“We know through painful experience that freedom is never vo…
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“We knоw thrоugh pаinful experience thаt freedоm is never voluntаrily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed. Frankly, I have yet to engage in a direct-action campaign that was ‘well timed’ in the view of those who have not suffered unduly from the disease of segregation. . . . We must come to see, with one of our distinguished jurists, that ‘justice too long delayed is justice denied.’ We have waited for more than 340 years for our constitutional and God-given rights. The nations of Asia and Africa are moving with jetlike speed toward gaining political independence, but we still creep at horse-and-buggy pace toward gaining a cup of coffee at a lunch counter.” -- Martin L. King Jr. African American leader, "Letter from Birmingham Jail", 1963 “The White man knows that the Black revolution is worldwide. . . . So I cite these various revolutions, brothers and sisters, to show you that you don’t have a peaceful revolution. You don’t have aturn-the-other-cheek revolution. There’s no such thing as a nonviolent revolution. The only kind of revolution that’s nonviolent is the Negro revolution. The only revolution in which the goal is loving your enemy is the Negro revolution. It’s the only revolution in which the goal is a desegregated lunch counter, a desegregated theater, a desegregated park, and a desegregated public toilet.... That’s no revolution. Revolution is based on land.... Land is the basis of freedom, justice, and equality. . . . A revolutionary wants land so he can set up his own nation, an independent nation.” -- Malcolm X, African American leader, “Message to the Grass Roots,” 1963 In noting that he had “yet to engage in a direct-action campaign that was ‘well timed,’” Martin Luther King, Jr., was most likely arguing against