Why We Can't Wait

In the last chapter of the book, King reflects on the future made possible by the events of the summer of 1963.

King opens the chapter by looking back to the times of slavery when some enslaved African-Americans were forced by their owners to purchase themselves, loved ones, and others out of slavery. King argues that when people ask what it will take for the protests to end or ask how much it will take for African-Americans to be satisfied, they are engaging in the same “system that bartered dignity for dollars” (155). While the transaction during the era of slavery was financial, the current system expects African-Americans to accept “gradualism and moderation” in exchange for rights that are theirs by birthright (156).

African-Americans are demanding immediate freedom because they know it is impossible to “truly exist half-slave and half-free” (157). King points to the example of the military to show that the United States is capable of change. Prior to World War II, the U.S. allowed the segregationists to prevent it from fully utilizing African-Americans. After that point, it changed, however. King argues that the time for delay is over because segregation is “immoral,” African-Americans know their rights, and continuing with segregation impedes progress on a national scale (158).

King also argues against allowing racial progress to proceed without planning and direction because problems like accelerating African-American unemployment caused by automation and ongoing housing discrimination are so big that they can only be addressed with systematic solutions. King admits that the solutions will be hard ones. However, “four hundred years of sinning cannot be canceled out in four minutes of atonement” (160).

In the second part of the chapter, King turns to the nature of leadership in the movement for civil rights. King reflects on an interview he and Roy Wilkins did on the news program Meet the Press. The panelists’ questions were rooted in the assumption that people like King could somehow restrain African-Americans from going “‘too far’” (160). King’s frustration was that the program did not allow him to state more clearly that African-Americans wanted nothing less than “absolute and immediate freedom and equality” (160).

King points out that starting with the decision to strike mention of slavery from the Declaration of Independence, the United States has a long, shameful history of delay that has “compromised not only the liberty of the Negro but the integrity of America” (161). The need for change is therefore urgent, and no one black leader can convince allAfrican-Americans otherwise.

White observers fail to understand this because they believe the myth of outside agitators as the cause of the Civil Rights Movement. The real cause of the movement for civil rights is that segregationists have deprived African-Americans of their rights. Under these conditions, King writes, “It was the people who moved their leaders, not the leaders who moved the people” (162).

The argument that “a band of militants has seized the offensive and that the ‘sound and sensible’ leaders are being drawn into action unwillingly” in order to maintain control “exaggerates the importance of the differences” (163). Leaders differ in tactics but not the overall goal, which is freedom. In fact, the freedom movement is quite unified, especially when one compares it to the substantial differences between the leaders of the American Revolution. Because the goal is freedom, it is impossible to go back to the status quo, a position King supports by quoting Patrick Henry, another leader of the American Revolution. 

In the third part of the chapter, King discusses the need for “some compensatory consideration for the handicaps [the African-American] has inherited from the past” in order to “balance the equation and equip him to compete on a just and equal basis” after hundreds of years of intentional deprivation (165). King acknowledges that even allies “recoil in horror” when reparations are mentioned (165). Although granting freedom but denying racial preferences seems reasonable, King asks the reader to imagine the unfairness of asking a man to compete in a race when the other contestant has a three-hundred-year start.

It is possible to engage in such a program, a point King makes with the example of India, where changes in moral climate and laws are being used to improve the situation of the untouchables, a caste of people who have been oppressed. In a response to a question during an interview, Prime Minister Nehru of India remarked that such programs may be discriminatory, but they are India’s “‘way of atoning for the centuries of injustices we have inflicted upon these people’” (166).

King argues that America needs to do the same “in a moral and practical way” (166). Just granting liberties without addressing the lasting impact of segregation is not a satisfactory approach: “The struggle for rights is, at bottom, a struggle for opportunities” (168). The United States has several important precedents for giving a boost to the disadvantaged. King highlights the Urban League’s examples of programs like the post-World War II Marshall Plan that helped Europe recover from the war, and the GI Bill of Rights,which gave veterans benefits and preferences to compensate them for the negative aftereffects of fighting in the war (169).

While the damage done to African-Americans is so vast that not “all the wealth of this affluent society could meet the bill,” King cites the “ancient common law” of compensation for wrongs as one way to make segregation’s victims whole (169). King calls his proposal a “Bill of Rights for the Disadvantaged” (170). The benefits of a national program would be both material and psychological, according to King, and many of the ills in the African-American community “would stagger the imagination” (170).

King furthermore argues that poor whites are “derivative victims” of slavery because it devalued their labor and limited their opportunities (171). Their victimization is so profound that they “have supported their own oppressors” because of prejudice (171). Poor whites should also be included in the Bill of Rights for the Disadvantaged in order to address these wrongs.

Other problems also need attention, according to King. African-Americans and poor whites should not have to compete against each other for a supply of jobs that have dwindled because of automation. “A social-work apparatus” is also needed to deal with the lack of literacy and emotional needs of people who have been left behind (172). The federal government needs to take the lead in confronting the “massive resistance” that is sure to arise if civil rights legislation or the Bill of Rights for the Disadvantaged are made into law (173). The Wagner Act, which established “the rights of labor to organize” is a good example of how the federal government could support these efforts, according to King (174).

In the fourth part of the chapter, King discusses the need for the Civil Rights Movement to mature politically now that it has established its power. Other oppressed groups are potential allies who could become a part of an effective coalition of interests.

King recalls that the National Council of the AFL-CIO, a big labor union, chose not to participate in the March on Washington, a sure sign of a lack of “statesmanship, vigor, and modernity” that must be overcome if labor is to survive as a political force (176). African-Americans supported labor unions during the 1930s and 1940s, so they “have a right to expect more from their old allies” (176). Labor unions should make common cause with African-Americans, states King, because their interests still align.

The federal government should also align with civil rights activists. There is something wrong, argues King, with already-disadvantaged African-Americans being forced to raise the funds to get state and local governments to comply with federal laws. This is the government’s job. It should “[assume] all responsibility for all legal proceedings” (177). The attitude of the president is also a key element of this support from the federal government. King highlights the three presidents with whom he has dealt—Dwight Eisenhower, John Kennedy, and Lyndon Johnson—to show what the impact their respective approaches to publicly addressing the problem of inequality have had on civil rights.

The previous presidents varied in their commitment to civil rights. Eisenhower personally supported civil rights but was unwilling to oppose his peers and advisors to change the status quo, while Kennedy’s views evolved as he discovered that he could shape the conversation. King laments that this more radical Kennedy was assassinated. The silver lining of his death is that it proved that “hate is a contagion” that poses dangers to everyone (179). If people maintain the remorse and rejection of extremism they felt in the days following his death, Kennedy’s most enduring monuments will be these shifts in attitude instead of the places that now bear his name.

King describes Johnson’s politics as one that has “the twin goal of a battle against discrimination within the war against poverty” because Johnson understands the connections between the two (182). Although King disagrees at times with Johnson’s timeline and tactics, he believes Johnsonis approaching these problems in “sincerity, with realism, and thus far, with wisdom” (182). King promises Johnson both support and opposition, as the occasion calls for it, in the future.

In the fifth part of the chapter, King continues his discussion of the implications of the political maturity of the Civil Rights Movement. King recalls that, despite his personal obligation to the Kennedys, he was hesitant to endorse John Kennedy before the 1960 election. He would, however, endorse Kennedy at this historical moment because “a new stage in civil rights has been reached, which calls for a new policy” (184). The movement is operating from a position of strength and is therefore capable of walking away from alliances or politicians who fail to deliver promised support or results.

Up until this historical moment, African-Americans have “operated outside of the political structures, functioning essentially as a pressure group with limited effect” (184). The resulting politics—“skeptical, issue-oriented, and independent-minded” (184)—have protected African-Americans as a political group from corruption and black “political bosses” (184). The downside to being outside of the political system is a lack of influence and “political inactivity” (185).

King argues that it is now time for a change: “It is time for Negroes to abandon abstract political neutrality and become less timid about voting alliances” (185). African-Americans should make their influence felt by letting politicians who “spurn” them know that they “will lose” and their opponents “will gain” African-American support (185).

King surveys the voting and population trends to further his argument that African-Americans are becoming a political force to be reckoned with. There are high populations of potential African-American voters in politically-important cities in the North and the South. These cities are key areas in states that are important in presidential contests. Kennedy’s margin of victory in South Carolina in 1960 reflects the concrete reality of the importance of the African-American vote, according to King.

Furthermore, “the subjective elements of political power—persistence, aggressiveness and discipline” are already apparent among African-Americans (186). Mobilizing this group politically has the potential to have a substantial impact. De facto alliances between this group and moderate whites explains for King why a new class of centrist politicians who are neither integrationist nor segregationist have been able to get elected.

King believes that organizing African-Americans into an actual political bloc could end segregationists’ domination of important committees needed to advance civil rights and social program legislation. Voting as a political bloc need not devolve into “racial exclusiveness” as long as aims are moral, good ones (188); further,African-Americans’ voting patterns in the election of Kennedy and Roosevelt demonstrate that they are already a bloc. “Consciously and creatively developed,” this bloc could gain more political power and freedom (188). African-Americans with talent and energy can and must take on leadership roles in politics. They must become more active because it is their responsibility as citizens.

In the last portion of the chapter, King describes the benefits that could come from this greater participation in politics: “The Negro in winning rights for himself produces substantial benefits for the nation” (189) such as an “enlarg[ing] [of] the concept of brotherhood to a vision of total interrelatedness” (190). The successful use of nonviolence in the struggle for equality demonstrates that it can also be used to secure world peace, especially in a time when nuclear weapons have the potential to “annihilate all humanity” (190). The existence of this threat means that “nonviolence, the answer to the Negroes’ need, may become the answer to the most desperate need of all humanity” (191).