Expanding the Legacy of King

No other American has a national holiday to memorialize their individual legacy. Precious few are immortalized in stone in our nation’s capital. How many others have annual parades in their honor? There is no danger of Martin Luther King Jr. being forgotten by history. Yet the danger of forgetting the deeper legacy of his life and teachings remains constant. Dr. King’s moral philosophy was deeper than the vast majority of his celebrators know. His pioneering conceptions of democracy give life to a civic understanding that could seed hope for the future, if only Americans knew. And King foresaw the complexities of our modern racial moment in terms that could clarify our present struggles if only we were aware of them. We must not only recapture our understanding of the legacy of Martin Luther King Jr. — we must expand it.