Emma Nicholas Enriched Language Arts 9 Mrs. Villers March 1st, 2024 Effect of Sources on Bias Towards the Civil Rights Movement During the Civil Rights Movement in the United States, activists like Robert F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr. had significant impacts on the literature and subsequent bias regarding the movement. This section contains the “I Have a Dream” speech and “Letter from Birmingham Jail” by King, as well as “Remarks on the Assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr,” a speech given by Kennedy. These selections were very impactful for the people who first heard or read them, and sparked both positive and negative change in regards to the civil rights movement. Of the literature from the 1960s civil rights movement, the most famous perhaps is the …show more content…
He was jailed many times, and eventually assassinated. While serving one of his jail sentences, King got word of white clergymen slandering the civil rights movement. He retaliated with a letter, called “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” a reference to the jail he was detained in. His letter had many impacts on his followers, one of these being their willingness to bail him out of jail. Instead of accepting this offer, King remained in jail to draw more attention. Instead of sending the letter to the clergymen directly, he published it to the general public, generating a broader audience and wider effect. King’s letter did eventually reach his intended audience when it was published in The Christian Century, a Protestant newspaper (Maranzani 2018). Though “Letter from Birmingham Jail” didn’t have as big of an effect as other selections, it helped to reach religious and younger audiences (Maranzani). On the night of King’s assassination, Robert Kennedy gave a speech with the most notable effect on his audience. After the initial shock and outrage of being informed of King’s murder, the crowd was very attentive and responsive to Kennedy’s