Former black radical now praises King's vision

Visiting Professor of Education Alvin O'Chambliss came of age in the 1960s as a college student at Jackson State University in Mississippi. Race relations in the Deep South were boiling over, and O'Chambliss soon grew to admire the radical black power leaders Stokley Carmichael and Julian Bond. \nMartin Luther King Jr. was at the height of his influence then, but many young African-Americans rejected him as a leader.\n"We felt he was less bold," O'Chambliss said. "We wanted black power. We were gung-ho."\nO'Chambliss said Carmichael and others in the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee felt King was "an Uncle Tom."\nToday he sees it differently. He credits King's middle-class background and his calmness amid the turmoil for making black advancement possible.\n"I'm not too proud to say that we were wrong," O'Chambliss said. "(King) could express his feelings in a less radical way. When he spoke, the whole world listened."\nIU and the Bloomington community will celebrate the life and legacy of King Monday. Classes are cancelled, and government offices are closed.\nWhile the holiday is packed with seminars, lectures, music and a film festival, events are also planned for later in the week. \n"The spirit does not just reside in one day," said IU law professor Frank Motley.\nMonday's planned celebrations include:\n-- Featured lectures by African-American journalist and intellectual George Curry and civil rights trailblazer Constance Curry\n-- A public discussion on diversity in the classroom, race relations and hate crimes.\n-- A concert by the African-American Choral Ensemble\n-- A film festival showing three classic performances by Sidney Poitier \nEvents later in the week include a civil rights reenactment march down Tenth Street and a three-part discussion on Native American, Latino and Asian-American activism. \nMotley said he is looking forward to hear Curry's lecture. A nationally syndicated columnist who has worked for the Chicago Tribune, St. Louis Post-Dispatch and Sports Illustrated, Curry has a reputation for tackling controversial subjects head-on.\n"He's a dynamic speaker, very passionate and very controversial," Motley said. "He doesn't bite his tongue."\nThe local theme uniting Monday's events is "A Day On! Not A Day Off!" to remind people to get out and participate in the activities.\nFormer President Ronald Reagan established the holiday commemorating King in 1983. O'Chambliss worked with Stevie Wonder and others to lobby Congress to create the national holiday. \nIU professor Carolyn Calloway-Thomas authored the book "Martin Luther King Jr. and the Sermonic Power of Public Discourse." She said King's philosophy of what he called "the beloved community" resonates today.\n"He wanted to bind people together in action," she said.\nKing's mesmerizing rhetoric also directed attention toward the gap between what America stood for in the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution and what it actually gave to its people, she said. \n"You can't deny that the 'I Have a Dream' speech catalyzed the movement," O'Chambliss said. "You have to have a symbol, and he was it."\n-- Contact General Assignments \nEditor Adam VanOsdol at avanosdo@indiana.edu.