Every year, citizens around the United States take a day off in January to honor the birthday of civil rights hero Martin Luther King, Jr. Here are five things every Lemonter should know about the national holiday:
A Brief History of MLK Day
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was a prominent activist and clergyman in the African-American civil rights movement during the 1950s and 1960s. He led the 1955 Montgomery Bus Boycott, and in 1963 he delivered his famous "I Have a Dream" speech in Washington D.C. He won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964.
King was assassinated on April 4, 1968, in Memphis, Tenn. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day was declared a federal holiday in 1983 by President Ronald Reagan. It was first observed Jan. 20, 1986, and in 1992, President George H.W. Bush declared that the holiday would be observed on the third Monday of January. All 50 holidays observed the holiday for the first time in 2000.
The idea of Martin Luther King Jr. Day as a holiday was promoted by labor unions in contract negotiations.[1] After King's death, United States Representative John Conyers (a Democrat from Michigan) and United States Senator Edward Brooke (a Republican from Massachusetts) introduced a bill in Congress to make King's birthday a national holiday. The bill first came to a vote in the U.S. House of Representatives in 1979. However, it fell five votes short of the number needed for passage.[2] Two of the main arguments mentioned by opponents were that a paid holiday for federal employees would be too expensive, and that a holiday to honor a private citizen would be contrary to longstanding tradition (King had never held public office).[2] Only two other persons have national holidays in the United States honoring them: George Washington, the first President of the United States, and Christopher Columbus, the navigator, colonizer, and explorer from the Republic of Genoa, whose voyages across the Atlantic Ocean led to general European awareness of the American continents.
Soon after, the King Center turned to support from the corporate community and the general public. The success of this strategy was cemented when musician Stevie Wonder released the single "Happy Birthday" to popularize the campaign in 1980 and hosted the Rally for Peace Press Conference in 1981. Six million signatures were collected for a petition to Congress to pass the law, termed by a 2006 article in The Nation as "the largest petition in favor of an issue in U.S. history."[1]
Ronald Reagan and Coretta Scott King at the Martin Luther King, Jr. Day signing ceremonyAt the White House Rose Garden on November 2, 1983, President Ronald Reagan signed a bill, proposed by Representative Katie Hall of Indiana, creating a federal holiday to honor King.[3][4] It was observed for the first time on January 20, 1986.
The bill established the Martin Luther King, Jr. Federal Holiday Commission to oversee observance of the holiday, and Coretta Scott King, Martin Luther King Jr.'s wife, was made a member of this commission for life by President George H. W. Bush in May 1989.
