Analysis Of Martin Luther King's Speech

Submitted By juliatricki
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Julia Trickey
COM-231-IT1-S-13
The Change of America

Certainly, Martin Luther King's most famous public address contains many memorable passages that spoke significant truths about the U.S. at the advent of the Civil Rights Movement, but more importantly, the speech delivers three ideas that still have relevance today. Prior to the Civil Rights Movement's successes, three conditions exists which King found to be wrongful and intolerable, and he identifies those societal factors in his famous speech.
One unfair component of American life for African Americans was that after the Emancipation Proclamation, they still were not actually free. Segregation and discrimination were still prevalent. King stated that Negros lived in poverty and exile in his own land. For one hundred years African Americans were theoretically allowed to be treated equally as their white neighbors, but this was not the case. This shows a definite need for transformation. Another crime against the African American people was the element that they were not receiving the same rewards as Caucasians. When the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution were drafted and signed, it was to give every American the same promise of fairness. King states that these documents were a promise of unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Our forefathers never mentioned that the color of skin would define a man’s worth. In this situation Americans needed to be reminded of what our country was founded on.
Lastly, the brutality against a man, woman, or child because of the color of their skin was insufferable and grossly inhumane. The police and cults for