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Martin Luther King’s final public remarks, delivered 43 years ago yesterday, are often called his darkest, because he appears to foreshadow his assassination the following day. He was in Memphis, Tenn., urging supporters of 1,300 striking sanitation workers to double-down at a critical juncture in what had been a troubled movement—a previous demonstration had turned violent, embarrassing King, and he was preparing a new march in defiance of court orders. He closes the speech by musing at length on the death threats he’d received.
“Like anybody, I would like to live a long life,” he says. “Longevity has its place. But I’m not concerned about that now. I just want to do God’s will. And he’s allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I’ve looked over and I’ve seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you, but I want you to know tonight that we, as a people, will get to the Promised Land.”
Decades later, we have not yet arrived.
