MLK Remembrance - Jet Magazine

As part of the Martin Luther King, Jr. birthday and holiday month, we’ll be posting some vintage images and articles from the way-back machine! This cover is from the February 29, 1968 edition of Jet Magazine. The article is about Dr. Kings’ planned “Poor People’s March.”

“Suggested to King by Marion Wright, director of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People’s Legal Defense and Educational Fund in Jackson, Mississippi, the Poor People’s Campaign was seen by King as the next chapter in the struggle for genuine equality. Desegregation and the right to vote were essential, but King believed that African Americans and other minorities would never enter full citizenship until they had economic security.

“Through nonviolent direct action, King and SCLC hoped to focus the nation’s attention on economic inequality and poverty. ‘This is a highly significant event,’ King told delegates at an early planning meeting, describing the campaign as ‘the beginning of a new co-operation, understanding, and a determination by poor people of all colors and backgrounds to assert and win their right to a decent life and respect for their culture and dignity’ (SCLC, 15 March 1968). Many leaders of American Indian, Puerto Rican, Mexican American, and poor white communities pledged themselves to the Poor People’s Campaign. 

“After King’s assassination in April 1968, SCLC decided to go on with the campaign under the leadership of Ralph Abernathy, SCLC’s new president. On Mother’s Day, 12 May 1968, thousands of women, led by Coretta Scott King, formed the first wave of demonstrators.” *

*https://kinginstitute.stanford.edu/poor-peoples-campaign

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