Pasadena Black History Month Magazine - February 2023 | Pages 13 & 14
KING TO CALTECH STUDENTS: 'SEEK TO SOLVE LOCAL PROBLEMS'
"WE MUST HAVE ACTIVE COMMITMENT RATHER THAN MERE ACADEMIC ACCEPTANCE IF WE ARE TO SOLVE THE RACIAL PROBLEMS THAT FACE AMERICA TODAY.
"The oppressed peoples of the world are coming through the wilderness of adjustment and into the promised land of liberty," King said in an address in Dabney Hall Tuesday night.
"The older order of segregation is passing away and a new order of justice and freedom is gradually coming into being." The accompanying world tensions are "the usual pains that accompany the birth of anything new." King pointed out that there are "challenges to be met if the new order is to survive.
The first is to rise above the narrow confines of individual concerns to the broad concerns of all humanity."
"There are four things a Caltech student could do to help the racial situation," King said in an interview with the California Tech. "He should seek to give impetus to movements and to influence political leaders. He should seek to solve local problems. Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.
"He should give support, both moral and financial, to freedom fighters everywhere. The vast majority of people believe in integration, but they need organization and support. And finally, he should help to educate himself and others. Very few people are totally free of misconceptions about Negroes."