Friend,

As we honor the life and legacy of my late friend Dr. Martin Luther King, I wanted to offer you my thoughts on where our struggle for equal rights stands today.

When I first became involved in the Civil Rights Movement some sixty years ago, we sought to transform the civic and economic systems of this country. There is an urgent need to renew that effort today. We recognize that systems of oppression continue to fall along racial and economic divides, and changing those divides require building solidarity across many disparate groups.

We have the potential to build such a coalition in this crucial election year. 

Dr. King worked to build a multiracial, multiethnic, socioeconomically diverse movement, bridging the rural and urban divide – a movement that welcomes all people on the basis of love and respect. We must continue this important work.

In 1968, when Dr. King was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee, I was there. We were supporting sanitation workers striking for fair wages and improved working conditions. Martin understood the need for solidarity in the face of racial, civic and economic injustice.

Today, we live in a country where people working a full-time job may still live in poverty due to the absence of livable wage legislation, the assault on unions and collective bargaining, and economic policies that shrink the middle-class.

We also live in a country where over 300,000 Georgians can be purged from the voter rolls simply for not voting – as if this inalienable right has an expiration date – and where citizens having paid their debt to society face a poll tax in Florida just for access to the ballot box.

We can and must do better!

Our struggle for equity in housing, education, employment, prosperity and civic life continues. We must find strong, thoughtful, respectful leaders willing to do the hard work of bringing us closer to justice. I believe that Teresa Tomlinson is such a leader. Her U.S. Senate campaign celebrates justice for all, and specifically includes addressing a new Civic and Economic Infrastructure.

Dr. King’s legacy was handed to each of us. Our work is not done. Indeed, the work to create a more perfect union never ceases, and it will take all of us to win the morally just society we deserve. Stay focused. Remain committed. Together, the power we hold can move mountains.

Gratefully,
Andrew Young