Martin Luther King, Jr., survives

hey, all. since tomorrow is Martin Luther King Day, i was inevitably reminded of the Boondocks episode in which he appears, having fallen into a coma rather than be killed and waking up again in the post-9/11 era. i've been batting this idea around in my head for a while, and i figured this was the best time to ask in any case:

what does everyone think history would be affected if Martin Luther King, Jr., either survived his OTL assassination in some way (coma, serious wound, or it never happens at all) and how would this affect politics and civil rights from then on. a President Martin Luther King, Jr., is a relatively common theme, for instance.
 
There is no Civil Rights Act of 1968, and whoever is elected president probably gets a headache from MLK's continuing opposition to the war.
 
There wouldn't be a federal/bank holiday named after him. That would be the obvious answer.


I remember the President King bit from some old what if thing on the Discovery Channel back in the 90s. Would he even run for President (or any other office)? I don't know enough about his personality to extrapolate.
 
Depends

If there had been no attempt, or if JE Ray had missed/been stopped, the above scenarios would be the most likely.
The interesting contrast would be the Boondock one, if King had been hit but somehow manage to survive, even in a coma. Would that have made a difference the way his death OTL did and if so, how much. Yes it does sound somewhat ASB, but people have been know to survive such things as a bullet to the head. Not very well, mind you, but it happens.
Just my two cents.
 
Top