Martin Luther King Jr. 1997
P age CK)
Luther King
J ani u n 15, i W ’ Tw P orti \ n d O bserver
by Coretta Scott King
Continued from page C9
I received the news about Martin’s release around noon the next day, and I was very, happy. SC LC chartered a plant
to bring Martin home we all went to the airport to meet him, and so little Marty did get to see his father come home from
0 « that occasion, Rev.
William Borders said, "thank you, Montgomery! Thank you,
Martin Luther King. ” But all the restaurants and lunch counters in Atlanta were still
completely segregated. There was hardly a place outside our own neighborhoods where a
Negro could even get a soda except by going to the side door o f a drugstore and having it
hunded out.
It is difficult to describe how inescapably segregation pursued you, even though you instinctively tried to avoid
putting your self into flying into Atlanta, well after he had achieved national recognition. He struck up a
conversation with the white man sitting beside him on the plane, and they enjoyed their conversation together
so much that his fellow passenger invited Martin to have lunch with him at the airport when they landed in Atlanta.
Martin gladly accepted, and the two men went into the restaurant together. They asked for a table for two, and
the hostess looked at Martin and said, “I’ll have to seat you at a separate table.”
Sh e directed Martin to an area behind a curtain and said, "Everything is the same: the
J MartinrelatedhiscxpcnencesandemotionalreactionstoconfinemenlatReidsville.Followingt
" a "“ ’ 'odetack ,0 town togethet-Marttn. Yokt. Marty. Mamma and Daddy Kmg.Chttrtme. andher
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occasions a mass nKe.tng was held that nigh, a, F.benease, Chntc-h. People from al, over town came. Mart,n old about
Ins experiences in jail, bul said nolhing political. He resolved to continue tn the struggle more determined than ever.
However. M d y King, who had been planmng Io vote for Nixon, had no such Inhibitions. He roared out ,0 the crowd.
"If 1 had a suitcase full of votes, I’d take them all and place at Senator Kennedy s feet.
4 few days later, John Kennedy was elected President o f the United States by only about a
hundred thousand votes. It is my belief that historians are right when they say that his
intervention in M artin’s case won the presidency fo r him. I hat seemed significant to me
because o f what happened later in the civil-rights struggle and the relationship o f the Kenne j . v
M i/j«
t a ll
tr v in e to accomplish.
food, the table, and the chairs are the same. ”
My husband answered her kindly but firmly, "Oh, no. It is not the same. When you
segregate me, you deprive me o f fellowship with my brother here, when I want to continue
to talk to him. ”
He pointed to the decorated walls and said, "When / am behind this curtain, you deprive
me o f the artistic pleasure o f those paintings. It is not at all the same. ” «
O f course, Martin was not willing to be seated behind a curtain, and he left.
It was against ju st such discrimination that the students began to organize protest
demonstrations. Their main target in Atlanta was R ich’s Department Store, one o f the
largest in the South. They invited Martin to sit-in at the lunch counter with them, and o f
course he accepted with alacrity.
There were about seventy-five students in the group on that particular day and they were all arrested, Martin
with them. Among them was Lonnie King, leader of the Atlanta Student Movement; the Reverend Otis Moss, the
Reverend John Porter, Ruby Doris Smith, the Reverend A.D. King, and Marian Wright.
The students in Atlanta were extremely well organized and during demonstrations
moved with military precision. The Reverend I red C. Bennette, Jr; the commander who
gave the orders, was referred to as "Le Commandant. "It had been agreed, in advance, that
i f they were arrested, they would not pu t up bail and most o f them stayed in Jail. Martin
said, "I'll stay in ja il one yea r or ten years if it takes that long to desegregate R ich’s. ”
The whole community was aroused when the imprisonments became known. A commit
tee o f students and adults was form ed to negotiate with the merchants and city officials to
try to reach a settlement. Martin stayed in ja il fo r about a week before an agreement was
reached. I was pregnant at the time, b u t! went to see him almost every day. Though the rules
o f the ja il allowed visiting only once a week, Daddy King knew the sheriff, who was a decent
man, and he arranged that I could come.
I heard that Robert Kennedy called Judge Mitchell to learn why Dr. King couldn’t be released on bail pending
appeal. That story leaked out to the press, and evidently Judge Mitchell had a change of heart. Now, he said Martin
would be released on bail.
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Today more than ever, our
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CHARACTER
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GROCERY
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SE Division
Vancouver, WA
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Beaverton
Nature's fresh Northwest is more than just a place to work. It's a place where a
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We have a social purpose beyond profit and are committed to supporting our
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please contact our .lob Line at
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Doug Williams. Human Resources
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(360) 256-3244 TI)I)
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Luther King, Jr. on January 20, 1997.
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Or by Fax (503) 233-4349
Career Hot line (503) 239-4339
Equal Opportunity Employer
I
i