From MLK's Dream to Obama's Presidency

501 Auburn Ave., Atlanta, Georgia: When Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. left this house on April 3, 1968 to go to Memphis, Tenn., he was unaware that he would never sleep there or ever again see his wife or children, who had been accustomed to their husband and father on mission that was as civic as it was divine. He rushed into a car, toward the airport. MLK was murdered in the Lorraine Motel in Memphis the very next day. This was merely 45 years ago.

One does not mess with the memory of this great man. His sister, Christine King Farris, does not like to mention her brother’s death except for at the annual service that has been taking place since 1968 at the famous Ebenezer Baptist Church, several meters away from the modest King residence.

“I am the oldest, and my brother was two years younger. We were very young, but I was in total awe of him. He was my little brother,” said his sister, almost 83, who still teaches at Spelman College in Atlanta, Ga.

“I go to church, but I am more reserved in the month of August. We will commemorate the 50th anniversary of the march on Washington. That was where it all started, where it all became possible … that we had a black president, Barack Obama, in 2008.”

What Still Remains of that Quest for Racial Equality?

The wealthy Auburn Avenue, which welcomed blue-collar whites and housed the emerging black community in its time of struggle, has been getting worse after all of those years. The Martin Luther King, Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change continues to welcome hoards of visitors, but the glory is gone. There is an air of abandonment, as if money is elsewhere. Just along the rear of the building, there are faded areas and housing projects, a behind-the-scenes sort of violence that accompanies eateries, places of worship and funeral homes that make up the avenue. In 1994, rehabilitation work was undertaken, allowing anonymous re-investments, like that of Gladys, 57, in this historic place. Nobody knows who Gladys is. She is part of the anonymous millions who helped King in his conquest of civil rights during those years. She now lives at 448 [Auburn Avenue], just across from 501, a return that rests as evidence. “[I returned] as much out of respect for the great man as out of activism because I am moved by a divine breath,” she said.*

She knows that King lives on in permanence through Ralph Abernathy, a close partner of King, as well as Rev. Jesse Jackson, an unsuccessful candidate for the White House, and other major figures in the struggle for civil rights, including John Lewis, now a representative of Georgia in Congress, or even Andrew Young, who was the mayor of Atlanta in 1982.

“I have a dream,” proclaimed King on Aug. 28, 1963 in Washington, D.C. What still remains today of this quest for racial equality? On the altar of balance and in spite of a black president, figures and statistics do not much favor the late reverend. African-Americans fill prisons and top unemployment charts. And for those who have succeeded, property ownership is still twenty times lower than among whites. Even King’s companions have abandoned the fight at the bottom in order to be able to live — with occasional success — at the high end of the American social system. King’s bodyguard has left Auburn and moved to the south of Atlanta, having confined himself to a very tight perimeter and claiming that “there are houses worth more than $3 million in this exclusively black neighborhood.”

“There Is No Progress on Poverty”

Still, most remain vigilant, as the legacy of King has only been partially fulfilled. Andrew Young, who was present on the day of his friend’s assassination, also has moved away from Auburn Avenue. At age 80, he continues to go to downtown Atlanta, its foundation, almost every day. This fight has driven him far, very far along the path of glory and honor.

King’s dream is not merely empty words for the former mayor of Atlanta, congressman and ambassador to the U.N. under Jimmy Carter, who risked his life in the 1960s:

“In his speech against the Vietnam War, King stuck to this prophetic phrase, ‘The bombs of this war threaten America; they explode at home,’ [as evidenced] by inflation and poverty. In recent times, racism no longer has the same intensity, but there has been no progress on poverty, whether in the U.S. or elsewhere, and blacks have been the most affected.”

Another of King’s companions, Joseph Lowery, who is known for his verbal excesses and support of Obama as a young candidate, claimed:

“King’s dream has been partially achieved. The election of a black president would never have happened without the civil rights movement.”

The man is 91 years old today. He was surrounded by trophies and photos of himself in the company of King and Obama. Although he is very weak, the pastor keeps to lyrical and biblical fancies when it comes to King.

“God works in many ways. He has put King and Obama on the same path. Without the one, there couldn’t have been the other. With Obama, I felt the same thrill I felt with King, the feeling that something big was going to happen for blacks in America.”