When the Good King Became the Bad King
Image: Hovering US Army helicopters pour machine-gun fire into the tree line to cover the advance of South Vietnamese ground troops as they attack a Vietcong camp 18 miles north of Tay Ninh, near the Cambodian border, in March 1965. AP.
Some 56 years ago, on April 4, 1967, the Rev Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. delivered a speech at Riverside Church, where he strongly condemned the Vietnam War. Driven by his conscience, Dr. King articulated the devastating impact of the war on both impoverished Americans and Vietnamese peasants, asserting that it was a moral imperative for the United States to take radical, nonviolent steps to end the conflict.
It was a speech that surprised even many of his supporters.
Image: Martin Luther King Jr speaks in Alabama. During the spring of 1966, he campaigned across rural Alabama to encourage African Americans to vote. Getty.
While Martin Luther King Jr. had previously expressed criticism regarding the Vietnam War, it was his impassioned "Beyond Vietnam" speech, delivered at an event sponsored by "Clergy and Laymen Concerned about Vietnam," that garnered widespread attention. King, known for his eloquence and typically delivering speeches without reading from a text, chose to read out "Beyond Vietnam" because he intended to submit it to publications and wanted to ensure his words were accurately conveyed without misquotation.
King’s public opposition to the Vietnam War began to emerge in March 1965 when he stated, “millions of dollars can be spent every day to hold troops in South Viet Nam, and our country cannot protect the rights of Negroes in Selma.” King, speaking on “Face the Nation,” emphasized his prophetic role as a minister and his deep concern for global peace and mankind’s survival, further solidifying his commitment to the anti-war cause.
In a variation of his “Transformed Nonconformist” sermon delivered in January 1966 at Ebenezer Baptist Church, King openly expressed his opposition to the Vietnam War, condemning American aggression as a violation of the 1954 Geneva Accord, which promised self-determination.
In early 1967, King intensified his anti-war stance, delivering similar speeches in Los Angeles and Chicago. His Los Angeles speech, titled “The Casualties of the War in Vietnam,” highlighted the war’s history and advocated for redirecting American power towards peace and humanity, rather than unleashing it inhumanely on defenseless people.
Image: Under sniper fire, a Vietnamese woman carries a child to safety as US marines storm the village of My Son, near Da Nang, searching for Vietcong insurgents, 25 April 1965.
Photograph: Eddie Adams/AP
Through his renowned oratory skills, King aimed to expose the inconsistency of U.S. foreign policies when juxtaposed with the persisting domestic inequality in America. This address, often referred to as "The Riverside Church Speech," faced criticism from various quarters, including prominent media outlets like The New York Times and the Washington Post, as well as organizations like the NAACP, which objected to the Civil Rights Movement's involvement in anti-war protests.
On April 4, accompanied by Amherst College Professor Henry Commager, Union Theological Seminary President John Bennett, and Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, King addressed over 3,000 attendees at New York’s Riverside Church during an event sponsored by Clergy and Laymen Concerned about Vietnam.
The speech titled "Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence" was a collaborative effort primarily authored by a close confidant and companion of King. Named Vincent Harding, he hailed from Harlem, New York City, and completed his undergraduate studies at City College of New York. Additionally, he obtained a Master's degree in Journalism from Columbia University, served in the U.S. Army from 1953 to 1955, and earned a PhD in History from the University of Chicago in 1965.
Throughout the years, Vincent Harding contributed to the drafting of numerous speeches for King, ultimately assuming the role of the inaugural director of the Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial Center. When asked about the choice of the title "Beyond Vietnam" during a period when the country was deeply entrenched in the war, Harding explained in an interview with Tavis Smiley, "This goes beyond merely withdrawing from Vietnam. It pertains to breaking free from a particular mindset, a way of perceiving ourselves and the world."
In "Beyond Vietnam - A Time to Break Silence," King employed a masterful use of imagery, diction, and parallel structure to draw poignant associations between the Vietnam War and injustice.
Throughout his address, King skillfully wove vivid imagery to illustrate the harrowing realities of the war, evoking a sense of outrage at its injustices. For instance, he painted a stark picture of, "Negro and white boys on TV screens, killing and dying together for a nation that had segregated them in schools."
King emphasized his responsibility to the American people and explained how conversations with young black men in impoverished areas reinforced his commitment to nonviolence.
This poignant imagery not only underscored the horrors of war but also connected the struggles of racial segregation to the Vietnam conflict, resonating deeply with his audience at Riverside Church, who could empathize with injustices committed by the American government.
Image: Medic Thomas Cole looks up with his one unbandaged eye as he treats wounded Staff Sergeant Harrison Pell during a firefight on 30 January 1966. Life: Henri Huet/AP
Similarly, King's portrayal of men, regardless of race, "in brutal solidarity burning the huts of a poor village," served to emphasize the war's catastrophic and inhumane nature.
When he asserted that all this brutality was carried out in the name of America, he stirred the audience's anger, compelling them to break their silence regarding the unjust involvement of the United States in Vietnam.
throughout this speech, King carefully selected words with negative connotations to firmly associate the Vietnam War with injustice. By labeling the United States as the "greatest purveyor of violence" and accusing it of favoring "massive doses of violence to solve its problems," he effectively cast the U.S. government as the principal wrongdoer. This deliberate choice of diction allowed King to logically argue that addressing the oppressor, the U.S. government, was essential if he were to continue advocating for the oppressed.
King's characterization of the war as "broken and eviscerated" set a tone of disappointment, condemning the war as morally bankrupt. When he insisted that the war's immorality should be "incandescently clear," he implied that those who remained silent were complicit in the erosion of America's integrity and values.
Moreover, King employed the powerful technique of parallelism within his discourse to elicit emotional responses from his audience. His repeated use of the phrase, "for the sake of," created a rhythmic cadence that enhanced receptivity to his message. For example, when he declared, "For the sake of those boys, for the sake of this government, for the sake of the hundreds of thousands trembling under our violence, I could not be silent," he employed parallelism to escalate his call to action, urging his audience to voice their opinions and actively oppose the unjust war in Vietnam.
Image. A US paratrooper, wounded in the battle for Hamburger Hill, grimaces in pain as he awaits medical evacuation at base camp near the Laotian border on 19 May 1969. Hugh Van Es/AP
King also provided a historical perspective, condemning Western arrogance for Vietnam’s devastation, asserting that the U.S. sided with the wealthy while creating misery for the poor. He outlined a five-point plan to end the war, including a call for a unilateral ceasefire. To King, the Vietnam War was a glaring symptom of American colonialism worldwide.
King contended that America hindered peaceful revolution by refusing to relinquish the benefits from overseas investments and advocated for a radical shift in values towards love and justice, rather than economic nationalism.
The initial response to King’s speech at Riverside Church in April 1967 was met with a considerable degree of skepticism and criticism. For instance, the Washington Post published an editorial on April 6, 1967, titled “A Tragedy,” in which they characterized King’s speech as “sheer inventions of unsupported fantasy” and lamented how “many who have listened to him with respect will never again accord him the same confidence.”
According to the PBS documentary "MLK: A Call to Conscience" (2010), the speech faced condemnation from 168 newspapers across the nation. Senator Barry Goldwater of Arizona, the Republican Party's presidential nominee in 1964, went so far as to suggest that the speech "might be on the brink of treason."
Similarly, the New York Times also published editorials critical of King’s position on the war. These editorials
characterized King’s words as both “facile” and “slander.” It said the moral issues in Vietnam “are less clear-cut than he suggests” and warned that “to divert the energies of the civil rights movement to the Vietnam issue is both wasteful and self-defeating,” given how the movement needed to confront what the paper called “the intractability of slum mores and habits.”
Whitney Young Jr., the executive director of the National Urban League, questioned King’s decision to speak out against the Vietnam War, fearing that it would divert attention and resources away from the pressing issues of racial inequality and poverty in the United States. Young believed that King should concentrate on these domestic concerns rather than becoming embroiled in foreign policy matters.
Dr. Ralph A. Bunche, a former United Nations Under Secretary for Political Affairs, director of the N.A.A.C.P. Dr. Bunche, and winner of the 1950 Nobel Peace Prize, expressed reservations about King’s decision to link civil rights and the Vietnam War, believing that these were distinct issues that should not be conflated.
Image:
Said. Bunche:
"He is, after all, an active clergyman and naturally sensitive to moral issues and values. But he should realize that his anti-U.S. in Vietnam crusade is bound to alienate many friends and supporters of the civil rights movement and greatly weaken it - an ironic twist for a civil rights leader."
Image: Ralph Johnson Bunche (1904-1971), Photo by David Lees/Corbis/VCG via Getty Images
Civil rights activist and U.S. Representative John Lewis from Georgia, who was among the 3,800 individuals in attendance when Dr. King delivered the speech, expressed his perspective to the New Yorker Magazine in 2017. He characterized the speech as "a message that resonated with all of humanity, for the global community. I had the privilege of hearing him speak numerous times, and I still believe this was perhaps his finest moment."
In general, the majority of criticism underscored a significant rift within the civil rights movement. Some leaders and activists voiced apprehensions that Dr. King was veering away from the central focus of domestic civil rights issues. They saw his views as overly simplistic and believed they were detrimental to his cause, the nation, and its people. The editorial contended that Dr. King's position on the Vietnam War had eroded his effectiveness as a civil rights leader.
Despite this criticism, King remained steadfast in his position. He continued to emphasize that peace and justice were interconnected and that addressing the Vietnam War was essential to achieving his broader goals of social and economic justice. King’s resilience in the face of criticism showcased his unwavering commitment to his principles and his belief in the interdependence of various social justice issues. His actions during this period demonstrated his courage in confronting deeply ingrained opinions and advocating for what he believed to be morally right.
Image: The May 26, 1967, cover of TIME.
While many remember Martin Luther King Jr. for his iconic 1963 “I Have a Dream” speech, his 1967 “Beyond Vietnam” speech holds profound insights and a more disturbing message. King’s willingness to confront the Vietnam War, a deeply divisive issue, demonstrated his commitment to justice and his belief that racial and economic inequality were interconnected with global issues.
So, summarily, we can say that, by 1967, with the destructiveness of the Vietnam war nearing its zenith, King felt compelled to speak. He was an internationally known peace advocate who had brought about concrete legislation that dismantled de jure segregation and made inroads into legal voting protections. Furthermore, as a member of the clergy, King felt a moral obligation to speak out against what he saw as the suffering and despair of innocent Vietnamese civilians, as well as and the hypocrisy and Corruption and corruption of American society.
And he did this for as noted, he gained a lot of enemies when, as the Vietnam War escalated, King boldly declared the U.S. as “the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today.” He rejected the advice of some civil rights allies who prioritized domestic concerns and argued that war, militarism, and capitalism were intertwined. King viewed the war as a corrosive force, corrupting not only the nation but also its soldiers. He recognized that the immorality of an unjust war tainted the entire country, stating that if America’s soul became poisoned, Vietnam would be part of the autopsy.
Although he would never live to see its end, King masterfully built a compelling argument against the United States' involvement in Vietnam by skillfully employing parallelism, carefully chosen diction, and vivid imagery. These rhetorical elements not only evoked anger but also enhanced his credibility as he critiqued the war's injustices. Ultimately, King's persuasive use of these stylistic devices effectively established America's participation in the Vietnam War as fundamentally unjust. The United States finally withdrew from Vietnam in 1975, its stated objectives unrealized.
In many ways, King’s prophetic speech against the war in Vietnam resonates with today’s ongoing “forever wars,” fought across multiple fronts with strategies derived from the lessons of Vietnam. His call for a radical revolution of values, from a materialistic society to a person-oriented one, remains relevant in our contemporary world. King’s vision of expanding moral solidarity, even with perceived enemies, is a powerful reminder of the need to empathize with those different from ourselves and seek common ground for positive change.
Resources
https://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/mlkatimetobreaksilence.htm
https://kinginstitute.stanford.edu/encyclopedia/beyond-vietnam#:~:text=Declaring%20“my%20conscience%20leaves%20me,Beyond%20Vietnam%2C”%20139).
https://www.thirteen.org/blog-post/martin-luther-kings-most-controversial-speech-beyond-vietnam/
https://time.com/5505453/martin-luther-king-beyond-vietnam/
“Dr. King’s Error,” New York Times, 7 April 1967.
“A Tragedy,” Washington Post, 6 April 1967.
Books
Ansbro, John J. Martin Luther King, Jr.: Nonviolent Strategies and Tactics for Social Change. Madison Books.
Baldwin, Lewis. Never to Leave Us Alone: The Prayer Life of Martin Luther King Jr. 2010. Fortress Press.
Baldwin, Lewis. There is a Balm in Gilead. 1991. Fortress Press.
Baldwin, Lewis. To Make the Wounded Whole. 1992. Fortress Press.
Bennett, Lerone, Jr. What Manner of Man. Chicago: Johnson Publishing Co., Book Division, 1964.
Branch, Taylor. At Canaan's Edge: America in the King Years, 1965-1968. Simon & Schuster, 2006.
Harding, Vincent. Martin Luther King: The Inconvenient Hero. Orbis Books.
Jackson, Thomas F. From Civil Rights to Human Rights: Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Struggle for Economic Justice (Politics and Culture in Modern America). University of Pennsylvania Press.
Moses, Greg. Revolution of Conscience: Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Philosophy of Nonviolence. The Guilford Press.