Today, when truth no longer appears to be the coin of Journalism’s realm, you can be excused for doubting the following story at the outset.  Sadly, it’s true and no doubt is being repeated in homes and schools across the nation on the heels of Martin Luther King Jr.’s holiday.

The  black father works overtime to pay for the family home in suburbia, where excellent schools are a given.  His eyes light up, and a broad smile merges with low laughter as he tells about his then four-year old son, who had learned King’s Dream speech by heart.  Somehow, a teacher in a nearby school heard about the child’s achievement and secured the father’s permission to allow the young scholar to deliver the speech to the children in their classrooms.  Black pride mingled with proper amazement and enthusiasm from his predominately white brothers and sisters, later echoed by their parents.

My reason for not giving the child’s name is because he’s delivered the speech so often that if King’s family ever came after their royalties, the child’s father would face bankruptcy before The Center for Dr. King in Atlanta.  The complex, which includes:  an administration building, a public building, a reflection  pool and Dr. King’s crypt, has fallen into disrepair. The National Park Service, according to Martin Luther King III, the elder son, and his sister Bernice, would like to take it over for the sum of $11 million.

The “Atlanta Journal Constitution” ran a series of investigative articles about the center’s finances and reported that the King Center needed repairs and ended  most  years with a deficit.  At the same time, Dexter King was collecting a salary of $180,000 and Martin King $150,000 and had given millions to a for-profit company run by Dexter King.  ( “The New York Times National,” January 14, 2006,  by Sheila Dewan.)

Above the article on p. 9, there is a five-column spread  photo of four black children marching in a straight line in front of King’s gravesite.

The first child has one hand slightly raised, as if he were stepping to a tune in his head.  Next, a little girl marches pensively, with her face forward and arms at her side, as though she knows this is a solemn  moment, and she  wants to be equal to the occasion.  At the end comes a little boy, with his coat half opened, and head scrunched down into his jacket, shut off from everyone, including the cameraman.  All appear to be around six years old, the same age as the child in our story.

Would it matter to them to be told that they could not recite the Dream speech unless they paid money to the King Family?  I think it would puzzle them.  Puzzles me.

The thing is, King was more than a politician, leading the civil rights movement; he was the pastor of Ebenezer Baptist Church, where three generations of Kings had served as pastors.  Pastoring means preaching, and preaching calls for praying, lots of praying, and success comes with grace, free grace.

Of course, preachers should be paid; they’ve put a lot of money and energy into their training, and have every right to be compensated.  But it seems to me that Dr. King gave that speech, full of passion and faith, for the world -- white, black, red, brown.

I’ll bet if he were alive today, he would look up that little wonder child, ask him to deliver the speech for his congregation at the Ebenezer Baptist Church, and give him a bear hug at the end, with no bill attached.

This reminds me of a study session one summer years ago down at Chicago’s Bishop Shield School, when the black  poet, Claude McKay, stood before us in his frayed dark suit, tie and white shirt, with matching frayed cuffs, possessed of a warrior’s dignity, recounting battles fought – some lost, some won.  We asked him to remove his jacket, so hot and humid was it on a July evening, but he refused, explaining  that he was the teacher and owed respect to us, his students.  That touch of class tends to stay with one over a lifetime.

His eyes were gentle, as though he had seen too much pain to pass it on to those who might not be able to bear more than they were already carrying.

Suffering and poverty had left their mark.  He appeared older than his 55 years, the 11th child of a farm couple in Jamaica,  so generously tutored by his brother that he authored his first book of poems at 19, called Song of Jamaica.

A year later, in 1912, he came to the United States to learn that the Civil War had not freed blacks from ignorance, poverty or fear.  With his gift for words, he spoke for his suffering brothers and sisters in Harlem, and launched the Harlem Renaissance with his book of poetry, In Harlem Shadows.

As I read this passage from “White Houses,” I cannot help but think of the millions whose doors to the future are closed shut because of the color of their skin:

Your door is shut against my frightened face,
And I am sharp as steel with discontent;
But I possess the courage and the grace
to bear my anger proudly and unbent.
Oh, I must keep my heart inviolate
Against the potent poison of your hate.

In the “Tropics of New York, “ we see a vulnerable McKay, lonely for home.

My eyes grew dim, and I could no more gaze;
A wave of longing through my body swept,
And, hungry for the old, familiar ways,
I  turned aside and bowed my head and wept.

We can be sure that today, like Dr. King, McKay would allow God’s brilliant child to recite his poetry any time, any place, free of charge.

We thank Dr.  Martin Luther King, Jr. for dreaming a great dream, and for all, old and young, who have taken it to their hearts, then  passed it on to others, hungering for a dream of their own. 

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