Honoring The Legacy Of Martin Luther King Jr. In The Streets!

On April 4, 1967, Martin Luther King, Jr. made an historic speech at the Riverside Church in Harlem, NYC, which criticized the U.S. role in the Vietnam War. His previous work had centered on fighting for Black civil rights in the United States. On this day, King pointed out that the Vietnam war effort was “Taking the Black young men who have been crippled by our society and sending them 8000 miles away to guarantee liberties in Southeast Asia which they had not found in southwest Georgia and East Harlem.” King was assassinated a year later on the exact same date – brutally shot down on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee.

On April 4, 2026, the December 12th Movement led a rally and march through the streets of Brooklyn NYC, honoring the tremendous lessons Martin Luther King Jr. taught us as we continue to fight now, decades later. The current situation in the U.S. concerning ICE raids, prisons, DEI, police brutality, health care and poverty, as well as the wars of aggression in Iran, Venezuela, and Cuba demand our urgent unified resistance.

Several organizations, including the Committee to Eliminate Media Offensive to African People (CEMOTAP), Nation Of Islam (NOI), Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA), Cuba Si NY/NJ, Code Pink, Palaver Collective and Struggle La Lucha, among others, joined in solidarity.

December 12th Movement Chair Omowale Clay opened the rally bluntly stating, “The anti-war speech King gave at Riverside Church probably sealed his death. Because he had a mass following. Putting King next to the anti-war movement was like lighting a fuse… We don’t think that it was an accident that a year later on the same day, April 4th, he was assassinated.”

Raymond Dugue of the UNIA was explicit. “Dr. King said, ‘it comes a time when to remain silent is betrayal.’ There has to be a time when we say enough is enough! King said in 1967, that the greatest purveyor of violence in the world is the USA. Nothing has changed!”

Reverend Andrew Wilkes of the Double Love Experience Church was crystal clear about building a united front. “King, in addition to pushing a position against the Vietnam war was also in unity with welfare workers, indigenous people, and laborers, to organize the Poor Peoples’ Campaign. This is the kind of dangerous connection of the class struggle to the anti-war struggle… Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere!”

Stephen Millies of Struggle La Lucha put it most succinctly. “The then-FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover wanted Dr. King dead. The orders came from on high… Just 3 days ago, the Fuhrer in the White House declared he needs another half a trillion dollars for the slaughter of Iran and the continued strangulation of revolutionary Cuba. He says we don’t need health care, daycare, Medicaid, and Medicare. 500 billion dollars should be a down payment on reparations! It shouldn’t go to the Pentagon!”

The rally began at Jitu Weusi Plaza and ended at Malcolm X Plaza drawing the attention and vocal support of people on the streets of Bed-Stuy. Omowale Clay ended the day with this message, “We don’t want to come out today as an event. This is a process of organizing and mobilizing our people to fight back against this vicious turn of the United States and deepen the question of fascism, racism, and war.”