By Rashad Phillips
By the end of 1967, African-Americans fought for and obtained federal legislation to establish civil rights, voting rights, and to abolish racial segregation. Dr. King viewed the passage of civil rights protections as the first steps toward freedom and equality for African-Americans. King said, “In spite of a decade of significant progress, the problem is far from solved. The deep rumbling of discontent in our cities is indicative of the fact that the plant of freedom has grown only a bud and not yet a flower.” Dr. King understood that racism was only a symptom of the problem when he told a New York Times reporter, “In a sense, you could say we’re involved in the class struggle”. Dr. King felt that African-Americans won legal equality but did not earn economic equality. Most of us have heard Dr. King’s I Have A Dream speech but very few people of aware of Dr. King’s ‘economic dream’ which he called “The Poor People’s Campaign.” In the spring of 1968, Dr. King planned to bring thousands of poor people of all ethnic and racial backgrounds to Washington, D.C., to block streets and disrupt government activities until the government addressed the needs of poor Americans. Under The Poor People’s Campaign, Dr. King developed an economic bill of rights, demanding a $30 billion anti-poverty package that included a government policy of full employment, guaranteed income for the poor, and additional low-income housing.
Dr. King’s Economic Dream was originally published on oldschool1053.com
