The Time I Saw Martin Luther King

I don't know what it is about old white men (I am one), but I'll bet they look at the picture of Andy, Barney, Opie, and Aunt Bea and recall that time as the "good old days". Well, I guess, I agree to part of that. I still watch the reruns - they are on TV everyday.  The Andy Griffith Show began in 1960 and reflected life in Mayberry, North Carolina, a fictional town with very nice white folks.

I was thirteen years old in 1960 and remember watching Andy and loving it. I never thought too much about there never (in the beginning) seeing any black characters. I guess they didn't have any black characters (or black actors) in the 1960s. Oh wait, they did have black actors. My mistake. 

I grew up in the western suburbs of Denver in the 1950s. I remember watching another Andy. He was the chubby black man with the cigar in the Amos 'N' Andy TV program. The show took place in Harlem and had the funniest characters and lines. I howled with delight when I watched these guys. I never thought of the show as black stereo-typing. There were no other black characters on TV back in the 1950s that I remember. I would see a black performer on the Ed Sullivan Show or maybe in a movie, but they were few.

There were no black people in my suburb or in my grade school, junior high, or high school.  Blacks were not allowed to live in Jefferson County, Colorado back then. It was the law. Subdivisions had restrictive covenants that disallowed non-whites to live in specific areas. There weren't any Mexicans either - well, one. A boy names Lupe was in my high school. Years later when I was a young gay adult lawyer in Denver, my Realtor told me and my partner that we could not buy a house in the Hilltop area because of restrictive covenants which disallowed non-married single people to buy houses together. This was in the early 1980s. I did not test it. It made me mad as hell. I had always been privileged. Now I was a victim of bias.

During the late fifties I watched the evening news on TV.  Douglas Edwards at CBS was my main source for news. Walter Cronkite replaced Edwards in 1962. The news wasn't any better then than it is now. In fact the news back then really rattled my forming brain as I was disturbed when I saw grainy black and white film of racial violence. Later videotape replaced the film. The violence was delivered to TV more quickly, but it was the same. It was always white government or white protesters assaulting black people or black people marching with signs. Or little black girls getting murdered in Sunday School. That kind of violence.

Two years later in Selma, Alabama this happened. I was in high school and could not imagine cops in Denver beating anybody up with  a baton for marching for Civil Rights. The march was peaceful. It was the government out of control.  America saw this on the nightly news.

Martin Luther King, Jr. became the leading Civil Rights figure of the twentieth century. He gave a voice and a presence that no other person has achieved - before or since. I got a chance to see him in person in Chicago in 1967 at the National Conference on New Politics. I wrote an entire blog about that event CLICK HERE.

On Monday night Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was the speaker at a large old auditorium far away from the Palmer House Hotel where the conference was held. We had heard rumors all day long about some serious threats having been made against Dr. King.  It was feared Stokely Carmichael would disrupt the speech.  Carmichael was the leader of SNCC (Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee) and was also a part of the NCNP, but he was not supposed to be a part of King's speech.  My buddy and I arrived very early so we could sit up close to the stage. I think we were in the first or second row. I will never forget that night.  The Internet is a repository of all kinds of information.  I found that speech which you can listen to if you CLICK HERE.

The speech lasted about forty minutes. Dr. King referred to his "I Have a Dream" speech.  He spoke of racism, militarism, poverty, the unending War in Viet Nam. The speech I heard was not memorable in itself except that I got to see and hear him and watch up close at the look in his eyes when all hell broke loose at the back of the auditorium. He had been looking around the room as if he was expecting trouble.  About thirty minutes or so into the speech there was a clamor at the rear of the auditorium. I said the hall was old. It had panic doors with glass windows with wire to protect against breakage. The doors had those metal push bars to permit quit exit.  The doors were thrust open and people at the rear made a lot of noise. I looked back but could not see what was going on. I could tell some people tried to force their way inside. But they were forced back and not allowed to enter. That was the end of it.  Dr. King continued with his speech unphased except that he looked grateful that nothing more serious happened.  Of course, we all now what happened a year later.

And after King's death, President Lyndon Johnson got the Congress to enact the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act along with other legislation that established a lot of entitlement programs designed to help the all persons. In 2013 the Supreme Court struck down the coverage formula in the Civil Rights Act as unconstitutional, reasoning that it was no longer responsive to current conditions which made much of the act unenforceable.

During the following fifty years (yes fifty plus years) various politicians and groups have been doing their best to undo what King inspired and what Johnson achieved. 

Every Vote Matters

The photo below shows me, far left (lol), waiting to shake hands with Vice President Humbert H. Humphrey in his hotel room at the Hilton Hotel in Denver in 1968. That was nearly fifty years ago. The photo was taken a few weeks before the Democratic National Convention which I attended as a member of the Colorado delegation.  I left the convention the day after Humphrey won the nomination - I refused to stay to watch him accept the nomination. I felt the whole thing was rigged.

1968 was a pivotal year in American history. These are a few of the events that happened that year:

In early spring Senator Eugene McCarthy of Minnesota challenged Lyndon Johnson for the Democratic Nomination as President.

On March 31 President Lyndon Johnson announced the would not seek nor would he accept the nomination of his party for another term as President.

Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated in Memphis on April 4th. Within a few days riots broke out across America. Cities burned. A month later Senator Ted Kennedy spoke at the Colorado Jefferson Jackson Dinner held at the Hilton Hotel. I was there that Saturday night. He had every man and woman in tears as he described the positive changes that had occurred as a result of Martin Luther King's life and leadership and loss we faced with his death.

Senator Robert F Kennedy was assassinated on June 6th within minutes after winning the California Democratic Primary Election.

Governor George Wallace of Alabama mounted a hugely successful candidacy to challenge both Vice President Hubert H Humphrey and Governor Richard M Nixon.

The Viet Nam War divided America more than any event I can remember in my years on earth. Half of America wanted to leave Viet Nam and the other half wanted to destroy it as if that would destroy Communism and restore our old world order.  Families were split. Generations were at war with each other with the older generation supporting the war effort and the younger generation demanding that we exit Asia. Many of the men in the service were branded as "baby killers". Young men that refused to join the war effort were called "draft dodgers" except guys like Bill Clinton and Donald Trump who got suspicious deferments. I got one of those deferments. I ended up feeling guilty as hell. 

The angst of the youth was not limited to the United States. In an era before Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and even the internet, young people across the world protested the war and social injustice. I watched the CBS Evening News every night and watched Walter Cronkite recounting the demise of the world. Each day I wondered what next would happen.

I was holdup in my dorm room in Fort Collins, Colorado thinking the world was about to end. Election Day came. I voted my conscious and not my party. I got my ballot and wrote-in the name of Eugene McCarthy for President and Abraham Ribicoff as Vice President. I wasted my vote. For that I am ashamed. I was smarter than that. But I voted with emotion rather than reason. Richard Nixon won the election, not because he was the most favored, but because he had the most electoral votes. Nixon had 301 electoral votes, Humphrey had 191, and George Wallace had 46.  My vote didn't change the election, but I know a lot of Democrats sat out the election or chose not to vote for Humphrey. We got Richard Nixon and all the chaos and rancor that followed. I realize now that our collective lives would have been different and I believe they would have been better.  I don't think the divisions that the Nixon era generated would have happened. He was a divisive figure.  I think his impeachment created the nexus to get a Democrat in revenge - not because it was merited but because Republicans sought equity. I may or may not be correct about that. It is what I think. I could be very wrong.  But I do know our reality would be entirely different had Humphrey won.

Forty-eight years later our country is facing a new election and has choices not everyone is excited about. I am excited about my candidate and have given money to the campaign. I will enthusiastically cast my ballot this year. I urge votes to vote. I know for certain that there will be a new reality no matter which person wins this election.

If you think one votes does not matter, you are wrong! Every vote matters!