MLK's Fight Against Racism, Militarism & Capitalism: Historian Taylor Branch on King's Final Years
by mail@democracynow.org (Democracy Now!) from Democracy Now! on (#3KXA8)
It was 50 years ago today when Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated in Memphis. He was just 39 years old. We turn now to a conversation Democracy Now! recently had with Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Taylor Branch and writer Trey Ellis, who both worked on the new HBO documentary "King in the Wilderness," which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival. The film recalls the last three years of King's life, beginning after President Lyndon Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Despite passage of the monumental legislation, King set his eyes on new battles by launching a Poor People's Campaign and campaigning to stop the Vietnam War. King's decision to publicly oppose the war isolated him from many of his closest supporters.