After this victory King forms the Southern Christian Leadership Conference to fight segregation and achieve civil rights. On May 17, Dr. King speaks to a crowd of 15,000 in Washington, D.C. this shows us how strongly DR. King feels about these issues and is willing to risk a lot to out his argument across. This will is tested one year later when, whilst on a speaking tour, MLK is stabbed by an assailant in Harlem whilst speaking about problems that black Americans face. But MKL continues to preach and speak publicly even after his potentially fatal attack.
In 1959 MLK returns to Dexter Avenue Baptist Church to concentrate on civil rights full time. One year on, in 1960, MLK goes to extreme lengths to be heard when he is arrested at a sit-in in a restaurant whilst waiting to be served and is sentenced to four months in jail. In November 1961, the Interstate Commerce Commission banned segregation in interstate travel due to work of MLK and the Freedom Riders.
Congress on Racial Equality (CORE) began the first Freedom Ride through the South, in a Greyhound bus, after the U.S. Supreme Court outlawed segregation in interstate transport.
This proves that MLK was a Christian because he stood up for what he believed in and protested (non-violently) for what he believed was right. But it was in the years to come that MLK was truly tested by his faith.
In 1962 he was arrested when a movement proves unsuccessful. But still he continues to speak out and on 23 June 1963 MLK leads 125,000 people on the freedom walk in Detroit. And again in March, he leads a record 250,000 people on the famous demonstration in Washington to prove to the world that MLK was serious about equal rights for blacks.
By now, MLK is a national hero but continues to lead a life of struggle for freedom and equal rights until his death in 1968 when one of his protests turns violent for the first time ever and King is brutally shot whilst standing on a balcony.
I feel that MLK was a good Christian because he stood out for what he believed in throughout his life and although didn’t keep to bible as a guide, his intentions were always good and he did his best to ensure the future for blacks across the world. If martin Luther King had never spoken out about such issues then segregation and racism could still be as bad now as it was in the early nineties.
