Beyond Vietnam to the madness of Iraq

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http://www.freepress.org/columns/display/4/2007/1525

April 16, 2007

On April 4, 1967, exactly one year to the day before his assassination, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his eloquent yet controversial address, “Beyond Vietnam,” at New York City’s Riverside Church. In his sermon, Dr. King announced his moral and political reasons for opposing the U.S. military escalation in Vietnam.

“I come to this magnificent house of worship tonight,” King began, “because my conscience leaves me no other choice.” King noted that the presence of hundreds of thousands of U.S. troops in southeast Asia had only led to the deaths of thousands of innocent victims, and had cost American taxpayers billions of dollars. “A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death,” King observed. It was impossible for the administration of then-President Lyndon Johnson to carry out his “Great Society” social programs, or his “War on Poverty,” when billions of dollars were being reallocated to destroy Vietnamese villages, towns and homes.

As journalist Bob Herbert recently noted, King’s “Beyond Vietnam” address “unleashed a hurricane of criticism.” Both the NAACP and black leaders such as Bayard Rustin sharply criticized King for “stepping out of his perceived area of expertise, civil rights, to raise his voice against the evil of the war.” The New York Times joined these critics, proclaiming in an editorial headline, “Dr. King’s Error.” snip