Letter From Birmingham Jail Analysis

Martin Luther King Jr. (MLK) was an excellent leader and a powerful historical figure. He is often remembered most for his writings and speeches, in which he invokes many philosophical theories and speakers to justify the opinions he expresses in them. In MLK’s, “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” he uses philosophical thinkers from the past to support the idea that civil rights activists should be allowed to protest peacefully, in spite of the laws against it. One of the thinkers MLK uses to support his argument is St. Thomas Aquinas, who wrote a lot on the topic of justice and what constitutes a just or unjust law. The specific wording MLK uses is, “An unjust law is a human law that is not rooted in eternal and natural law. Any law that uplifts
Referring to the moral injustice of an I-it relationship allows MLK to say the following from his letter: “Hence, segregation is not only politically, economically, and sociologically unsound, it is morally wrong and sinful.” Using Buber’s writing allows MLK to complete the next step in arguing that civil rights activists should be allowed to break the law: confirming the inherent moral fallacies present in segregation. MLK often uses comparisons to prove his points in, “Letter from Birmingham Jail.” The figure he turns to most often for such comparisons is Socrates, who was known for causing trouble with the establishment in much the same way that MLK and other civil rights activists did. MLK uses Socrates to establish the legitimacy of what he’s doing by showing that an esteemed figure of history was taking many of the same actions that civil rights activists were taking at the time of his
In the first Socrates quote above, MLK immediately follows Socrates name with a lofty description of the higher thought the Socratic method can achieve, using phrases like, “majestic heights of understanding and brotherhood.” In the second quote, MLK speaks about Socrates having an, “unswerving commitment to truth,” and even speaks about the people of Greece being, “misguided,” to make Socrates drink hemlock. In the third quote, MLK attributes academic freedom, a concept someone with a doctorate degree certainly appreciates, entirely to Socrates. MLK wouldn’t speak so highly of someone he didn’t identify with on a personal