Peter Jennings Reporting - I Have A Dream
Air Date: 8/28/03
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) The words spoken here to a crowd of ordinary Americans in the
summer of 1963 moved them deeply. In those days, these Americans were called
Negroes. And there was no liberty and justice for Negroes in America, 100 years
after the slaves were set free, Black patience was almost exhausted. And in that
season of turmoil, there emerged to the world a new American revolutionary. He
came here to share his dream.
Graphics: Peter Jennings Reporting, I Have A Dream
Peter Jennings – On Camera
Good evening, I'm Peter Jennings. And it is here at the Lincoln Memorial that Martin
Luther King gave one of the most important speeches in American history. Today,
his "I Have a Dream" speech is taught in American schools. It helps to shape our
memory of who King was. His struggle to articulate what freedom meant to American
Blacks and his linking that to the American dream ensures his place in the national
consciousness. But a speech is not complete without context, not enough without
knowing the times in which it was given. And in the south that summer, American
Blacks didn't just march their way to freedom, they worked their way. It was
sometimes bloody, and it was always hard.
Graphics: Not an End, But a Beginning
Doctor Martin Luther King Jr.
Civil Rights Leader
1963 is not an end, but a beginning. Those who hoped that the Negro needed to
blow off steam and will now be content will have a rude awakening if the nation
returns to business as usual.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) On April the 12th, 1963, in room 30 of the Gaston Motel in Birmingham,
Alabama, Martin Luther King met with his advisors. At stake was King's future as a
civil rights leader. For almost ten years, King had fought for change in the south. But
not very much had changed. He now believed that Birmingham was his last chance.
Ambassador Andrew Young
Civil Rights Leader
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Peter Jennings Reporting: I Have A Dream
He knew it was a dangerous situation. Either he was going to step up to the plate in
Birmingham, or he was gonna be, he was gonna drop by the wayside as a leader.
Hedrick Smith
The New York Times, 1962 - 1988, The New York Times, 1962 - 1988
The stakes in Birmingham were high, not only because of Birmingham, but
Birmingham was a symbol and a signal to everybody else. If Birmingham changed,
then you could change any place.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) There had been so much violence against Blacks in Birmingham, the
Black part of town was known as Dynamite Hill.
Reverend Walter Fauntroy
Southern Christian Leadership Conference, 1961 - 1965
And I'll never forget my first meeting there. They called it "Bombingham." I said, "Dr.
King, they mean Birmingham, don't they?" He said, "No, Walter." He said, "They call
it Bombingham down here because when Blacks get out of line, they will bomb you
out. And there are 60 unsolved bombings in the town."
Ambassador Andrew Young
Civil Rights Leader
Everybody was sort of intimidated in Birmingham, and for very good reason.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) King and his team tried to organize a larger campaign to break
segregation. But most people were afraid to demonstrate. They were up against a
notorious segregationist, Eugene "Bull" Connor, the commissioner of public safety.
And Connor was winning.
Taylor Branch
Author, Parting The Waters
They planned for it to take a while to build, and staked a lot on the hopes that the
earlier arrests would stimulate more people willing to go to jail, and over time, a
building of publicity and a growth of national interest, none of which happened.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) In desperation, King allowed himself to be arrested. Even this did not
light a spark. King stayed in jail for a week, but there was no public outcry. King
hoped that President Kennedy would intervene in Birmingham. The President did
not. When he got out of jail, King went back to speaking in churches, night after
night, but the crowds began to dwindle. The movement in Birmingham was failing.
Doctor Martin Luther King Jr.
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Peter Jennings Reporting: I Have A Dream
Down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, one day right down in Alabama, little Black
boys and Black girls will be able to join hands with little White boys and White girls
as sisters and brothers. I have a dream today.
Graphics: Little Black Boys And Black Girls
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) It was April in Alabama, 1963, when the youngest and most radical
member of King's staff, James Bevel, suggested that using children might make a
difference.
Reverend James Bevel
Southern Christian Leadership Conference, 1962 - 1969
If you know you are oppressed, it is your duty to act against that policy that you
know violates your dignity. Now, it doesn't determine what age you are when you
can comprehend that. Whenever you can comprehend that, that's when you're
supposed to take responsibility and act.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) Black students in Birmingham of almost every age wanted to
demonstrate, but King feared that the movement would be criticized for putting them
in danger.
Reverend James Cone
Author, Martin and Malcolm and America
That was a tough decision for King. But King did come to realize that if they're old
enough to go to church, they are old enough to go to jail.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) May the 2nd, James Bevel called it D-day. A little after 1:00 in the
afternoon, about 50 students filed out of the 16th Street Baptist Church to
demonstrate. By now, the police were accustomed making daily arrests. And these
students would be no different. But then another 50 appeared. And another 50 and
another.
Dorothy Cotton
Southern Christian Leadership Conference, 1960 - 1974
You can see them now on some of the old footage laughing and singing and running
up and down the street asking their friends, "Hey, are you going to jail today?" And it
was the thing to do.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) By the end of the day, the police had arrested more than 600 students.
They were the spark. The following day, more than 1,000 children showed up to
demonstrate. Bull Connor realized he couldn't arrest them all. So he brought in the
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Peter Jennings Reporting: I Have A Dream
fire department with its high- powered hoses. And he brought in police dogs. The
national press was watching as the children assembled in the park that Thursday
across the street from the Baptist church. Bull Connor washed away the last hope
for preserving segregation. James Orange was one of the kids.
Reverend James Orange
Southern Christian Leadership Conference, 1963 - 1977
The dogs didn't turn us around. The water hoses didn't turn us around. And you had
the police being outworked. When they'd beat down one group, here was another
group coming behind them.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) Within a week, there were nearly 3,000 students in jail. Connor built
outdoor pens at the county fairgrounds to hold them.
Jailed Student
I want equal rights, just like everybody else. I want my freedom just like everybody
else.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) And that May, which seems so distant now, with the children of
Birmingham doing battle for their future, all of America saw what was happening.
Michael Eric Dyson
Author, I May Not Get There With You
Martin Luther King Jr.. understood that if we could dramatize the plight and
predicament of African-American people while most White Americans are eating
their dinners, that it would play on the evening news, and it would play broadly and
dramatically.
Hedrick Smith
The New York Times, 1962 - 1988
Yeah, it was controversial. It was risky. But obviously, it worked. I mean, it had an
electric impact. I mean, that was enormously powerful symbolism.
Dick Gregory
Comedian, Activist
There was people that didn't give a damn about a Negro, but they still didn't want to
see dogs biting little children. They still didn't want to see fire hoses on people. And it
forced, those horrible pictures coming out, forced this government to do things that it
really didn't want to do, and it wouldn't have done.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) In Washington, President Kennedy, who had done nothing until now,
said privately the pictures made him sick. And finally, he intervened, quietly
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Peter Jennings Reporting: I Have A Dream
pressuring the business community in Birmingham to integrate lunch counters,
department stores, and other public facilities in defiance of local laws.
President John F. Kennedy
The business community of Birmingham has responded in a constructive and
commendable fashion.
Doctor Martin Luther King Jr.
I am very happy to be able to announce that we have come today to the climax of
the long struggle for justice, freedom, and human dignity.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) Martin Luther King was 34 that summer. His movement had been
saved by the children. Three months before his "I Have a Dream" speech,
Birmingham had set the nation on fire.
Graphics: Peter Jennings Reporting, I Have A Dream
Commercial Break
Doctor Martin Luther King Jr.
There will be neither rest nor tranquility in America until the Negro is granted his
citizenship rights. The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of
our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.
Graphics: Whirlwinds of Revolt
Peter Jennings
The whirlwinds of revolt in Birmingham were being felt in other places. City after city
across the country erupted in conflict over civil rights. In Greensboro, North Carolina,
a student leader named Jesse Jackson, Student Leader led more than 1,000
demonstrators to jail.
Jesse Jackson
Student Leader
Can I be admitted?
Segregationist
No, siree, you cannot be admitted.
Jesse Jackson
Student Leader
Why?
Segregationist
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Peter Jennings Reporting: I Have A Dream
I am not going to serve you.
Peter Jennings
In Jackson, Mississippi, teenagers sat in at Woolworth's. Hundreds were arrested. In
Cambridge, Maryland, the National guard was called in to restore order after
demonstrations led to violence.
Representative John Lewis
Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, 1959 - 1966
There were people saying, "If they can sit-in in Birmingham, if they can march in
Birmingham, we can march in Nashville. If they can march in Jackson, Mississippi,
we can march in Albany, Georgia." The time was right. It was an unbelievable
period.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) Dr. King was now in demand to speak or lead a march all over the
south. And now he saw an opportunity to go national.
Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton
March on Washington Staff
Here were people risking their lives all over the south. But what was it going to
accomplish? You've got to bring it together. And, of course, the leaders understood
that this was the moment to make something out of all that disparate movement
action so it culminated in something real, something we had been striving for for 100
years.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) A giant march on Washington had been a civil rights goal for some
years. A. Philip Randolph, the head of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, a
powerful Black labor union, had been talking about it since 1941. Now Randolph and
King and four other civil rights leaders agreed they would do it together.
Dorothy Cotton
Southern Christian Leadership Conference, 1960 - 1974
The reason for the march was so that we could once and for all pull everybody
together to make a powerful statement by massive numbers of people that
something had to change in this country.
Doctor Martin Luther King Jr.
The marvelous new militancy, which has engulfed the Negro community, must not
lead us to a distrust of all White people. Many of our White brothers have come to
realize that their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom. We cannot walk
alone.
Graphics: We Cannot Walk Alone
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Peter Jennings Reporting: I Have A Dream
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) When John F. Kennedy became President, Black Americans were
hopeful that they would no longer have to walk alone. During the campaign,
Kennedy had often said he would end segregation "with the stroke of a pen." When
he got to the White House, many people sent him pens. But by the summer of 1963,
the President had done almost nothing about civil rights.
Representative John Lewis
Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, 1959 - 1966
We became impatient with the slowness, the reluctant to act, to use the power of the
Federal government.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) The southern base of the Democratic party was strongly opposed to
civil rights, and Kennedy was preoccupied with the Soviet Union.
Taylor Branch,
Author, Parting The Waters
I mean, this is the height of the Cold War, and we're talking about the free world and
the Russians. And the communists are saying, "Free world, ha." you know, "what
kind of free world? You're oppressing your own people."
Dick Gregory
Comedian, Activist
Around America, they saw it as the south. Around the world, they saw it as America.
I mean, so nobody in Paris ever heard of Birmingham. This was America. And it was
an embarrassment to America.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) On June the 11th, 1963, there was another reason for the world to pay
attention. The segregationist governor of Alabama, George Wallace, had pledged to
prevent the court-ordered admission of Black students to the University of Alabama.
Nicholas Katzenbach
Deputy Attorney General, 1962 - 1964
Governor Wallace had said he was going to stand in the schoolhouse door, and he
wouldn't permit this to happen.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) The job of confronting Wallace was given to Deputy Attorney General
Nicholas Katzenbach.
Nicholas Katzenbach
Deputy Attorney General, 1962 - 1964
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Peter Jennings Reporting: I Have A Dream
Everything that we knew led us to believe that we were gonna have to bring the
military in, but that he would yield to the military.
Governor George Wallace
Segregationist
Now, therefore, I, George C. Wallace, as Governor of the state of Alabama, do
hereby denounce and forbid this illegal and unwarranted action by the central
government.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) That morning, the President had federalized the Alabama National
Guard to force the students' admission. For two years, Kennedy had avoided wading
into the muddy waters of the civil rights struggle. But watching Governor Wallace's
show of resistance, Kennedy told his aides he wanted to talk to the nation on
television that night.
President John F. Kennedy
We are confronted primarily with a moral issue. It is as old as the Scriptures and is
as clear as the American Constitution. The heart of the question is whether all
Americans are to be afforded equal rights and equal opportunities. Are we to say to
the world, and much more importantly, to each other, that this is a land of the free,
except for the Negroes? That we have no second-class citizens, except Negroes?
That we have no class or caste system, no ghettoes, no master race, except with
respect to Negroes? Now the time has come for this nation to fulfill its promise.
Doctor Martin Luther King Jr.
It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment. This
sweltering summer of the Negro's legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an
invigorating autumn of freedom and equality.
Graphics: The Urgency Of The Moment
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) Eight days after the President spoke on television, he sent a civil rights
bill to the Congress. It was the most important Presidential initiative for Black
Americans since President Lincoln freed the slaves. If it passed the Congress, Black
Americans could no longer be excluded from restaurants, hotels, and other public
facilities anywhere. But the President was worried about the march on Washington.
He and his brother, the Attorney General, met with the civil rights leaders and asked
them to stop it.
Representative John Lewis
Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, 1959 - 1966
During that meeting, President Kennedy says something like, "You know, we got to
get the Negroes out of the streets. If you have all these Negroes in the streets, we
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Peter Jennings Reporting: I Have A Dream
will never be able to get a civil rights bill through the Congress." And Mr. Randolph
said, "Well, Mr. President, the Negroes are already in the streets, and we're going to
march on Washington." And you can tell by the very body language of President
Kennedy, he didn't like what he heard.
John Reilly
Assistant To Deputy Attorney General, 1962 - 1964
I mean, what was going to happen? Was there going to be bad things happen? Was
it going to be the kind of thing that would jeopardize the final passing of any
legislation? There was a fear of that. And President Kennedy tried to convince King
and the rest of them that the time was not right for a march on Washington.
Nicholas Katzenbach
Deputy Attorney General, 1962 - 1964
When it was clear that the march was going to take place, then the decision was
made either by President Kennedy or by Bobby or by the two of them, I imagine, that
what we would do is not only accept the march, but we would, in essence, join the
march and try to achieve some kind of control. We were very nervous about it.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) When King left the White House, he flew to Detroit, where 100,000
people demonstrated for civil rights. America was on the brink of great change. That
afternoon, Dr. King used the same words that he would later repeat for the world in
Washington.
Doctor Martin Luther King Jr.
I have a dream this evening, that one day, we will recognize the words of Jefferson
that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain
unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. I
have a dream this afternoon.
Graphics: Peter Jennings Reporting
I Have A Dream
Commercial Break
Doctor Martin Luther King Jr.
Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy. Now is the time to rise
from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice.
Now is the time.
Graphics: Now Is The Time
Peter Jennings
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Peter Jennings Reporting: I Have A Dream
(Voice Over) It was a Wednesday, August the 28th. At the end of a long, sweltering
summer of racial discord, Washington was frightened that maybe it was next. The
government ordered bars and liquor stores closed. Major League Baseball was
canceled. The National Guard was put on alert. The White House had prepared an
executive order for martial law. An army of citizens was descending on the nation's
capital.
Courtland Cox
Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, 1960 - 1967
People were quite nervous. Who are all these people? Are they angry? Are they
going to do what they did in Birmingham? Are these people gonna throw rocks? Are
these gonna, radicals? Are these, you know, okay, we know there are going to be
some peaceful people, but, you know, what are, who are these other elements,
gonna, you know, are the communists gonna take over? Do the Russians have a
plot?
Roger Mudd
CBS News, 1961 - 1980
Washington had never had a march like this. They didn't know what to expect. They
expected the worst. They had seen on television the violence, the dogs, the hoses.
They hoped it wouldn't happen in Washington, but they didn't know.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) In cities across the country, after months of organization, the time had
come. Under the careful direction of the march's chief planner, Bayard Rustin,
hundreds of special buses and trains and carpools were now delivering thousands
and thousands of people to Washington.
Courtland Cox
Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, 1960 - 1967
So it was really an organizational effort, I mean, a massive organizational effort, to
try to, to, to mobilize people, to get them from around the country at every level. I
mean, so we're trying to get people from Congress there. We're trying to get the
movie stars there. I mean, we were trying to pull America to this place.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) A group of teenagers had walked the 225 miles from New York. A
young man named Ledger Smith roller-skated from Chicago. By 10:00 AM, more
than 40,000 people were already there.
Reverend Walter Fauntroy
Southern Christian Leadership Conference, 1961 - 1965
Brother, they were coming and coming and coming. I said, "Look, we're gonna fill up
this whole mall." You know?
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Peter Jennings Reporting: I Have A Dream
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) On the night before, Martin Luther King was still struggling to finish his
speech.
Ambassador Andrew Young
Civil Rights Leader
He was very anxious the night before.
Reverend C.T. Vivian
Southern Christian Leadership Conference, 1963 - 1967
We all knew that this was the high point. This was the chance to get over to America
like we'd never had before.
Ambassador Andrew Young
Civil Rights Leader
He went over it and over it, and he crossed out words three, four times, trying to get
not only the right word, but, and meaning, but the right rhythm and the right sound.
Reverend Walter Fauntroy
Southern Christian Leadership Conference, 1961 - 1965
He knew all the lines that got the best response. And our problem was which of the
lines we needed to put in the speech. Because it's not just, you know, 3,000 people
in a church now, or 5,000 or 10,000 people in a stadium, this was the world stage.
Reverend James Cone
Author, Martin and Malcolm and America
He wanted to connect with the American tradition. He wanted to connect with the
Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and Lincoln's Gettysburg address,
that whole spirit. And I know that King had Lincoln in mind when he prepared his
address.
Michael Eric Dyson
Author, I May Not Get There With You
So he begins, "Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow
we stand today, signed the Emancipation Proclamation." So already, we're in Lincoln
territory. But also, I think what's interesting, in the early part of that speech, is that it
contains the most radical ideas of the speech, when King says that we have
essentially come to the nation's capital to cash a check.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) There were several drafts of the speech, and the reference to a check
was in from the beginning.
Ambassador Andrew Young
Civil Rights Leader
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Peter Jennings Reporting: I Have A Dream
"We've come to our nation's capital to cash a check. When the architects of our
republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of
Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to
fall heir."
Clarence Jones
Personal Counsel to Doctor King
"Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a
bad check, a check which has come back marked 'insufficient funds.'"
Ambassador Andrew Young
Civil Rights Leader
It was in the face of this terrible injustice that he believed that America could live out
the true meaning of her creeds. And so this was a fulfillment of the promise of
Washington and Jefferson and John Adams.
Reverend James Cone
Author, Martin and Malcolm and America
So King saw in those documents a way of making White America see the gap
between what it says about itself and what it actually does. And he is saying it's time
to close the gap.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) At 11:00 AM, the crowds around the Washington monument
spontaneously set out for the Lincoln Memorial. The march's leaders had to rush to
catch up halfway down Constitution Avenue. All three television networks were going
on the air.
Reporter
Apparently, now the leaders have caught up with the parade they were supposed to
have led just a moment ago. The Reverend Martin Luther King of the Southern
Christian Leadership Conference arrived here on the plaza. So within the next few
minutes, we should be seeing the others move up to the steps of the Lincoln
Memorial.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) By noon, there were a quarter of a million people on the Washington
Mall.
John Reilly
Assistant To Deputy Attorney General, 1962 - 1964
You could see the people coming all the way down, all the way from Independence
Avenue, all the way over to Constitution Avenue. And that was an unbelievable
sight. I know I had never seen a crowd that, like, like that. I had never seen a crowd
that well-behaved.
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Peter Jennings Reporting: I Have A Dream
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) The program began to get underway at about 2:00. One of those who
entertained the crowd was the young folk singer Joan Baez. Harry Belafonte
organized a celebrity contingent, including Paul Newman, James Garner, Marlon
Brando, Sidney Poitier, and Charlton Heston.
Hedrick Smith
The New York Times, 1962 - 1988
It was so peaceful. It was like a state fair. It was like a festival. It was so ebullient
and nonthreatening, that it was surprising. It was surprising almost in its
ordinariness. People just wandering around. It was a sense of celebration. It was not
just a protest. It was a celebration.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) Behind the scenes, a small group of Justice Department lawyers was
working to make sure the march went smoothly. Plainclothes police were brought in
from New York. The Kennedy Administration worked with the labor unions to make
sure there were plenty of White faces in the crowd. There were no police dogs. But
on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, an official from the Kennedy Administration sat
by a switch to turn off the sound system if the government thought any speaker was
inciting violence. President Kennedy watched from the Oval Office. It was a long
afternoon. There were many speakers.
Announcer
Mr. Burt Lancaster.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) Everyone remembers it as a beautiful day.
Harry Belafonte
Entertainer, Activist
And I remember Dr. King when he saw all of this before he went on. And he looked
out. His eyes filled up. It was beyond anything I've ever, ever experienced.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) It was about 20 to 4:00 when Dr. King got up. He was the last speaker.
With his speech in his hand, and people as far as his eye could see, he began.
Doctor Martin Luther King Jr.
I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest
demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation. Five score years ago, a great
American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today, signed the Emancipation
Proclamation.
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Peter Jennings Reporting: I Have A Dream
Ambassador Andrew Young
Civil Rights Leader
It was hot, and I was very uncomfortable, until Martin started speaking. And then the
thing took on a new, a new character.
Dick Gregory
Comedian, Activist
And then just the whole crowd just hushed. The whole crowd just hushed. And, and
just something came over, and everybody was just spellbound.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) Dr. King was nervous, looking down repeatedly at what he had written.
Some people thought at first that he was not his preacher self that day. He followed
his prepared text closely.
Doctor Martin Luther King Jr.
It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note, insofar as her
citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America
has given the Negro people a bad check, a check which has come back marked
"insufficient funds."
Harry Belafonte
Entertainer, Activist
When he speaks, everybody understands. It is the cadence of common tongue. The
clarity of it was astounding.
Doctor Martin Luther King Jr.
We cannot be satisfied as long as a Negro in Mississippi cannot vote, and a Negro
in New York believes he has nothing for which to vote. No, no, we are not satisfied.
And we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like
a mighty stream.
Ossie Davis
Actor, Activist
We responded as if we already knew to some degree what he was going to say. So
it wasn't as if he was bringing us good news that we hadn't heard, as it was if he was
sharing with us a story, and we knew as much about it as he did.
Doctor Martin Luther King Jr.
Go back to Mississippi. Go back to Alabama. Go back to South Carolina. Go back to
Georgia. Go back to Louisiana. Go back to the slums and ghettoes of our northern
cities knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed. Let us not
wallow in the valley of despair. I say to you today, my friends ...
Peter Jennings
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Peter Jennings Reporting: I Have A Dream
(Voice Over) And then as King was getting to the end of what he had written,
sensing something in the crowd, he later said, he put the text aside.
Dorothy Cotton
Southern Christian Leadership Conference, 1960 - 1974
Dr. King looked up and saw that crowd. He felt the energy. He was moved by this
massive humanity in front of him. He looks away and forgets what has been written
and starts to come from someplace else.
Doctor Martin Luther King Jr.
So even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It
is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) When we come back, the passage that has inspired a nation.
Graphics: Peter Jennings Reporting, I Have A Dream
Commercial Break
Doctor Martin Luther King Jr.
I have a dream that one day, this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of
its creeds. We hold these truths to be self- evident that all men are created equal.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) Martin Luther King never fully explained what happened to him that
day, but the speech he had prepared was no longer enough.
Dorothy Cotton
Southern Christian Leadership Conference, 1960 - 1974
He knew that what he said was what he had to say, was what was given to him to
say. That's what was given to him to say.
Representative John Lewis
Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, 1959 - 1966
I think he said, "I'm going to preach. I'm going to tell the story."
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) King had spoken of the dream many times, but now, the world was
listening.
Doctor Martin Luther King Jr.
I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves
and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of
brotherhood. I have a dream, that one day, even the state of Mississippi, a state
sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be
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Peter Jennings Reporting: I Have A Dream
transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice. I have a dream, that my four little
children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of
their skin, but by the content of their character. I have a dream today.
Ossie Davis
Actor, Activist
We knew America was listening. We could hear America dropping every other thing,
to pay attention to what was going on. And there we were, and the whole world
looking at us, and all of us speaking together out of one man's mouth.
Doctor Martin Luther King Jr.
I have a dream that one day down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its
governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification, one
day right down in Alabama, little Black boys and Black girls will be able to join hands
with little White boys and White girls as sisters and brothers. I have a dream today.
Taylor Branch
Author, Parting The Waters
What you hear in his voice projects this kind of conflict that I think goes to the heart
of King, which is the timbre of his voice. There's this great hope in the words, and
there's this great moaning almost, because he sees how bad things are.
Doctor Martin Luther King Jr.
I have a dream, that one day, every valley shall be exalted, and every hill and
mountain shall be made low. The rough places will be made plain, and the crooked
places will be made straight. And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all
flesh shall see it together. This is our hope. This is the faith that I go back to the
south with. With this faith, we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a
stone of hope.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) Very briefly, he goes back to the text, but he is rolling now.
Doctor Martin Luther King Jr.
With this faith, we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a
beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith, we will be able to work together,
to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom
together, knowing that we will be free one day.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) Dr. King knows the crowd is with him now. This was no longer a
speech. This was a Baptist sermon.
Doctor Martin Luther King Jr.
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Peter Jennings Reporting: I Have A Dream
This will be the day when all of God's children will be able to sing with new meaning
"My country 'tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing. Land where my fathers
died, land of the pilgrim's pride, from every mountainside, let freedom ring." And if
America is to be a great nation, this must become true. So let freedom ring from the
prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire. Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains
of New York. Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania. Let
freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado. Let freedom ring from the
curvaceous slopes of California. But not only that, let freedom ring from Stone
Mountain of Georgia. Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee. Let
freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi, from every mountainside, let
freedom ring. And when this happens, when we allow freedom ring, when we let it
ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be
able to speed up that day when all of God's children, Black men and White men,
Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in
the words of the old Negro spiritual, "Free at last. Free at last. Thank God almighty,
we are free at last."
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) President Kennedy had never seen King speak before. "He's damn
good," the President said.
Reverend C.T. Vivian
Southern Christian Leadership Conference, 1963 - 1967
It was a marvelous thing to feel. And when you looked at Martin, seemingly
exhausted, but in that exhaust that comes out of joy, he was still vibrating with the,
with, with, with the great ideas. You were looking into his mind more than you were
looking at his face, you see.
Representative John Lewis
Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, 1959 - 1966
For the first time in people's living room they saw, they heard. They could almost feel
and touch what the movement was all about.
Reverend James Cone
Author, Martin and Malcolm and America
The nation was listening that day. Even people listening who said they weren't going
to listen.
Dick Gregory
Comedian, Activist
And why did White folks look at it? Not because they wanted to hear what niggers
had to say. They thought it was going to be a bloodbath. They thought there was
going to be violence. And so they listened all the way to the end. If you would've told
White folks, "We have a very eloquent Negro that's going to give a very eloquent
18
Peter Jennings Reporting: I Have A Dream
speech. We want you to listen," they would've broke the TV. And so we were so
happy when it was over that there was no violence.
Hedrick Smith
The New York Times, 1962 - 1988
For a lot of White people, particularly people who didn't live in the south and hadn't
really seen the civil rights struggle firsthand, this is their first real exposure. I think it's
a moment of discovery for lots of ordinary people all across the country. "What is this
all about? Who are these people? What do they look like?"
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) As soon as the speech was over, Dr. King and the other leaders were
taken to the White House to see the President. It was a moment that had great
meaning.
Taylor Branch
Author, Parting The Waters
He always angled to lift the movement up to the place where the center of American
politics, where you can get things done, is within sight, where the prophetic voice
can actually speak to power and have power respond. Now all of a sudden, he is
dealing in politics at a national level. This is a new thing for the civil rights
movement.
Doctor Martin Luther King Jr.
We have had some very meaningful and fruitful conferences today, culminating with
a conference with the President of our nation.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) But America would not change overnight.
Commercial Break
Doctor Martin Luther King Jr.
Go back to Mississippi. Go back to Alabama. Go back to South Carolina. Go back to
Georgia. Go back to Louisiana. Go back to the slums and ghettoes of our northern
cities, knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed.
Graphics: Go Back
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) America did not change overnight. The next day, Blacks were still
second-class citizens. Civil rights activists were still in southern jails. The President's
civil rights legislation faced almost certain defeat in the Congress, but something
was different.
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Peter Jennings Reporting: I Have A Dream
Ossie Davis
Actor, Activist
We knew that the march had changed us and had changed the, the name of the
game. We didn't know how that would work out, but we knew it. Something has
happened, which means that the past is dead. I don't know about the future, but that
part of the past, that we agonized over so much and that was so painful, is dead, no
more.
Roger Mudd
CBS News, 1961 - 1980
I think that day changed the face or helped change the face of the civil rights
movement from isolated cases of violence in the south, of forcing their way here to
the lunch counter in defiance of southern custom, into a, into a movement that was
indefatigable, was determined, and was respectable, and sent a signal to President
Kennedy and to Capitol Hill, that "You're going to have to deal with the issue. You're
going to have to deal with it."
Representative John Lewis
Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, 1959 - 1966
There was so much hope, so much optimism. And I think those of us who had been
involved, we went back to the south much more determined. But that hope and that
sense of optimism was shattered 18 days later.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) On the morning of Sunday, September the 15th, a bomb went off at the
16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham. Four little girls were killed.
Dorothy Cotton
Southern Christian Leadership Conference, 1960 - 1974
I remember, just for a fleeting moment, wondering, how much do we have to suffer?
Representative John Lewis
Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, 1959 - 1966
That day, standing across the street from the church, was sad very, very sad and
trying time. We had to pick up. We had to keep going. But it's hard and difficult to
believe someone could be so evil.
Clarence Jones
Personal Counsel to Doctor King
That was a call to reality. It was what I called the segregationist's answer to the
speech and to the assemblage of the march on Washington.
Hedrick Smith
The New York Times, 1962 - 1988
20
Peter Jennings Reporting: I Have A Dream
The church bombing in Birmingham was really an act of desperation, but it was also
an act of defeat. These people knew they'd lost, that's why they did it. Because the
power structure had shifted away from them under the pressure of a mass
movement. They finally have to resort to darkness of night, killing little kids,
intimidation, fear.
Peter Jennings
(Voice Over) The bombing was a grim omen of the brutal years still ahead. President
Kennedy was assassinated, Malcolm X, Robert Kennedy, and, of course, Dr. King
himself. But what Dr. King said on that bright August day has continued to redefine
America.
Michael Eric Dyson
Author, I May Not Get There With You
This document was as critical to race relations as the Declaration of Independence
was to the freedom of the nation.
Taylor Branch
Author, Parting The Waters
Well, the "I Have a Dream" speech is a founding father speech. And the only
problem with America is that we're still not accustomed to the idea that our modern
founding fathers are Black.
Harry Belafonte
Entertainer, Activist
Not only did it transform us of the next moment, but it began to play out the details of
that transformation through everything that came after it. It's being played out even
until today.
Clarence Jones
Personal Counsel to Doctor King
The speech has become one of the great statements of what our country is, can be,
and should be.
Peter Jennings – On Camera
"I Have a Dream," 40 years ago. Thank you for joining us. I'm Peter Jennings. Good
night from Washington.