"Well, I don't know what will happen now. We've got some difficult days ahead. But it really doesn't matter with me now,*because I've been to the mountaintop.
And I don't mind.
Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about that now. I just want to do God's will. And He's allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I've looked over. And I've seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land.
And so I'm happy, tonight. I'm not worried about anything I'm not fearing any man! Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord!!"
Martin Luther King, Jr
April 3, 1968
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(
taken from the Washington Post -- April 11, 1998)
The 40th President also gave a eulogy -- "
And yet few men had such faith in America as Dr King had. He strove to desegregate and integrate America to the end that this great nation of ours, born in revolution and blood, conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created free and equal, will truly become the lighthouse of freedom where none will be denied because his skin is black and none favored because his eyes are blue. We have come a long way, and though we have further to go still -- for America is a work never finished, and ever self perfecting -- Dr King called himself fortunate for having seen so much come about in his lifetime..."
He concluded, "
Let us honor Dr King -- not with words but with deeds. Let us resolve to continue on our nation's march for freedom. Let us never stop. Let us never break the promises that we have made -- that ours is a nation devoted liberty and justice for all; and that we shall overcome someday."
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(
taken from American Conscience: The Ministry of Dr Martin Luther King
by Taylor Branch)
Here, perhaps, was segregation at its most absurd -- the premier speaker in America, who incidentally was a frequent target of violence, was relegated to a motel. Every time King wanted to go from one room to another, he had to traverse the rain-soaked outdoor motel catwalks. Across the street in a flophouse next to a fire station, a two-bit drifter and petty criminal named James Earl Ray thrust his .30-’06 Remington through a bathroom window. King emerged from his room for dinner, chatted up some of his associates, hangers-on, and admirers, made the acquaintance of a member of the band that was to play for them that night. A shot rang out, narrowly missing him and lodging in the concrete wall. Quickly, the party dispersed back into the hotel and screamed for someone to call the cops. Such brushes with death were not uncommon for the Reverend by then...
OOC: Well, first post of a new TL -- let's see how this goes
JFTR -- the eulogy of TTL borrows from Benjamin Mays eulogy of OTL, and the last section borrows liberally from Roguebeaver's
Land of Milk and Honey (hope he doesn't mind

)