[Congressional Bills 115th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Res. 246 Introduced in House (IH)]
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115th CONGRESS
1st Session
H. RES. 246
Commemorating the 50th anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s
``Beyond Vietnam: A Time To Break Silence'' sermon condemning the
Vietnam War and calling for a true revolution of values in the United
States.
_______________________________________________________________________
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
April 4, 2017
Mr. Conyers (for himself, Mr. Lewis of Georgia, Ms. Norton, Ms. Eddie
Bernice Johnson of Texas, Mr. Evans, Mr. Richmond, Ms. Plaskett, Mr.
Espaillat, Mr. McGovern, Ms. Velazquez, Ms. Barragan, Ms. Lee, Mr.
Rush, Ms. Bass, Ms. Moore, Ms. Sewell of Alabama, Mr. Cummings, Ms.
Jayapal, Mr. Danny K. Davis of Illinois, Ms. Clarke of New York, Mr.
Johnson of Georgia, Mr. Cohen, Mr. Gutierrez, Mr. Clay, Mrs. Lawrence,
Mr. David Scott of Georgia, Mr. Jeffries, Mr. Courtney, Ms. DeLauro,
Mrs. Beatty, Mr. Carson of Indiana, Mrs. Napolitano, Mr. Grijalva, Mr.
Nadler, Ms. Wilson of Florida, Mr. McEachin, Mrs. Dingell, Mrs.
Demings, Mr. Cleaver, Ms. Jackson Lee, Ms. Maxine Waters of California,
Mr. Serrano, Mrs. Watson Coleman, Mr. Raskin, Ms. Fudge, Mr. Ellison,
Ms. Adams, Mr. Payne, Mr. Meeks, Mr. Pallone, Mr. Lawson of Florida,
and Ms. Kelly of Illinois) submitted the following resolution; which
was referred to the Committee on Foreign Affairs
_______________________________________________________________________
RESOLUTION
Commemorating the 50th anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s
``Beyond Vietnam: A Time To Break Silence'' sermon condemning the
Vietnam War and calling for a true revolution of values in the United
States.
Whereas, on April 4, 1967, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., civil rights icon and
one of the greatest leaders in our Nation's history, issued his ``Beyond
Vietnam: A Time To Break Silence'' sermon to an overflow crowd at the
Riverside Church in New York City regarding the participation of the
United States in the War in Vietnam and the consequences of the war on
the movement for civil rights and for our Nation as a whole;
Whereas in the sermon, Dr. King presented a powerful case for an end to the war
in Vietnam, stating ``We must stop now. I speak as a child of God and
brother to the suffering poor of Vietnam. I speak for those whose land
is being laid waste, whose homes are being destroyed, whose culture is
being subverted. I speak for the poor in America who are paying the
double price of smashed hopes at home, and dealt death and corruption in
Vietnam. I speak as a citizen of the world, for the world as it stands
aghast at the path we have taken.'';
Whereas Dr. King recognized the challenges inherent in speaking out against our
own Nation's foreign policy, stating that ``Even when pressed by the
demands of inner truth, men do not easily assume the task of opposing
their government's policy, especially in time of war. Nor does the human
spirit move without great difficulty against all the apathy of
conformist thought within one's own bosom and in the surrounding world.
Moreover, when the issues at hand seem as perplexing as they often do in
the case of this dreadful conflict, we are always on the verge of being
mesmerized by uncertainty. But we must move on. Some of us who have
already begun to break the silence of the night have found that the
calling to speak is often a vocation of agony, but we must speak.'';
Whereas Dr. King addressed critics who lambasted him for addressing an issue
outside of the strictly construed realm of civil rights for African-
Americans, declaring that ``the path from Dexter Avenue Baptist Church--
the church in Montgomery, Alabama, where I began my pastorate--leads
clearly to this sanctuary tonight. There is at the outset a very obvious
and almost facile connection between the war in Vietnam and the struggle
I and others have been waging in America. A few years ago there was a
shining moment in that struggle. It seemed as if there was a real
promise of hope for the poor, both black and white, through the poverty
program. There were experiments, hopes, new beginnings. Then came the
buildup in Vietnam, and I watched this program broken and eviscerated as
if it were some idle political plaything on a society gone mad on war.
And I knew that America would never invest the necessary funds or
energies in rehabilitation of its poor so long as adventures like
Vietnam continued to draw men and skills and money like some demonic,
destructive suction tube. So I was increasingly compelled to see the war
as an enemy of the poor and to attack it as such.'';
Whereas King was subsequently attacked for giving this sermon by 168 major
newspapers including the New York Times and Washington Post;
Whereas Dr. King understood that his commitment to his religion required him to
speak out on behalf of peace and understanding between peoples and
nations, stating ``To me, the relationship of this ministry to the
making of peace is so obvious that I sometimes marvel at those who ask
me why I am speaking against the war. Could it be that they do not know
that the Good News was meant for all men--for communist and capitalist,
for their children and ours, for black and for white, for revolutionary
and conservative? Have they forgotten that my ministry is in obedience
to the one who loved his enemies so fully that he died for them?
Finally, as I try to explain for you and for myself the road that leads
from Montgomery to this place, I would have offered all that was most
valid if I simply said that I must be true to my conviction that I share
with all men the calling to be a son of the living God. Beyond the
calling of race or nation or creed is this vocation of sonship and
brotherhood. Because I believe that the Father is deeply concerned,
especially for His suffering and helpless and outcast children, I come
tonight to speak for them. This I believe to be the privilege and the
burden of all of us who deem ourselves bound by allegiances and
loyalties which are broader and deeper than nationalism and which go
beyond our nation's self-defined goals and positions. We are called to
speak for the weak, for the voiceless, for the victims of our nation,
for those it calls `enemy' for no document from human hands can make
these humans any less our brothers,'';
Whereas Dr. King noted the challenge of telling aggrieved Americans that
violence would not solve their problems while their country was using
violence to address its problems abroad, explaining that ``As I have
walked [in the ghettos of the North over the last three years] among the
desperate, rejected, and angry young men, I have told them that Molotov
cocktails and rifles would not solve their problems. I have tried to
offer them my deepest compassion while maintaining my conviction that
social change comes most meaningfully through nonviolent action. But
they asked, and rightly so, `What about Vietnam?' They asked if our own
nation wasn't using massive doses of violence to solve its problems, to
bring about the changes it wanted. Their questions hit home, and I knew
that I could never again raise my voice against the violence of the
oppressed in the ghettos without having first spoken clearly to the
greatest purveyor of violence in the world today: my own government. For
the sake of those boys, for the sake of this government, for the sake of
the hundreds of thousands trembling under our violence, I cannot be
silent.'';
Whereas such an observation remains particularly relevant today, as people in
cities nationwide are rising up in protest against injustices such as
police brutality and are similarly urged to air their grievances
peacefully;
Whereas Dr. King made a powerful call for a ``true revolution in values,''
stating that such a revolution ``will lay hand on the world order and
say of war, `This way of settling differences is not just.' This
business of burning human beings with napalm, of filling our nation's
homes with orphans and widows, of injecting poisonous drugs of hate into
the veins of peoples normally humane, of sending men home from dark and
bloody battlefields physically handicapped and psychologically deranged,
cannot be reconciled with wisdom, justice, and love. [...] America, the
richest and most powerful nation in the world, can well lead the way in
this revolution of values. There is nothing except a tragic death wish
to prevent us from reordering our priorities so that the pursuit of
peace will take precedence over the pursuit of war. There is nothing to
keep us from molding a recalcitrant status quo with bruised hands until
we have fashioned it into a brotherhood.'';
Whereas Dr. King warned of prioritizing war spending of that for social welfare,
declaring that ``A nation that continues year after year to spend more
money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is
approaching spiritual death.'';
Whereas this warning is particularly applicable today, given recent proposals
for dramatic increases in military spending, on top of a budget that is
already far greater than that of any other nation on earth, combined
with sharp reductions in social welfare programs;
Whereas Dr. King clarified that his critique extended beyond the Vietnam War,
stating that ``The war in Vietnam is but a symptom of a far deeper
malady within the American spirit, and if we ignore this sobering
reality, we will find ourselves organizing `clergy and laymen concerned'
committees for the next generation. They will be concerned about
Guatemala and Peru. They will be concerned about Thailand and Cambodia.
They will be concerned about Mozambique and South Africa. We will be
marching for these and a dozen other names and attending rallies without
end unless there is a significant and profound change in American life
and policy. So such thoughts take us beyond Vietnam, but not beyond our
calling as sons of the living God.'';
Whereas these words have proven to be prophetic, as exemplified by ongoing
United States involvement in conflicts such as Afghanistan, Iraq, among
many other simmering conflicts where our Nation has military
involvement, many of which continue to incur a great cost, both in terms
of our Nation's financial resources as well as a human toll for both our
service members and the civilian population; and
Whereas Dr. King called for an enlightened future for our society, stating that
``Our only hope today lies in our ability to recapture the revolutionary
spirit and go out into a sometimes hostile world declaring eternal
hostility to poverty, racism, and militarism. With this powerful
commitment we shall boldly challenge the status quo and unjust mores,
and thereby speed the day when `every valley shall be exalted, and every
mountain and hill shall be made low, the crooked shall be made straight,
and the rough places plain.' Now let us begin. Now let us rededicate
ourselves to the long and bitter, but beautiful, struggle for a new
world. This is the calling of the sons of God, and our brothers wait
eagerly for our response. Shall we say the odds are too great? Shall we
tell them the struggle is too hard? Will our message be that the forces
of American life militate against their arrival as full men, and we send
our deepest regrets? Or will there be another message--of longing, of
hope, of solidarity with their yearnings, of commitment to their cause,
whatever the cost? The choice is ours, and though we might prefer it
otherwise, we must choose in this crucial moment of human history. And
if we will only make the right choice, we will be able to transform this
pending cosmic elegy into a creative psalm of peace. If we will make the
right choice, we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our
world into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. If we will but make the
right choice, we will be able to speed up the day, all over America and
all over the world, when justice will roll down like waters, and
righteousness like a mighty stream. We must rapidly begin the shift from
a thing-oriented society to a person-oriented society. When machines and
computers, profit motives and property rights, are considered more
important than people, the giant triplets of racism, extreme
materialism, and militarism are incapable of being conquered.'': Now,
therefore, be it
Resolved, That the House of Representatives--
(1) commemorates the 50th anniversary of the ``Beyond
Vietnam'' sermon by Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.;
(2) affirms that the principles enunciated in the ``Beyond
Vietnam'' sermon were profoundly wise at the time they were
given, and that they remain valid today; and
(3) encourages the branches of our Government that conduct
foreign policy to do so in a manner that is consistent with the
vision delineated in this landmark speech.
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