DIVERSITY
The Invention of a Concept
Chapter One
Diversity in America
Loose Threads
In his Letter from Birmingham Jail, April 16, 1963, Dr. Martin Luther
King Jr. offered a striking image of human unity. He wrote:
Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are
caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single
garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all
indirectly.
King had used the phrase "single garment of destiny" before, as
early as a 1961 commencement speech at Lincoln University, and he
would use it again in many more speeches and sermons. Sometimes
he varied the surrounding language:
We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a
single garment of destiny. All life is interrelated.
(Nobel Peace Prize lecture, Oslo, Norway, December 11, 1964)
We are tied together-white and black Americans-in a single
garment of destiny. There cannot be a separate black or white
path to power.
(Address at the University of Pittsburgh, ... read full excerpt from Diversity: The Invention of A Concept ebook
