In January 1968, just a few months before his assassination, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. delivered a stirring address at Ohio Northern University. We celebrate his life today and remain committed to his struggle for truth, freedom, and justice.
His words that day, in part:
“I haven't lost faith in the future. I still feel that we can develop a kind of coalition of conscience, and with this coalition move on into a brighter tomorrow. With this faith we will be able to do it. There is something in this universe that justifies Carlyle in saying, ‘No lie can live forever.’ There is something in this universe that justifies William Cullen Bryant in saying, ‘Truth, crushed to earth, will rise again.’ There is something in this universe which justifies James Russell Lowell in saying, ‘Truth forever on the scaffold, wrong forever on the throne, yet that scaffold sways the future.’ With this faith, we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. We will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood.”
For his entire speech and recollections from those who attended, visit onu.edu/mlk.