Political Quotes

“Martin Luther King was truly an American. He was a loyal American. He took the difficult side. He took the dark side and brought light to it. He enlightened all of America on the evils. He enlightened all of America on the worst part of our system. But he also moved to correct the evil, to shed not only light but to bring those evils to the forefront and to terminate them and eradicate them from our society. During his lifetime he was only partially successful in doing this. It is up to the rest of us to continue his good work. To reauthorize this act means that we reaffirm what he had started. It means that we wish to continue what he has done. It means that we wish to continue to strengthen democracy. His legacy proves to us that it was needed. To remember him is to improve on that legacy. As we look at our society, all those things that are good and all those things that we wish to preserve, we often think of our heroes and what they have done to improve the past. Mr. Speaker, this is one hero whose legacy we must preserve. We must preserve what he started. We must continue to improve on it. And we do that when we reauthorize the act that set his date as a national holiday. It is not a day just to remember him but is a day to be joyful that a man of his caliber came along and set the record straight and changed America. It was his desire to do good. It ought to be our desire to continue goodness.”