A dream deferred?media.economist.com
A dream deferred?
Made popular 1876 days ago in Society & Religion
economist.com — MARTIN LUTHER KING dreamed of a day when his children would be judged not by skin colour but by character. Black America has moved far since his murder on April 4th 1968, at least on the political front. Four decades ago racists blew up churches and beat civil-rights marchers. Today, at least at the top, black America has found its voice: a black woman, Condoleezza Rice, is secretary of state, and a black man, Barack Obama, may capture the presidency in November.

In social and economic matters across the black population as a whole, however, blacks are still much worse off than whites. They endure far greater rates of poverty, crime and other social ills. Efforts to tackle these problems have produced dismal results, as opposing groups lay claim to King's dream of colour-blindness.

Schooling shows some of the most intractable difficulties. Last year the Supreme Court declared unconstitutional plans by two school districts to assign students, according to race, to various schools (in an effort to balance the mix of races in classrooms). The court narrowly declared that the plans were against the constitution's promise of equality before the law.

Yet few tools exist to tackle de facto educational resegregation. Aggressive federal intervention in the 1960s got black and white pupils to mix more. But by the 1980s white parents and conservative jurists had turned against controversial programmes such as the bussing of students to distant schools. Today blacks are again increasingly concentrated, if not legally segregated, into failing schools. Some 73% of black

Report This Post
Posted by rfuller
Add To Favorites
137 Votes
Similar Issues
3 Comments
ShareThis
Has Dr. King's Dream been realized?
Yes
37%
No
63%
This is not a scientific survey, click here to learn more. Results may not total 100% due to rounding and voting descrepencies.
User Comments
Charles43
Posted 1876 days ago
0 up votes, 0 down votes
Dr. King's dream has gained at lot of ground after his death - slow but moving forward. I believe in Senator Obama. His managerial skills, grass-roots politics, bringing people and country together, and finally putting the issues of race and gender, etc., is right-on. Senator Obama say's what he is going to do and does it. This in its self can bring Dr. King's dream closer to reality.
moblou
Posted 1875 days ago
0 up votes, 0 down votes
I'm very much afraid that Senator Obama is hurting race relations in our country, rather than helping it. I, for one, am fearful in my own community to show support for Hillary Clinton around African Americans. Also, I talk to many white and black Americans who feel their race has had racist feelings heightened. Many black Americans also say that they are intimidated to show support for Hillary as well. I don't think this is MLK's dream being realized anymore. Let's get back to the premise that all men and women are created equal. I do not like the way things are going after Obama's "race speech". He too, in my mind is taking the black voter for granted. That is not right either. Tell us what you really have to offer America, Senator Obama.
jbierman
Posted 1875 days ago
0 up votes, 0 down votes
Maybe not realized, but we've come a looooong way
You will have 2 minutes to edit your comment.

Add your comments