Coretta King Calls For Nonviolent Protest

Echoing the message of her late husband, Martin Luther King Jr., Coretta Scott King last night told a Memorial Church audience that "non-violence can be applied to solve every major conflict facing humanity today."

Speaking before a half-capacity crowd of 300 in Memorial Church, King, who is the president of the Martin Luther King Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change, cited the success of the women's rights movement, the work of Bishop Desmond Tutu and Corazon Aquino.

She said non-violent protest could be also used to bring democracy and human rights to South Africa, Haiti and the Soviet Union because it "is the most powerful force available to the peace and liberation movements throughout the world."

King spoke out strongly against the nuclear arms race, saying that it was the cause of "poverty and economic stagnation throughout the world" because governments are spending money on nuclear arms instead of social programs.

King cited nuclear arms as the cause of "poverty and economic stagnation throughout the world."

"We are approaching spiritual death," she said. "We must stave the tide of military aggression."

The arms race "is ruining our economy and is demoralizing millions of homeless impoverished Americans. We are dangerously weak at the very fabric of our society," she said.

She also attacked the current "peace through strength" doctrines saying that human rights will not be gained by building up nuclear arsenals.

Gospel Music and Prayer

King was the keynote speaker in an evening of Jubilee Singers gospel music and prayer, sponsored by the Divinity School, the DuBois Institute and Radcliffe's Schlesinger Library.

Praising the lack of violence during the first national celebration of Martin Luther King Jr. Day in January, the civil rights leader's widow said that "this peaceful holiday was a great affirmation of non-violence."

King said her husband's work is still relevant 18 years after his death. "His work can be found in the ever-increasing chorus of struggling people everywhere," she said. "Not all the bullets and all the arsenals could kill his dream."

King also showed a video about the Martin Luther King Jr. Center, which receives over a 500,000 visitors a year.

The center, both a memorial to her husband and a training center on the methods and techniques of non-violent change, contains the papers of both Martin Luther King and Mahatma Gandhi, and hosts lectures, symposia and theatrical productions geared to teach problem solving through non-violent means.

"Non-violence gave us the dignity and power to resist racism and brutality," King said. "It raised us up to the promise of freedom and justice."