luther King, Jr.
A Birmingham Jail
April 16, 1963
Read “Letter from A Birmingham Jail” here.
Posted by John B. Chilton
"MLK mugshot birmingham" by Birmingham AL police dept(Life time: NA) - Original publication: circulated to news media in April 1963. Immediate source: http://photos.nola.com/tpphotos/2013/04/martin_luther_king_mugshot_apr.html. Licensed under PD-US via Wikipedia.
