In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

320 Martin Luther King Jr. A Time to Break Silence Martin Luther King, Jr. had begun to criticize America’s involvement in the Vietnam War two years before this landmark speech at Riverside Church. At a Howard University address in 1965, he said that the war was “accomplishing nothing,” and at that year’s Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) annual meeting, he argued that the United States must negotiate with the Viet Cong and that it must halt the bombing. His antiwar stance at this point was not radical, however; he also declared that there should be no unilateral US withdrawal. Still, he was heavily criticized for his stand. Benjamin Hooks warned King against going “too far in the international arena.” The SCLC dissociated itself from King’s antiwar comments. Many black leaders argued that King’s antiwar stance would hurt the cause of civil rights, even as that cause was gaining real legislative success. In addition to such criticism by black leaders and the black press, King was attacked by many white leaders and the white press. U.S. News and World Report asked, “Is Vietnam to Become a ‘Civil Rights’ Issue?” Time also signaled its disapproval in its headline: “Confusing the Cause.” Both Time and U.S. News and World Report quoted the NAACP’s Roy Wilkins as saying, “I don’t believe civil rights groups have enough information on Viet Nam, or foreign policy, to make it their cause.” The white establishment clearly agreed with Wilkins. By fall of 1965, emotionally fatigued from fighting the criticism and with the press of other issues such as the Watts riot, King returned his focus to civil rights.1 Events, however, caught up with him. In the summer of 1966, the Office of Economic Opportunity, the primary agency for Johnson’s Great Society A Time to Break Silence 321 programs, had its budget cut by one-third in order to support the growing defense appropriations. In a very real sense, the poor were funding the war. African Americans were also shouldering a disproportionate share of the combat duty. As early as 1964, only 18.8 percent of eligible whites were drafted as compared to 30.2 percent of eligible blacks. By 1967, fueled by the troop buildup in Vietnam, 31 percent of eligible whites were being drafted compared to 67 percent of eligible blacks. Moreover, while 13 percent of the military was African American, they drew 28 percent of the combat assignments . Yet as late as 1967, although most blacks favored a cease-fire or some lessening of hostilities, only 25 percent were opposed to US involvement in Vietnam, compared with 15 percent of white Americans. The majority of African American antiwar sentiment was found in the young, the urban, and the poor.2 Indeed, in 1966, King rallied the SCLC to his position, and some of its leadership, such as Hosea Williams and Ralph Abernathy, began to speak out actively against the war. Throughout the year, King, too, briefly addressed the war in sermons and speeches, but not until the spring of 1967 did he begin to deliver speeches devoted solely to the antiwar cause. The first such speech was at a forum sponsored by the Nation on February 25, 1967. However, his most compelling speech, and the one that drew the greatest national attention , was his address at the Riverside Church before a meeting sponsored by the Clergy and Laymen Concerned about Vietnam. Speaking to an audience of about three thousand, King explained his antiwar position in New York, on April 4, 1967, exactly one year before his assassination.3 According to communication scholar Michael Eric Dyson, “A Time to Break Silence” was originally drafted by Vincent Harding, revised by King, and then delivered largely extemporaneously at the Riverside Church. Harding , a minister and professor at Spelman College in Atlanta, had a specific agenda for the speech. He wanted it to be a strong statement against the war, he wanted the antiwar argument to be grounded in King’s role as a religious leader for peace and freedom, and he wanted King to express solidarity with the Vietnamese people. In this speech, King accomplished all three goals.4 As with many of King’s speeches, a striking feature of “A Time to Break Silence ” was its careful organization. He began the speech on a highly personal note, speaking of the “betrayal of my own silences,” and the “burnings of my own heart,” remarking that “many persons have questioned...

Share