EJI / Legacy Museum Letter
Dr Babs and Naomi
First I want to thank you for including me in the Heritage Trail tour! Next year ,I will be healthy enough to work and be more involved in help to make next year's tour work for more people!
I’m writing this letter with thoughts of my heart wrenching experience from our visit to the Legacy Museum and thoughts from Martin :
“ Now is the time to get this right…. What is needed is the realization that power without love is reckless and abusive and love without power is sentimental and anemic. Power, at it’s best , is love implementing the demands of justice and justice at it’s best is lovingly correcting everything that stands against love.” Today there seems to be far too many events occurring that are unjust and against love.
As I experienced visiting the Legacy Museum it is those injustices that demand we create the Naomi Ruth Barber King Youth Empowerment Center in Atlanta Ga. Precisely that collision of immoral power with powerless morality which still constitutes the major crisis of our time.
I would like us to be part of this Movement (EJI & others ) to try to create a just nation more committed to fairness and equality. The YEC will be committed to pursuing relief from the under education and over incarceration of our young people. Which has made the USA the most punitive nation on earth. Our children need our love and an education not our hatred and incarceration!
We will provide alternatives to the HS Dropout Crisis and the current pipeline to incarceration. We will give the courts and decision makers a way to reduce relying on jails and prisons.
Conditions in the state of Georgia of confinement have become abusive, violent, dangerous and unconstitutional. We will be committed to change the narrative about over incarceration, racial and economic injustices. As all of this seems to worsen , it's time to get this right! Mostly because I am aware of several urgent situations: (1)our goal is/was to have Naomi be with us the day the YEC doors open (2) thousands of our young continue to live their lives in fear, uncertainty, hopelessness and chaos (3) we seem to be regressing in our human rights/ civil rights as a society- 50 years age Martin , A.D., Bobby and others gave their lives for this not to happen.
What happens to a dream deferred? Langston Hughes asked this question in one of his most moving and insightful poems:”Does this dream dry up like a raisin in the sun?” I am asking us the same question about the lives of three extraordinary gifted men ( A.D., Martin & RFK) The brothers were born in the segregated south- living the conditions exhibited at the Legacy Museum! All died before their dreams could be realized.
Now is the time for us to get this right!! What does happen to dreams deferred ? Those dreams seem to have snaked in chaos, hopelessness, despair, addiction and poverty. For far too many , these dreams deferred have continued to be the American Nightmare! This Nightmare has left millions out of the American Dream!!
Martin cried out over fifty years ago “ Why We Can't Wait" I believe NOW is the time to open the doors of opportunities for our at risk youth. My vision is the Naomi Ruth Barber King Youth Empowerment Center in Atlanta Ga. It will be the vehicle that drives the dreams of our young people into a hope filled future ! I believe by creating the Naomi Ruth Barber King Youth Empowerment Center, we can recreate A.D. and Martin's vision : Educational and Economic Empowerment!
Over the past three years, I have been touched by Naomi's grace, faith, integrity , intellect , love and her compassion for all. In Montgomery she was visibility shaken when we arrived at the Legacy Museum. Her pain seemed deep, scars of her past experiences. In spite of her past experiences she genuinely loves everyone. My mission is for All to know the dedication and love she has for All Gods people and especially for Gods Children!
The creation of the YEC will be a living memorial to help not defer the Brothers Dream! By focusing on bringing justice to those who currently live in humiliation, despair, hopelessness and broken promises. The Center’s focus on Educational and Economic Empowerment will continue the Brothers Dream - Naomi's Dream! We need to move forward while Naomi is gracing us with presence. It would ,also, bring into perpetual existence the truth about the role of Dr Rev Alfred Daniel King in the Civil Rights movement.
I thank you and Naomi for your prayers, unconditional love and having me like a member of the family.
Your fellow warrior of peace, hope , love and justice. I am a very proud Board Member of the A.D. King Foundation. Kevin McDermott
Now is the time for us to get this right!