“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”  Martin Luther King Jr.

Introduction

After a few words about the art of rhetoric and about Martin Luther King Jr, this essay will look at what King does in his speeches and how he persuades his audience.  It is arranged in a general way around the three kinds of persuasion.  The aim is to highlight his own character and his understanding of his audience.

Rhetoric

Rhetoric, according to Aristotle, is “the power to observe the persuasiveness of which any particular matter admits.”  Today, however, the term ‘rhetoric’ is often used in a pejorative way, referring not only to persuasion but also to propaganda or spin and to the notion that the speaker may be lacking in ethics.  It seems to me that as rhetoric is important in many fields such as politics, the courts and even advertising, Aristotles definition is insightful as it applies not only to what the speaker is doing, but also to how the audience receives and interprets the efforts of the speaker.  Knowledge of rhetoric is important for the audience to evaluate a speech, to understand if the speaker is acting ethically or logically. 

Aristotle says that there are three types of proofs which are to be found in the character of the speaker, the disposition of the audience and in the speech itself.  He refers to these as ethos, pathos and logos.  Ethos is appeal based on the character of the speaker.  Pathos is appeal based on emotion and requires an understanding of the audience and the means to persuade them.  Logos is appeal based on logic or reason.

About Martin Luther King Jr.

Martin was born in Atlanta, Georgia just before the great depression.  His father and grandfather were Baptist ministers.  He always enjoyed good health and loved and admired his parents.  He was aware from a very early age of the prejudices against black people.  He resented segregation believing it a grave injustice.  He says that “the inseparable twin of racial injustice was economic injustice.”  After skipping two years of school he enrolled in Morehouse College, a Negro institution in Atlanta where he earned a Bachelor of Arts degree.   Even when he was first there he was seriously concerned with racial and economic justice.  Here he was encouraged to find a solution to racial ills. At age 19 he entered Crozer Theological Seminary and gained a bachelor of divinity degree in 1951 at age 22 and was awarded a fellowship to study for his doctorate which he gained in 1955.  It is clear that from the beginning of his career he commanded considerable respect from within his community.  Of course he also had enemies. His house was bombed, he was attacked several times, he almost died after being stabbed and he certainly did receive letters of opposition.  He was shot and killed in Memphis on 4 April 1968, the day after his speech, ‘I See the Promised Land’.  He was the youngest ever recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, he received twenty honorary doctorates.

The Rhetoric of Martin Luther King Jr. – an Early Speech

Martin Luther King Jr. at the age of 15 in 1944 gave a speech in a state wide oratorical contest on the topic, The Negro and the Constitution.  Many of the ideas in this speech are pointers to other speeches in his future.  Many of the words and ideas are repeated in several of his other speeches, particularly in the ‘I have a Dream’ speech.  He refers in this 1944 speech to the history of the United States, the civil war, the Emancipation Declaration and draws attention to the lack of progress since that time.  He refers also in that speech to the spirit of Lincoln, a spirit that began with Jesus.  Near the end of this speech he says, “my heart throbs anew in the hope that inspired by Abraham Lincoln, imbued with the spirit of Christ, they will cast down the barriers to perfect freedom.”  This very early speech shows a great deal about Martin Luther King.  No doubt it was well prepared and perhaps he had some assistance.  All the same it became a symbol of the rest of his life.  And it indicates the sincerity with which he pursued his work.  

Ethos

King’s character was well known by people who knew him from early times.  But his character comes through clearly in his speeches, and he was certainly a gifted speaker.  For many speakers their ethos may well come to our attention at the beginning of a speech but for Martin Luther King, his ethos is on display throughout.  In his speech ‘Rediscovering Lost Values’, a sermon given in 1954 he begins by expressing humility at being in a church with so great a reputation.  He addresses the congregation as friends and includes stories about his family.  In this particular speech he says that the first principle that needs rediscovering is moral law.  It is always wrong to hate, he says.  The second principle that he says needs rediscovering is the presence of God in our lives.  “We must remember that it’s possible to affirm the existence of God with your lips and deny his existence with your lives.”

King is opposed to violence.  One of his mentors was Mahatma Ghandi.  King says, “While the Montgomery boycott was going on, India’s Ghandi was the guiding light of our technique of non violent social change.”  He spoke about Ghandi in a number of his speeches.  On a number of occasions he exhorts the people to refrain from violence.  For example, in his speech at the Great March on Detroit he says, “For we’ve come to see that (non-violence) is not a weak method, for it’s the strong man who can stand up amid opposition, who can stand up amid violence being inflicted on him and not retaliate with violence.”  

Authority is added to the speeches of Martin Luther King by his demonstrations of his considerable knowledge of history, of poetry, of Shakespeare, of Negro spirituals, of the Old and New Testaments.  In his ‘I Have a Dream’ speech he refers to the Constitution of the United States, the Declaration of Independence and the Emancipation Proclamation.  He shows some knowledge of American geography.  He quotes from the Book of Isaiah 40: 4-5.  He quotes from the hymn by Samuel F. Smith (1808-1895), My Country, ‘Tis of Thee. 

In his ‘Letter from a Birmingham Jail’ in defending his willingness to break civil laws, he quotes from St Augustine – “an unjust law is no law at all” and from St Thomas Aquinas – “An unjust law is a human law that is not rooted in eternal law and natural law”.  When he addressed the sanitation workers on 3 April 1968 he knows that there is trouble brewing but he is not prepared to be silenced.  Towards the end of that speech he says, “Well, I don’t know what will happen now.  We’ve got some difficult days ahead.  But it doesn’t matter with me now.  Because I’ve been to the mountaintop.  And I don’t mind.  Like anybody, I would like to live a long life.  Longevity has its place.  But I’m not concerned about that now.  I just want to do God’s will.”  Clearly he is prepared to die for a cause he believed in.

Pathos

Pathos is the awakening of emotion in the audience so that they will be most receptive to the words of the speaker.  These emotions are states of mind that will affect judgments.  King’s appeal to emotions is based in part on his understanding of the audience.  For example his ‘Letter from Birmingham Jail’ was written in response to a published statement by eight fellow clergymen, but white clergymen.  It is clear that these men of religion were hostile to him or his methods.  But near the beginning of his letter he indicates his respect for them, “But since I feel that you are men of genuine good will and that your criticisms are sincerely set forth, I want to try to answer your statements in what I hope will be patient and reasonable terms.”  He then goes to considerable lengths using reasoned argument to justify his position referring to the unjust way in which black people are treated and that their protests are peaceful.  He even agrees with their suggestion that negotiation is called for.  

In the Eulogy of the Young Victims of the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church Bombing he praises the children who died, “as unoffending young and beautiful children who died nobly”.  He acknowledges that it is almost impossible to say anything to console the bereaved families.  He recognizes the darkness of the occasion for the people and how they may well have felt there but urges them not to become bitter, not to “harbour the desire to retaliate with violence.”  When a man who was almost killed in a knife attack, whose home was bombed and who spent time in jail urges peaceful actions only, one is likely to listen.

In his ‘I Have a Dream’ speech, in which he addressed a predominantly black crowd, he uses words to which they will particularly relate.  He refers to the poverty in which they live and the manacles of segregation which cripple them.  In the ‘I See the Promised Land’ speech he makes a point of identifying with the audience of about 2000 people who have assembled in bad weather.  He says how pleased he is to live even a few years in the second half of the twentieth century.  He sees God in the masses of people rising up.  He relates how after he was stabbed he received communications from the President, the vice President and the Governor of New York.  He forgot what those communications said but he did remember verbatim what a nine year old girl said in a letter to him.  He identifies with the poor and the ‘small’ people.  

In ‘Loving Your Enemies’, a sermon delivered at Dexter Ave Baptist Church, King begins by mentioning that he was ill that morning and the doctor said that it would be best for him to stay in bed.  There follows a lengthy sermon that begins slowly and quietly but builds in speed and more particularly in strength of voice.  King identifies with his audience, mentions his frailty, mentions his family and recognizes the difficulties faced by those in his audience.

King’s delivery is full of emotion both in terms of his voice and body.  The ‘I Have a Dream’ speech has been described as a “fervent emotional sermon, forged out of the language and spirit of democracy.  King’s mastery of the spoken word, his magnetism, and his sincerity raised familiar platitudes from cliché to commandment.”  

Logos

Aristotle speaks of argument being supported by enthymemes, maxims, common topics and examples.  In his speech as a fifteen year old, ‘The Negro and the Constitution’ King uses logic in referring to the constitution based on the principle that all men are created equal.  Then he refers to the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation and the stark contrast of a Black America still wearing chains.  He uses enthymemes such as, “We cannot have an enlightened democracy with one great group living in ignorance.  We cannot have a health nation with one tenth of the population ill-nourished, sick, harbouring germs….”  Again, “We cannot be truly Christian people so long as we flaunt the central teachings of Jesus: brotherly love and the Golden Rule.”  The audience can infer that the nation does not have a democracy and the nation is not healthy.  

One of the great benefits that King had in making his word effective was the tradition of black preaching.  “[This tradition] included call-and-response interaction with listeners; a calm-to-storm delivery that begins in a slow, professorial manner before swinging gradually and rhythmically to a dramatic climax; schemes of parallelism, especially anaphora (e.g., “I have a dream that . . .”); and clusters of light and dark metaphors.”  This style in some of his speeches would have worked very well as most of the audience were black people.   Anaphora can be seen in many of his speeches.  In the aptly named ‘I have a Dream’ that phrase is included at least nine times, ‘let freedom ring’ at least four times and ‘now is the time’ at least four times.  ‘I have a dream’ repeated at least ten times in the speech at the Great March on Detroit (and echoed several times by the audience) is related to the American dream.  Repetition is a device for strongly making a point.

King also used wonderful metaphoric imagery.  For example in the ‘I Have a Dream’ speech he refers to the negro as living in a lonely island of poverty in a sea of prosperity, and refers to the cashing of the cheque, the promissory note given to the in them with the proclamation declaration.  He uses similarities, for example in defending his position against those clergymen who claimed that his actions precipitated violence he says, “Isn’t this like condemning Socrates because of his unswerving commitment to truth…?”

Conclusion

Plato said that rhetoric was the art of enchanting the soul.  King was a master at it.  He had a deep commitment to his own people.  His voice was his weapon which he wielded with great skill.  Non-violence was his strength.  In the shadows of a greater man, he upset the status quo, annoyed the conservatives and was killed for his trouble.  But he did have considerable success and his words were a significant tool in that success.  Kings method was peaceful protest.  His messages were of love, forgiveness and that all men are created equal even though the experience of the United States did not bear this out.

After his death King’s work, begun with his words, continues to be done.  There has been the establishment of the Martin Luther King, Jr. national holiday (although it is not yet observed in every state).  The Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial and Centre for Non-violent Social Change is now part of a National Park that includes his birth home and the church where he and his father ministered.  

Garry A. Deegan

Bibliography

Aristotle, The Art of Rhetoric, translated by H. C. Lawson-Tancred, London: Penguin,

Carson, Clayborne (Ed.) The Autobiography of Martin Luther King, Jr., New York:  Little, Brown and Company, 1999 

Carson, Clayborne & A Knock at the Midnight, accompanied by

Holloran, Peter (Eds.) six Audio Tapes, New York:  Warner Books, Inc., 1998 

Sullivan, Patricia A. & New Approaches to Rhetoric, Thousand Oaks, 

Goldzwig, Steven R. Eds., California:  Sage Publications Inc. 2004

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhetoric

http://www.u-s-history/com/pages/h2623.html

http://www.time.com/time/time100/leaders/profile/gandhi.html

http://www.hymnsite.com/lyrics/umh697.sht

http://www.presentation helper.co.uk/martin-luther-king-i-have-a-dream-speech.htm

http://college.com/english/health/syllabuild/iguide/king.html

Speeches of Martin Luther King:

The Negro and the Constitution 13/04/1944

Rediscovering Lost Values 28/02/1954

Loving your Enemies 17/11/1957

Letter from Birmingham Jail 16/04/1963

Speech at the Great March on Detroit 23/06/1963

I Have a Dream 28/08/1963

Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence 04/04/1967

I See the Promised Land 03/04/1968