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Page A2
February 8. 2006
BLACK HISTORY MONTH and the American Experience
Struggle for Justice Echoed in King Funeral
Mourners say
goodbye to
First Lady of
Civil Rights
(AP)— Four U.S. presidents joined
more than 1 (),(XX) mourners Tuesday
in saying goodbye to Coretta Scott
King, praised by President Bush as
“one of the most admired Americans
of our time.”
“I ’ve come today to offer the
sympathy o f our entire nation at the
passing o f a woman who worked to
make our nation whole.” President
Bush told King’s four children and
the crowd that filled New Birth Mis­
sionary Baptist Church for the fu­
neral o f the widow of the Rev. Martin
Luther King Jr.
“Coretta Scott King not only se­
cured her husband’s legacy, she built
her own,” Bush said. “Having loved a
leader, she became a leader, and when
she sp o k e, A m ericans listened M artin Luther King III (far left) Yolanda King (center) and Dexter S cott King (far right) holds hand with other
members o f the King fam ily during funeral services for Coretta Scott King Tuesday in Lithonia, Ga., a suburb o f
closely.”
Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin Atlanta. (AP photo)
stressed that King spoke out, not just
King Jr., spoke directly to the current
against racism, but about “the sense­
administration’s foreign and domestic
lessness of war and the solutions for
policies.
poverty.”
“Our marvelous presidents and gov­
“She sang for liberation, she sang
ernors come to mourn and praise ...
for those who had no earthly reason to
but in the morning will words become
sing a song,” with a voice that was
deeds that m eet need?” Lowery
heard “from the tintop roofs of Soweto
asked.
Former President
to the bomb shelters of Baghdad,”
“For war, billions more, but no more
Bill Clinton arrives
Franklin said.
for the poor,” he said, in a take-off of
at the Coretta
Former President Carter echoed
a lyric from Stevie W onder’s song “A
Scott King funeral
that theme of a peaceful struggle for
ceremony at the
Time to Love,” which drew a roaring
justice in a service that grew increas­
New Birth Mission­ standing ovation. The comments drew
ary Baptist Church.
ing political as other leaders ques­
head shakes from Bush and his father
(AP photo)
tioned what the Bush administration
as they sat behind the pulpit.
was doing to continue the Kings’
Coretta Scott King, who carried on
dream.
her husband’s dream of equality for
The Rev. Joseph Lowery, who co­
nearly 40 years after his death, died
founded the Southern Christian Lead­
Jan. 30 at the age of 78 after battling
ership Conference with Martin Luther
ovarian cancer and the effects of a
stroke.
Former Presidents Clinton and
Bush, poet Maya Angelou and the
Kings’ children were also among the
more than three dozen speakers dur­
ing the funeral.
“I don’t want us to forget that there's
a woman in there, not a symbol,”
Clinton said, standing behind King’s
flow er-covered cask et. “ A real
woman who lived and breathed and
got angry and got hurt and had dreams
and disappointments.”
Angelou spoke of King as a sister
with whom she shared her pain and
laughter.
“Those of us who have gathered
h e re ,... we owe something from this
minute on, so this gathering is not just
another footnote on the pages of his­
tory,” Angelou said.
“I mean to say I want to see a better
world. I mean to say I want to see
some peace somewhere,” she said to
roaring applause.
Outside the suburban church Tues­
day morning, the lines to get into the
funeral and to attend the final viewing
of King’s body started forming before
3 a.m.
“There’s one word to describe go­
ing to go see Coretta - historic. It’s
good to finally see her at peace,” said
Robert Jackson, a 34-year-old finan­
cial consultant from Atlanta whose
10-year-old daughter. Ebony, per­
suaded him to take her to the church.
More than 160,(XX) mourners had
waited in long lines to pay their re­
spects at public viewings since King’s
body was returned to Georgia - on
Monday at Ebenezer Baptist Church,
where her husband preached in the
1960s, at New Birth Missionary Bap­
tist Church on Tuesday morning, and
during the weekend at the Georgia
Capitol, where King became the first
woman and the first black person to lie
in honor there.
The funeral followed a day of
continued
on page A 6
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