MLK Day and Citizen's United

courtesy of Marion S. Trikosko/Library of Congress

In an AlterNet article appearing today, the day we celebrate the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., entitled "As We Celebrate MLK Day . . . Tomorrow's Anniversary of Citzen's United Reminds Us of Increasing Injustice," Professor Ian Haney Lopez discusses the connection between Dr. King's economic equality message which dominated the final years of his life, and increasing wealth inequality in America, represented strongly by the Supreme Court's Citizen's United opinion.

Per AlterNet:  "Monday is the national holiday honoring Martin Luther King Jr., and  Tuesday marks the fourth anniversary of Citizens United, the case that dramatically widened the flood of big money in elections. Their confluence is opportune, for while each seems to invite reflection on a different core social problem—respectively racial inequality and the power of concentrated wealth—each teaches lessons relevant to the other.

King clearly saw how racial and economic justice formed mutual requirements. The strike by African American sanitation workers in Memphis, where King was assassinated, reflected the truth that racial justice for minorities would depend on economic opportunities. In the other direction, the Poor Peoples’ March on Washington that King labored for in the months before his death arose out of the conviction that economic security for persons of every race depended on transcending racial divisions."