From remarks originally delivered at Zion Baptist Church Interfaith Vesper Service, January 12, 2025
This is the time of year when we see an avalanche of performative actions in Dr. Martin Luther King’s name. As my father, Judge Nathaniel Jones described it to me: “people who despised Dr. King when he was alive quoting his speeches out of context, eyes teary, lips aquiver and then spending the other 364 days of the year undermining everything he stood for.”
“[O]ne must truly struggle to learn what it was that Dr. King gave his life to achieve,” my father said in a 1981 speech commemorating Martin Luther King Day before it became a national holiday. “It is time to face the fact that merely observing Dr. King’s life is no answer. In fact, we ill-serve the memory of Dr. King as long as we fail to seek out the essence of his life and apply it to our own daily lives.
Folks love to quote Dr. King’s “dream” as a call to stand down and wait for our oppressors to find the goodness in their own hearts. But I think Dr. King’s dream of one nation was much more radical than some people assume. It doesn’t mean waiting for a fantasy future where all people agree and everyone is all pulling in the same direction.
What does Dr. King’s dream mean? What did it mean to Dr. King? What should it mean to us, especially in this moment, in this time of strife and fear and division and uncertainty?
Does it mean we all get along without differences? No, I don’t think so. That is the Disneyfied version of Dr. King—the caricature created after his death that bears little resemblance to who he actually was, what he truly believed, and what he meant to this world.
I believe that sharing a dream of one nation is to recognize that we will never have a perfect world, that there will always be forces arrayed against us. But it is a call for people of goodwill to unify under the banner of justice, equity, and the relentless pursuit of a better tomorrow, to push back on this evil and overcome those obstacles. It means doing the hard work, facing some difficult truths, making real sacrifices.
Dr. King himself recognized the challenges that lay ahead, and his words still resonate today:
“And I must confess, my friends, that the road ahead will not always be smooth. There will still be rocky places of frustration and meandering points of bewilderment,” he wrote. “There will be inevitable setbacks here and there. And there will be those moments when the buoyancy of hope will be transformed into the fatigue of despair. Our dreams will sometimes be shattered and our ethereal hopes blasted … But difficult and painful as it is, we must walk on in the days ahead with an audacious faith in the future.”
AN AUDACIOUS FAITH IN THE FUTURE.
That is a radical concept, isn’t it?
I’ve been thinking a lot about that phrase … and realized that it resonates with me because it also describes my father’s vision. He, too, had a faith that many thought was audacious. I often say he lived the most improbable life. A life that was not expected or foretold for him, a life that no one but his mother, his mentor, and a few others could even have imagined for him. And it was his audacious faith in the future that kept him going and inspired others to do the same.
I remember feeling that fatigue the morning after the 2004 election, as my father, shaving calmly, reminded me of the setbacks his generation faced but overcame.
“You think THIS is bad? Imagine how we felt in 1956 when Adlai Stevenson lost again—for the second time. And we didn’t have a Civil Rights Act or a Voting Rights Act or Black Members of Congress or governors or mayors. We didn’t just elect a Black man to the Senate. We didn’t have any of the resources or powers or tools that you have now. But we didn’t give up. We kept fighting. We got a Civil Rights Bill passed in 1957. In 1958, we had huge wins in Congress. And then in 1960, we elected Jack Kennedy president.”
“Progress isn’t like a freight train just barreling forward. It’s a pendulum that sometimes swings backward,” he continued. “The important thing is not to let go, but to always keep pushing forward so that the next time, you move even further ahead.”
“So, feel sorry for yourself all you want today. But tomorrow, get back to work.”
And, of course, as usual, he was right. In 2006, we won back the House and Senate. And in 2008, we elected Barack Obama president.
Many of us thought that signaled a huge leap forward and weren’t prepared for the backlash that would ensue, the backlash we are seeing now.
Even my father hoped for the best, as he noted in the final words of his 2016 memoir, “Answering the Call”: “Truth be told, the other ugly faces of America, to which Black persons have been subjected, we hope now, and we pray for all time, have been buried.”
Daddy hoped they were buried, but he also remained wary. He cautioned us not to let down our guard, to remain vigilant, to never assume that the fight for justice and equality was over. He knew the hard-earned gains could be rolled back, and, as we saw in the 2016 election, his fears were not unfounded.
That election broke my father’s heart. It wasn’t just the result, but the fact that so many Americans, including some of his friends and colleagues, supported a man and a movement so antithetical to his values and so determined to undo the progress he had fought for all his life. In a letter to an old friend after the election, he expressed a rare moment of despair, writing, “It seems that all I believed in and hoped for is about to wind up in the rubble.” For my father, this was a rare acknowledgment of how deeply shaken his faith had been.
Despite this, he did not give up. Even as his body weakened, he continued to fight, insisting on working for the causes he cared about, holding onto hope until the very end. My father never gave up on this vision. He believed in the potential for change, even when faced with profound setbacks.
He had an audacious faith in the future until the end.
Last November, I felt the same frustration, pain and disillusionment he felt in 2016. I think many of us did. But Daddy’s words, “Progress isn’t like a freight train just barreling forward. It’s a pendulum” helped me refocus.
Daddy described progress as a pendulum, a powerful force driven by gravity. Dr. King spoke of it in similar, if more sweeping terms:
“When our days become dreary with low-hovering clouds of despair, and when our nights become darker than a thousand midnights, let us remember that there is a creative force in this universe working to pull down the gigantic mountains of evil, a power that is able to make a way out of no way and transform dark yesterdays into bright tomorrows.”
Dr. King and my father both recognized that we have the power to instigate positive change, to bend the arc of the moral universe Dr. King described.
Two weeks ago, we said goodbye to former President Jimmy Carter. On Tuesday, I walked the few blocks from my house on Capitol Hill to the Capitol to pay tribute as his cortege arrived for his lying in state in the Rotunda. As I watched his flag-draped casket pass, flanked by military honor guards and a riderless horse, I thought about his journey, his connection to my family, the mutual love and admiration he and my father shared. How his appointment of my father to the Sixth Circuit changed our family’s lives, set Daddy on a course he could never have imagined for himself.
I also considered what a crushing a blow it must have been for him to lose the 1980 election. He himself said it took time and much prayer and reflection to come to terms with it and move on. And yet, he didn’t walk away or give up. He found other ways to serve, although “serve” is an inadequate word to describe what Jimmy Carter did in the 44 years after he left office. What a life. He is a beacon of the power of focused energy.
And in the end, he was hailed as a hero, a good and decent man. Daddy always said history would be kinder to Jimmy Carter than we had been. And he was right.
The cortege also reminded me of Rosa Parks, who died 20 years ago this year. I attended the service in the Capitol Rotunda that preceded her lying in honor where leaders of government gathered to pay her tribute. As we awaited in the hushed chamber for Mrs. Parks’ casket to arrive from the airport, President and Mrs. Bush arrived and quietly stood with the rest of us for about 20 minutes. There was something strange about the scene—and then I realized what was so odd. As an old presidential advance person, I know that the President rarely ever waits for anyone. He customarily enters the room only after everyone else has assembled and everything begins when he arrives. Yet, here stood the President of the United States—in an act of extraordinary tribute—waiting for Rosa Parks, nearly 50 years to the day that she was hauled off that bus for refusing to give up her seat.
Each of these leaders faced dark times, painful journeys, fearful nights, and uncertain dawns. But he kept going. They taught us that, even when the pendulum swings backward, we must push it forward as far as possible with all our might.
But in order to do that, we must gather our strength. That means taking the time to step back, think, pray, restore ourselves, reconnect and reinforce our spirits.
That’s just what many of us are doing now. Taking the time to think and pray and be still for a moment. Reflecting on where we’ve been and considering where we are going and how we can get there together. Pausing, recharging, and preparing for the work ahead. The fight for justice, equity, and peace, the work to fulfill Dr. King’s dreams is ongoing, and it demands our continuous commitment. But it also requires our energy and strength and clearheadedness.
Doing our part doesn’t mean being loud or large or in charge. It doesn’t mean leading a march or starting a movement. It can be simply looking around to see where help is needed and lending a hand to provide that help – what my father used to call “brightening the corner where we are.”
Whether it is through activism, education, or everyday acts of simple kindness, each of us has a role in bending the arc of the moral universe. As Dr. King said, “if we make the right choice, we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our world into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood.”
If we truly want to work toward one nation, we must fight for social and economic justice and speak up for those whose voices we often don’t hear. We can’t remain silent while the powerful abuse the powerless. We must refuse to look the other way because we think our privilege will shield us. We must reach out to and speak up for those who are being openly targeted and are living in real fear, including immigrants, our LGBTQ brothers and sisters and other marginalized people who are in actual danger.
We often hear the Rev. Niemoller quote:
First they came for the Communists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Communist
Then they came for the Socialists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Socialist
Then they came for the trade unionists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a trade unionist
Then they came for the Jews
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Jew
Then they came for me
And there was no one left
To speak out for me
This is a powerful message that speaks to us through the ages. And while it is an important warning, we should speak up for people, not just because we fear that, if we don’t, no one will be left to speak out for us. We should speak out because they are our brothers and sisters who need and deserve to be protected, regardless whether we think we may end up as the next victims and will need them to help us.
So please don’t be afraid to speak out, to challenge your friends, colleagues, and neighbors, if necessary, even if it makes them uncomfortable. Even if it makes YOU uncomfortable. Even if your voice shakes. Dr. King preached non-violence. He did NOT preach non-confrontation. Acting from a place of love does not mean holding our tongues and cloaking everyone in comfort, especially when our voices are needed to speak out for justice and mercy.
Dr. King told us this repeatedly: “A time comes when silence is betrayal … Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter … The ultimate tragedy is not the oppression and cruelty by the bad people but the silence over that by the good people”
Tonight, as we gird ourselves for what will come at noon tomorrow in the middle of Martin Luther King Day (is that the universe’s joke or a message?), let’s remember that the journey toward justice is fraught with challenges. Injustice still persists, and the road ahead is long. But we must not despair. We must build our resolve and our strength and prepare for what we need to do.
And then in the coming days, inspired by the lessons and the legacies of the great and good people who brought us this far, holding on to our audacious faith in the future, it will be, in the words of The Good Judge—time to get back to the work of bringing us closer to the dream of one nation Dr. King envisioned for us all.