Logos In Dr. King's I Have A Dream By Martin Luther King

Martin Luther King Jr. was an important figure in gaining civil rights throughout the 1960’s and he’s very deserving of that title as seen in both his “I Have a Dream” speech and his “Letter from Birmingham Jail” letter. In both of these writings Dr. King uses logos - logical persuasion - and pathos - emotional appeal - to change the opinions of people who were for segregation and against civil rights. Although King was arrested for a nonviolent protest, he still found a way to justify his actions with the use of logos and pathos. MLK uses both ways to gain the attention and agreement of the audience but, he uses pathos not just more, but in a more relatable way in order to appeal to his audience. The “I Have a Dream” speech is well known throughout history to be one of the most famous speeches to be on the subject of civil rights. Throughout the entirety of “I Have a Dream”, Dr. King uses pathos more than logos. “We can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality. We can never be satisfied as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities.” (King, 263). The use of words like victim, horrors, heavy with the fatigue, are all there to make the

“...;when you have to concoct an answer for a five year old son who is asking; ‘Daddy, why do white people treat colored people so mean?’” (King 275-276). The whole of the paragraph that this quote is from is all demonstrating pathos. The use of the child is used to relate to the audience members with children, or who remember being a child (which would be almost every member of the audience) and make them think of how hurt that child must be. Dr. Kings usage of the audience’s sympathy is widely shown before and after every quote containing