Early yesterday morning I played yet again, the immortal words of the black civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King. They were words of protest delivered to more than a million of his supporters by the Lincoln Memorial in 1963; words immortalised in the phrase: “I have a dream....” And as I listened and watched, I could feel the tears welling up inside. And I had the same stirrings of emotion while I followed the inauguration of Barack Obama, and especially as I watched his daughters Malia and Sasha make their way along the corridor in the Capital Building to join the multitude outside. I think it was the sight of Malia especially, that got to me: just ten years old, radiant, and brimming with confidence. After all, the inauguration of their father as President of the United States, was about the future; and the future belongs to the young.
And I listened carefully beforehand to the pundits, who were speculating as to what the new President needed to do in his inaugural address: of how he needed to inspire the masses with something more than: “Yes we can”. What was needed they told us, was a new form of words, a phrase that would capture the moment and be remembered when all of us had returned to our ordinary lives. Well, if they were at fault for missing the point, I too was at fault for not spotting it, until the ceremonies were over and I was walking the dog. For whatever phrases Martin Luther King, or John F Kennedy, might have left us to ponder, no such rhetoric was required on this occasion. Because for months and years to come, what will inspire the masses, is not words, but the sight of an African-American family in the White House.
And besides being moved by the significance of what was happening, I was struck, (the oaths of office accepted), by how prayerful the occasion was. First, there was the invocation by the controversial pastor Rick Warren from California, in which he asked God's blessing on Obama: that he might lead the nation with “humility”, “integrity” “compassion”, and “generosity”, before going on to call for forgiveness, in particular, “when we fail to treat our fellow human beings and all the Earth with the respect that they deserve...” And this religious sentiment found an echo in the music of John Williams, especially composed for the occasion. For woven into the score, were echoes of the well known song / hymn, Lord of the Dance. And who could not have enjoyed the conclusion of the concluding prayer, or “Benediction”, delivered by the Rev. Joseph E. Lowery. The Rev Lowery together with Martin Luther King, was a co-founder of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference in 1957 and he crusaded along with King for voting and other civil rights for blacks. The conclusion to his prayer was greeted with laughter and applause, not just on account of its wit, but because it put the affairs of men, (the pomp and ceremonial of the state), in perspective:
“...help us work for that day when black will not be asked to give back, when brown can stick around, when yellow will be mellow, when the red man can get ahead, man, and when white will embrace what is right.”
Now in the context of this prayerfulness, I found myself wondering about two things. How was it that the swearing in of the new President, an action of the legislature, could be accompanied by Christian religious ritual, when the First Amendment of the Constitution expressly forbids the making of laws “respecting an establishment of religion” In other words, where there is to be no state church and no one religious creed given preference over another, nor preference over irreligion? And the second question in this same context, was, what if Obama had been a Muslim?
Well, thankfully, this last question is the easier of the two to answer. For the Constitution under Article II Section I, makes this provision in respect of the President:
"Before he enter on the Execution of his Office, he shall take the following Oath or Affirmation: - "I do solemly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.""
As for my first question, I am backing off, because I am not remotely competent to answer it, still less comment on the shenanigans between the Executive and the Supreme Court, that has the final say as to what was intended by the Founding Fathers. But I am not finished.
In my previous blog: “I Have a Dream that one day...” I wrote that: “for me”, the emergence of Barrack Obama on the world stage, had the feel of the fulfilment of prophecy, not just because of who he is, but because until recently, no one had seen him coming, an unlikely follower in the footsteps of George Bush. Well, this sense of the prophetic, has caused me for days, to wonder if perhaps we didn't pay sufficient attention to what Martin Luther King actually had to say in that memorable address. Because if we had, we might have understood it better. In it, and with reference to the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, Martin Luther King used the language of money: the metaphor of the “promissory note” to highlight the sense of injustice in black America. Whenever it is presented, he reminded his audience, it is returned on the grounds that there are “insufficient funds”. After which, and with the pitch of his voice rising, he went on to pour scorn on the idea, that, “the bank of justice [was] bankrupt”, adding:
“We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation. And so, we've come to cash in this check, a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice.”
Reflecting on these words I could not help wondering, (in the context of the prophetic), if it had not been intended that we see this metaphor as the sign, whereby we would see it coming: the collapse of an economic system and set of values, that to no small degree, (both inside and outside America), was founded on slavery. And that natural justice when it came, would require us, not just to reassess our values, in terms of money, but also in terms of who we are in relation to one another. And that that is why, it has fallen to a son of that great injustice, to provide inspiration and hope.
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© Cormac McCloskey
Note: This blog, "High Noon", was first published on Windows Live Spaces, by me, on 21st January 2009
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