The I Have a Dream Speech

In 1950's America, the equality of man envisioned by the Declaration of

Independence was far from a reality. People of color — blacks, Hispanics, Asians —
were discriminated against in many ways, both overt and covert.
The 1950's were a turbulent time in America, when racial
barriers began to come down due to Supreme Court decisions, like Brown v. Board of
Education; and due to an increase in the activism of blacks, fighting for equal rights.

Martin Luther King, Jr., a Baptist minister, was a driving force in the push for racial
equality in the 1950's and the 1960's. In 1963, King and his staff focused on
Birmingham, Alabama. They marched and protested non-violently, raising the ire of
local officials who sicced water cannon and police dogs on the marchers, whose ranks
included teenagers and children. The bad publicity and break-down of business forced
the white leaders of Birmingham to concede to some anti-segregation demands.

Thrust into the national spotlight in Birmingham, where he was arrested and jailed,
King helped organize a massive march on Washington, DC, on August 28, 1963. His
partners in the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom included other religious
leaders, labor leaders, and black organizers. The assembled masses marched down the
Washington Mall from the Washington Monument to the Lincoln Memorial, heard
songs from Bob Dylan and Joan Baez, and heard speeches by actor Charlton Heston,
NAACP president Roy Wilkins, and future U.S. Representative from Georgia John
Lewis.

King's appearance was the last of the event; the closing speech was carried live on
major television networks. On the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, King evoked the
name of Lincoln in his "I Have a Dream" speech, which is credited with mobilizing
supporters of desegregation and prompted the 1964 Civil Rights Act. The next year,
King was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

The following is the exact text of the spoken speech, transcribed from recordings.

I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest
demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation.

Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today,
signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great
beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been seared in the flames of
withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of their
captivity.
But one hundred years later, the Negro still is not free. One hundred years later, the
life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains
of discrimination. One hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of
poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity. One hundred years later,
the Negro is still languishing in the corners of American society and finds himself an
exile in his own land. So we have come here today to dramatize a shameful condition.

In a sense we have come to our nation's capital to cash a check. When the architects of
our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of
Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to
fall heir. This note was a promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men,
would be guaranteed the unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of
happiness.

It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note insofar as her
citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America
has given the Negro people a bad check, a check which has come back marked
"insufficient funds." But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We
refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of
this nation. So we have come to cash this check — a check that will give us upon
demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice. We have also come to this
hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of now. This is no time to
engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism.
Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy. Now is the time to rise from
the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice. Now is
the time to lift our nation from the quick sands of racial injustice to the solid rock of
brotherhood. Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God's children.

It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment. This
sweltering summer of the Negro's legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an
invigorating autumn of freedom and equality. Nineteen sixty-three is not an end, but a
beginning. Those who hope that the Negro needed to blow off steam and will now be
content will have a rude awakening if the nation returns to business as usual. There
will be neither rest nor tranquility in America until the Negro is granted his citizenship
rights. The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation
until the bright day of justice emerges.

But there is something that I must say to my people who stand on the warm threshold
which leads into the palace of justice. In the process of gaining our rightful place we
must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom
by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred.

We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We
must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and
again we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.
The marvelous new militancy which has engulfed the Negro community must not lead
us to a distrust of all white people, for many of our white brothers, as evidenced by
their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny is tied up with our
destiny. They have come to realize that their freedom is inextricably bound to our
freedom. We cannot walk alone.

As we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall always march ahead. We cannot
turn back. There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights, "When will you
be satisfied?" We can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is the victim of the
unspeakable horrors of police brutality. We can never be satisfied, as long as our
bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the
highways and the hotels of the cities. We cannot be satisfied as long as the Negro's
basic mobility is from a smaller ghetto to a larger one. We can never be satisfied as
long as our children are stripped of their selfhood and robbed of their dignity by signs
stating "For Whites Only". We cannot be satisfied as long as a Negro in Mississippi
cannot vote and a Negro in New York believes he has nothing for which to vote. No,
no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like
waters and righteousness like a mighty stream.

I am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great trials and
tribulations. Some of you have come fresh from narrow jail cells. Some of you have
come from areas where your quest for freedom left you battered by the storms of
persecution and staggered by the winds of police brutality. You have been the veterans
of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that unearned suffering is
redemptive.

Go back to Mississippi, go back to Alabama, go back to South Carolina, go back to

Georgia, go back to Louisiana, go back to the slums and ghettos of our northern cities,
knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed. Let us not wallow in
the valley of despair.

I say to you today, my friends, so even though we face the difficulties of today and
tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its
creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal."

I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and
the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of
brotherhood.
I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the
heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an
oasis of freedom and justice.

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will
not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.

I have a dream today.

I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its
governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification;
one day right there in Alabama, little black boys and black girls will be able to join
hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.

I have a dream today.

I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain
shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be
made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it
together.

This is our hope. This is the faith that I go back to the South with. With this faith we
will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith we
will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony
of brotherhood. With this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to
struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that
we will be free one day.

This will be the day when all of God's children will be able to sing with a new
meaning, "My country, 'tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing. Land where
my fathers died, land of the pilgrim's pride, from every mountainside, let freedom
ring."

And if America is to be a great nation this must become true. So let freedom ring from
the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire. Let freedom ring from the mighty
mountains of New York. Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of
Pennsylvania!

Let freedom ring from the snowcapped Rockies of Colorado!

Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California!

But not only that; let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia!

Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee!

Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi. From every
mountainside, let freedom ring.

And when this happens, when we allow freedom to ring, when we let it ring from
every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to
speed up that day when all of God's children, black men and white men, Jews and
Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of
the old Negro spiritual, "Free at last! free at last! thank God Almighty, we are free at
last!"