Honored for a Dream | Assassinated for a Plan

By: Natalie Leggette

Four days after the assassination of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Congressman, John Conyers, from Michigan, pushed for a holiday to honor the great leader. Fifteen years, six million signatures, a hit song by Stevie Wonder, an anniversary March on Washington and a boldly defiant gesture by Senator, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, from New York later, the bill for the holiday passed, 78 - 22. President Reagan signed the legislation, and the first federal holiday was celebrated in 1986. It was not until 2000 that every state in the Union observed the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday.

It is possible that the fight to honor and recognize Dr. King caused the black community to relinquish control of the narrative. Generations have been taught about King's nonviolence stance, his Nobel Peace Prize achievement0, and of course he had A Dream. A dream so eloquently described that is has been adopted into the marketing of America around the globe.

Today the story is told that Martin Luther King Jr. died. Some may argue semantics yet, words hold power and determine meaning. Dr. King was assassinated, murdered, targeted and killed. The story that is shared is a half truth. Dr. King had a plan. A proven plan of cooperative economics. A deliberate intentionality directing the resources of the black community to demand equity and equality.

Dr. King had a plan to help organize a movement attacking “ghetto” segregation and the systemic exclusion of Black Americans from white neighborhoods. Dr. King and his wife moved into a Chicago slum. The Blacks residing in the slums paid more for everything. They paid more for housing than the white residents living in the suburbs next to them. Blacks paid more for consumer goods. There was not job opportunity nor opportunity for upward mobility, creating an ghetto imprisoned by economic restrictions.

Months of dispute led to a commitment to open housing from the City of Chicago and its Board of Realtors. The agreement inspired 1968's Fair Housing Act of which passed after King’s assassination.

Dr. King was organizing the Poor People’s Campaign. Focused to bring together poor Blacks, Latinos, Indigenous people and whites to march on Washington to demand economic justice, literally coming for the check. That is the plan that many in this nation wanted to stop. The greatness of Dr. King's leadership is not lessened by the reality that many sought to kill him for his ideology. The reality of his assassination shines a light on the plan Dr. King had for economic justice. How radical the idea of honoring Dr. King by executing his plan?