Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. would have been surprised to see how quickly and thoroughly the federal government’s support for civil rights, civil liberties, and the rule of law have been reversed since this time last year. True, at the time of his death in 1968, King knew that he was the target of FBI investigations. But he died also knowing that a significant number of congressional Republicans and a majority of Supreme Court justices, not just liberal Democrats, had supported the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965, the Immigration Act of 1965, and other federal laws advancing equal opportunity and racial justice.
King died believing that the majority of Americans were moral and decent. He acted on the premise that in a democracy, when informed about the facts of an unjust situation by a free press, and when prompted by non-violent public demonstrations appealing to their sense of morality and decency, the majority of Americans could effect political change. King believed this not only as an article of faith, but also because he saw it happen during his own short lifetime.
Of course, King also saw reverses during his lifetime, but nothing comparable to the current reversal. It would have been hard for King to have imagined a time when “states rights” doctrines must be invoked to protect local citizens from repressive, immoral, and unjust federal government actions carried out by Trump’s willing executioners in Congress and in our streets. Or a time when significant numbers of Americans, badly misinformed and inflamed by blatantly partisan news media, believe the lies justifying those repressive federal actions rather than the truth.
On MLK Day in 2026, we hold public demonstrations designed to appeal to Americans’ sense of decency and morality, but uncertain whether moral persuasion remains an effective tool for changing hearts and minds, or whether American democracy works in the same way that it did during King’s lifetime.
David Glassberg
Amherst