I encourage you all to read Martin Luther King's letter from the Birmingham Jail. It is a powerful document, and as a professor who believes in law and justice, King's words demonstrate that he did as well. Not just his words in this letter but his words in many other speeches as well. King truly wanted a color blind society in which all people were not judged by the color of their skin but the content of their character. We can debate the many issues we have in society today about how to achieve fairness, but the law is meant to be applied fairly. Criminal law, is meant to analyze the actions of one person at one moment in time. Did one person murder another, for example. The criminal law is meant to be blind for an individual case. That is why the statute of lady justice is wearing a blindfold. Outside of individual criminal acts is where we measure the actions of many, collect statistical data, and determine why portions of our society are unbalanced. King's words, in this letter and in many speeches, cover both of these two separate fields of study.Â
The Khan Academy video gives some background on the letter and who King was addressing in the letter. You can read the letter in its entirety at the second link. It is worth reading.
Video from Khan Academy
Letter