This speech was presented by Governor George Wallace at his inauguration as Governor of Alabama on January 14, 1963. This was seven months before the Birmingham Campaign was launched in the spring of the same year. George Wallace put himself out there in this speech and later on emerged as the leading opponent to the civil rights movement. His speech surrounds the topic of keeping the streets of Alabama segregated, and he backs this up with the famous words - ‘segregation today. segregation tomorrow. segregation forever. To open the speech, Wallace begins by talking about the ancestors of the (then) modern America - the founding fathers, and how they ‘sounded the drum for freedom, time and time again through history’. The quote ‘I draw the …show more content…
He uses religion as a way to blind the white citizens of Alabama into being on his side, and wanting to keep segregation. According to Wallace desegregation is not the path to the foundation that God meant that men should be. He refers to the term ‘framework’ a lot in the second half of his speech, talking about how we should all respect the rights of others to be separate and work within their political framework. ‘Each race, within it’s own framework, has the freedom to teach, to instruct, to develop, to ask for and receive deserved help from others of separate racial stations.’ is a quote from the second last verse of the speech, and it is a push at telling the white majority that the negro citizens have everything they need within their community, and that there is no need to desegregate, when in reality, the black minority are willing to do anything to get better education, jobs and opportunities. Finally, Wallace appoints a warning ‘to any group’ - which in the case of the civil rights movement refers to the SCLC, SNCC or even larger groups such as Project C. ‘That freedom was won at a hard price and if it requires a hard price to retain