Martin Luther King, Jr.
Martin Luther King's "I have a dream" speech is one of the most historic and powerful speeches in history. He began with a story: "Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand, signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of captivity.But one hundred years later, we must face the tragic fact that the Negro is still not free. One hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination. One hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity. One hundred years later, the Negro is still languishing in the corners of American society and finds himself an exile in his own land. So we have come here today to dramatize an appalling condition. " With this opening, he captured his audience's attention, and the rest is history.
Source
Boundless vets and curates high-quality, openly licensed content from around the Internet. This particular resource used the following sources: