Ian Gomez Moncayo - Analytical Reading Letter From Birmingham Jail 3.10

Then came the opportunity last September to talk with some of the leaders of the economic community. In these negotiating sessions certain promises were made by the merchants, such as the promise to remove the humiliating racial signs from the stores. On the basis of these promises, Reverend Shuttlesworth and the leaders of the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights agreed to call a moratorium on any type of demonstration. As the weeks and months unfolded, we realized that we were the victims of a broken promise. The signs remained. As in so many experiences of the past, we were confronted with blasted hopes, and the dark shadow of a deep disappointment settled upon us. So we had no alternative except that of preparing for direct action, whereby we would present our very bodies as a means of laying our case before the conscience of the local and national community. Check Your Understanding Underline the promise that King explains the merchants broke which may have prevented the direct action he’s describing Source Analysis What was the direct action seeking to get the merchants to do? Source Analysis Highlight the claim Dr. King supports using the evidence of the broken promise by the merchants This can come from this section or the one below. We were not unmindful of the difficulties involved. So we decided to go through a process of self- purification. We started having workshops on nonviolence and repeatedly asked ourselves the questions, “Are you able to accept blows without retaliating?” and “Are you able to endure the ordeals of jail?” We decided to set our direct-action program around the Easter season, realizing that, with exception of Christmas, this was the largest shopping period of the year. Knowing that a strong economic withdrawal program would be the by- product of direct action, we felt that this was the best time to bring pressure on the merchants for the needed changes. Then it occurred to us that the March election was ahead, and so we speedily decided to postpone action until after election day. When we discovered that Mr. Conner was in the runoff, we decided again to postpone action so that the demonstration could not be used to cloud the issues. At this time we agreed to begin our nonviolent witness the day after the runoff. Source Analysis Highlight the claim Dr. King supports using the evidence of the broken promise by the merchants This can come from this section or the one below. Source Analysis Thinking back to Dr. King’s intended audience and purpose, why is he describing these delays in the direct action? What is he trying to communicate to his audience? This reveals that we did not move Check Your Understanding Underline where, in this

After You Read Thinking Like a Political Scientist Reasoning Process: Process What was the process for achieving gains in civil rights that Dr. King described in his argument? What challenges might a social movement using this process encounter? How might a social movement using this process overcome this challenge? Political Science Disciplinary Practices Source Analysis What is one implication of the process outlined in Dr. King’s argument? How might this process affect policy-making, other social movements, or another political principle, institution, process, policy, or behavior discussed in the course so far?

cottonwoods, for relief from the late-summer heat, and, beneath a tarp, hung a tin can containing cedar leaves and coals from a neighbor’s fire to cleanse the site with smoke. The next morning, we set off for the main part of the encampment. I wondered whether the pause in construction would prompt people to leave, but it became clear, as we approached a mass of tent canopies, that the protest was still growing. Men and women unloaded donations from the trunks of cars—boxes of squash, bags of warm clothes—and passed them with cheerful efficiency down a line of volunteers. Others chopped firewood, hauled trash, peeled vegetables, and fed horses. I unloaded some donations and then joined Yellowbird-Chase for lunch. (It was important, she said, that “we eat with the people.”) As we stood in line, friends and strangers stopped to chat. Many would greet us like this throughout the day, including an elderly white man who was handing out red feathers and who explained, timidly, that he’d dreamed of the protests before he’d come and, in this dream, had handed out red feathers. “That’s cool,” Yellowbird-Chase said, and stuck one in her hair. Over the weekend, the encampment continued to swell with new visitors. Aztec dancers came from Minneapolis, then delegations from the Round Valley Indian Tribes in California, the Jemez Pueblo in New Mexico, and the Blackfeet Nation in Montana. They entered through a corridor lined with the flags of hundreds of other tribes who had offered support. These arrivals, which happened every day, signified as much a coming together of old enemies as of old friends. Weeks earlier, the Crow, who aided the U.S. Cavalry in its nineteenth-century battles against the Sioux, had come with blankets, coolers of meat, and a horse trailer full of cordwood. What is the author seeking to show in this section about the social movement underlying the protests in Standing Rock? Source Analysis How is the process Dr. King described for advancing civil rights potentially relevant to the Native Americans at Standing Rock?