(RNS) — While Martin Luther King Jr. Day is mostly commemorated with quotes and clips of King’s 1963 “I Have a Dream” speech and footage of bus boycotts and the 1965 march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama, some of the most important moments of King’s work came later, as he turned his attention from civil rights to poverty and the Vietnam War.
As he made more appearances in Northern cities to protest segregation and unequal treatment of Black Americans, King’s popularity began to drop. Surveys of the American public as well as statements from some clergy and activists showed the cost of shifting his focus away from the South and Jim Crow after the passage of the Civil Rights Act.
In 1967 — the last full year of his life before he was killed in Memphis, Tennessee — Religion News Service (then known as Religious News Service) published dozens of stories about King, chronicling how his growing outspokenness against the Vietnam War and his advocacy for the poor, while it garnered support from celebrities such as Dr. Benjamin Spock, drew criticism from evangelist Billy Graham and others.
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