As a teenager I had never been able to accept the fact of having to go to the back of a bus or sit in the segregated section of a train. The first time I had been seated behind a curtain in a dining car, I felt as if the curtain had been dropped on my selfhood. – Martin Luther King,Jr., Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story, 1958

“I” cannot reach fulfillment without “thou.” The self cannot be self without other selves. Self-concern without other-concern is like a tributary that has no outward flow to the ocean. – Martin Luther King,Jr., Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community?, 1967

The poor in our countries have been shut out of our minds and driven from the mainstream of our societies, because we have allowed them to become invisible. – Martin Luther King,Jr., Nobel Prize lecture, 11 December 1968

A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death. – Martin Luther King,Jr., Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community?, 1967