The author of this article feels that whites owe Dr. King a great debt because he was the man who really freed the US. Before King, America was not and could not claim to be a free and unprejudiced nation. He argues that without King, there still would have been great prejudice and discrimination during the cold war, and thus a horrible perversity in the motive of the US to challenge the opressive Russian dictatorship, when America still opressed its own people.
Martin Luther King was most certainly the right man at the right time, but I believe that even if he had been born after the civil rights movement, he would have become a great icon. He was one of those people, like Abraham Lincoln, who lived at the right time in the right place, but would have become great under any circumstances at almost any time in our nations history.
Later in the article, the question of the use of Dr. King's most famous quote —"I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character"— was adressed. The article brings up the fact that this quote is used by people who are against affirmative action, and goes on to suggest that King would not condone such usage. Obviously since Dr. King is dead we cannot know for sure how he would have felt, but I believe that he would be okay with how the quote is used. Dr. King would push for the absolute equality of the races now as he pushed for it then.
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