King Memorial Is Worth More Than Gold

The timing couldn’t have been better. A little more than a month before the national celebration of Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday on Jan. 17, the National Capital Planning Commission unanimously approved the Martin Luther King Jr. Monument in Washington D.C. There was much handshaking, back-slapping and headline-grabbing quips by supporters of the King monument.

Yet when the euphoria passed, the stark reality that it will cost millions to build the monument sunk in. And the cash must be raised within seven years of the monument’s official design approval, probably in June. So now the question is: Who will and should pay for the King monument?

One answer is that those who benefited the most from the epochal social changes of the King-inspired and -led civil rights movement should pay. That means virtually everyone who has reaped the rewards of that movement--and there are millions. The civil rights movement had a global sweep. It ignited or profoundly influenced labor struggles, anti-colonial battles in Africa and Asia, priests in Latin America, student and pro-democracy movements in Europe, the gay and women’s movement and the peace movements. Most important, the civil rights movement ushered in a new age of economic and social justice for Americans of all colors that remolded and democratized much of law, politics and theology in the United States.

While they all owe an eternal debt to King, no one has benefited more from the gargantuan social changes that King inspired than African Americans.

There are two compelling reasons why African Americans should make it their solemn mission to bankroll the monument. The first is that the civil rights movement remade black America. The eternal media and public image of African American communities as a wasteland of violence and despair and in permanent crisis is false, phony and self-serving.

In the three decades since the civil rights movement smashed the barriers of legal segregation, this is how black America has benefited and changed: According to a Census Bureau report released in February 1999, nearly nine out of 10 African Americans aged 25-29 are high-school graduates, and 15% have college degrees. College enrollment among blacks has soared 40% over what it was a decade ago. The black high-school dropout rate is only marginally higher than that of non-blacks. African American median income continues to grow, and the drop in poverty rates for African Americans accounts for 60% of the overall drop in poverty in the United States. Twenty percent of African Americans work in management or the professions. The number of African American-owned businesses leaped nearly 50%, and their gross receipts rose 63% between 1987-1992. Nearly 60% of African American children under 18 live in a married-couple family.

The second reason to fund the memorial is that the civil rights movement opened the door to undreamed of fame and fortune for many African Americans. Oprah Winfrey, Michael Jordan, Bill Cosby, Michael Jackson, Tiger Woods and thousands of athletes and entertainers bag colossal incomes and contracts. They alone have the wealth and income to pay for dozens of King monuments. Yet they are only the most visible and conspicuous tip of the iceberg of African American wealth. Nearly half of all African Americans now earn incomes above $25,000. And there are thousands of businesspeople and professionals who earn incomes far above that. In 1999, the top 100 African American corporations had sales of more than $4 billion. While stock and mutual fund investments by African Americans still drag behind that of whites, more than 30% of African Americans have stock and bond investments.

King’s old fraternity, the Alpha Phi Alphas, has publicly announced that it will mount an international campaign to raise funds for the monument. With the mountainous wealth and income of many African Americans, it shouldn’t take seven days, or even seven minutes, for African Americans to pay for a monument for the man who did so much for so many. And if it takes a second longer than that to cough up the money, it will be the nation’s shame and disgrace, and African Americans’ special shame and disgrace. Let’s make sure that doesn’t happen by the time we celebrate King’s next birthday.