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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, 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
captivity. But one hundred years later, we must face the tragic
fact that the Negro is still 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 an appalling 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 would be guaranteed
the inalienable 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 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 open the doors of opportunity to all God's children.
Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial
injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood.
It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the
moment and to underestimate the determination of the Negro. 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
wrong 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 and their freedom is inextricably bound
to our freedom. We cannot walk alone.
And as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall 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 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 storms of persecutions 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 modern 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, that in spite of the difficulties
and frustrations of the moment, 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 out 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 desert
state sweltering with the heat and injustice 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 the state of Alabama, whose governor's
lips are presently dripping with the words of interposition and
nullification, will be transformed into a situation where little
black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little
white boys and white girls and walk together 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
plains 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 with which I return to the
South. 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 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 snow-capped Rockies of Colorado.
Let freedom ring from the curvaceous peaks 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.
When we let freedom 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."
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