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Martin Luther King’s Letter from Birmingham Jail analyze
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Martin Luther King’s Letter from Birmingham Jail analyze
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In MLK’s famous letter from Birmingham Jail and “I Have a Dream”, he uses different types of persuasive arguments such as appealing logic as well as charging his language to affect people’s emotions. Although Dr. King uses mostly pathos in the letter from Birmingham Jail, he still uses facts and evidence to support his claims. By appealing to both the logical and emotional side of people Dr. King provides good reasons to join the fight for African American rights and the end to segregation. Despite using mostly charged language aimed at people who play more the moral side of life than the people who play more to the logical side of life, Dr. King still states strong evidence about the injustices African Americans face daily.
In “Letter from a Birmingham Jail,” Martin Luther King Jr. is responding to accusations made by eight Alabama clergymen. He asserts that his actions, and the actions of his followers were just and reasonable. He notes that the clergymen claimed he was acting too hastily but King explains that their actions were not hasty. He backs up his actions with persuasive argument and reasoning. He points out ways that others actions have been unjust and immoral.
A "Letter from the Birmingham Jail" (1963), by Martin Luther King Jr. was written in response to a letter published by Alabama clerics. This time he will respond with all his heart to this cynical oppression. In the course of the letter King makes extensive allusions to multiple philosophers, including Aquinas and Socrates. King's work has only one objective: the protection of civil disobedience as a form of protest that the Civil Rights Movement could continue in an unencumbered way despite this singularity of purpose, the complexity of the situation meant that it was "A Call for Unity" published by the eight clergymen. Immoral and immoral mentions drew the attention of the Minister through the letter, and were expressed by different points
History has only proven that the insufficiency of equality as individuals brings hostility between people. For example, the discrimination that people of color had suffered due to the rules and restrictions that were imposed to them. Even though, they were American born citizens, the government was not treating them as equal. Therefore, they started to fight for their rights; most of their manifests were non-violent but due to the discernment from the opposite side some of those protests ended up in riots. Dr. Martin Luther king Jr. even describes their frustrations on a letter that he wrote to his oppose white fellow.
Martin Luther King was a firm advocate of peaceful protests and actions to attain social change; however, these actions failed to bring equality. On April 10th, 1963 the city of Birmingham banned street marches without permission. When King refused to call off his demonstrations he was arrested on April 12, and placed in solitary confinement in the Birmingham Jail. While in jail King read the newspaper ad “A Call for Unity”, calling King’s activities “unwise and untimely”; this ad was a public statement signed by eight Alabama clergymen in protest to King’s actions. In response to this, King writes “Letter from Birmingham Jail”, arguing the points the eight men made in their statements and defending his actions.
In August of 1963, from the Birmingham Jail, Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. wrote a public response to a statement issued by eight white religious leaders. In the statement by the religious leaders, they described the Birmingham protests "unwise and untimely." In King’s response, he both defended the actions of himself and his fellow activists, but he expressed his disappointment with two large groups due to either their actions or inactions. King was justified in his expressed disdain for the actions of some but not all of those targeted in this famous Letter from Birmingham Jail.
After reading Letter from Birmingham Jail by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., I am convinced that he held his values so dearly that he was willing to die for them. He did not shrink back from engaging in actions that were vital to the civil rights movement, even when it was apparent that his life was in jeopardy. Two of the values that he believed in so much that he was will to lay down his life if necessary were nonviolence and justice. Because Dr. King deeply believed in a nonviolent approach and because he did not want the bloodshed that was sure to follow any violent demonstration, a considerable amount of preparation was made prior to start of the protest to racial inequality. One of the steps that Dr. King mentions as required before
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in his “Letter from Birmingham Jail”, uses the lense of social power in order to get his thoughts across. Social power is the degree of influence that an individual or organization has among their peers and within their society as a whole. This idea is illustrated throughout his letter to show the significance of the disabilities and unfair treatment the black community has faced for the entirety of their existence. African americans have never been able to gain the respect from others they deserve due to the idea that other races have more power on them simply due to the color of their skin. Martin Luther King is able to express these ideas by referencing multiple examples as to how social power has negatively affected their societal presence for many years.
“The Letter from Birmingham Jail” by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. is a letter to eight white clergymen who responded towards King’s acts of protests of segregation. Segregation in the 1960’s was alive and well in the U.S but mainly in Birmingham, Alabama. King went to the city of Birmingham because of the injustice that was happening to fellow black Americans, blacks were limited to their rights, black Americans had a hard time to vote, had to give up their seats on buses, had to use different restrooms, and many other daily issues. King went into Birmingham to protest segregation, which is the separation of groups because of their racial differences, and King wanted an immediate stop to it. “The Letter from Birmingham Jail” is an effective letter.
Dr. King stood in front of many people and gave his speech, which was created to strike the people’s emotions of how African Americans suffered and why they wanted a change. In contrast, the letter was created to show the reasoning behind wanting a change, because he was writing to his fellow clergymen who said his actions were unwise and untimely. In Dr. King’s speech and letter, he uses rhetorical appeals many times to compel the feelings and reasoning behind the civil rights movement. In Dr. King’s famous speech, “I Have a Dream” he appealed to the audiences’ emotions about the topic of inequality and he proved his logic and reasoning for the Civil Rights movement. When Dr. King gave his speech about the inequality of African Americans, he backed himself up with reasoning to prove why equality was needed.
On April 12, 1963, civil rights leader, Martin Luther King, was arrested in Birmingham, Alabama. He was asked by an affiliate of his organization to partake in a nonviolent program. He was arrested during a non violent protest. Police Commissioner Eugene Connor declared that the reason behind King’s arrest was that he did not at have a permit to protest. While he served his 11 day sentence, King would write the “Letter From Birmingham City Jail” to the eight Birmingham Clergymen.
Equal rights protester Martin Luther King Jr. once said, “now is the time to make real the promise of democracy, and transform our pending national elegy into a creative psalm of brotherhood.” In 1963, King was arrested for protesting in Birmingham and was put in jail. During that period, he had a lot of spare time and wrote a long and powerful letter full of stylistic elements to church leaders in Birmingham who had criticized him for leading a protest. They made public statements opposing King and his methods for achieving change, but King believed that they misjudged his cause and ways of doing. Martin Luther King, Jr. uses many stylistic elements including convincing examples and keen figurative language to influence his reader to agree with his point in "Letter from Birmingham Jail."
On March 25, 1965, Martin Luther King Jr. and thousands of other African-Americans marched from Selma to Montgomery in the state of Alabama to gain rights for people of color. The main focus of this march was to register black voters in the South. This protest was started because southerners were not following the Civil Rights Act of 1964 which prevented discrimination in voting. Non violent resistance was used when Dr. King tried to lead peaceful marches but was met with a blockade of state troopers. This act of civil disobedience caught the attention of President Lyndon B. Johnson who had Congress pass the Voting Rights Acts which allowed African-Americans to vote.
The civil rights movement and coinciding events were revealed as a monumental declaration for certain groups of people. For other groups of people, it served as a reminder of the misdirection that the United States of America had been taking in terms of moving forward. Together, they compile into a collection of political, social, and moral reactions of various populations towards the civil rights movement and towards African Americans. Specifically, these were positive and negative reactions that were perceived towards Martin Luther King’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail”, the “I Have a Dream” speech, and the civil rights campaign which had originated in Birmingham, Alabama. People were led to believe different things about these events
In Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “A Letter From a Birmingham Jail,” he provides answers to fundamental metaphysical questions regarding the nature of the human soul. Though his letter is addressed to a group of eight clergymen criticizing his direct action campaign in Birmingham, his ultimate aim is the uplifting of human personhood. Underlying King’s letter is a philosophical, hylemorphic anthropology which puts an anchor deep into a certain conception of personhood, and binds all people who are to read it. He looks deeply at the nature of human beings, as rational creatures who are made to love and be loved, and from thence, deliberates that there is a universal Gospel of Freedom and Justice. Martin Luther King, Jr. asserts that there are universal principles justifying what actions are morally right and wrong, just and unjust.
