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While sitting in the cell of the Birmingham Jailhouse, Martin Luther King Jr. wrote a letter to his followers explaining the current situation with his arrest and the injustice sweltered around him. His actions showing civil disobedience is only ok when the need is great and harm the futures of those to come. King feels not only as a person being directly affected by the racial profiling going on in the South, but as a Christian man and President of many of his religious groups he should stand up for himself and others to help aid the problems faced. “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere” said Martin Luther King Jr. in paragraph five. By this he means that the injustice battles faced not only in Birmingham but in the South altogether, it is only a matter of time until others outside of this region will follow similar patterns. And when this takes place those he has an obligation to lead the blacks in a way where they are respectful yet determined to seek towards a change. Though him and other African American leaders have sought to follow all guidelines of a nonviolent campaign, city officials like their police respond with brutality and the bombing of their houses and churches. Stating how long African Americans have waited for equal rights in the thirteenth paragraph, King compares his situation and issues with the justice system to the Asian and African nations, who have sought towards a long battle of political justice and won, yet people in America still have trouble with such an adjustment for different races. King also states how his fight for equality through nonviolence has become more and more of a difficult task because of the feelings many of his fellow black oppressors who feel that it is getting them nowhere. “Past promises have been broken by the politicians and merchants of Birmingham and now is the time to fulfill the natural right of all people to be treated equal” quoted also in the essay.
