Honoring the Life and Accomplishments of Mrs. Coretta Scott King
HONORING THE LIFE AND ACCOMPLISHMENTS OF MRS. CORETTA SCOTT KING -- (House of Representatives - February 01, 2006)
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Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, it was with great sadness that I learned of the passing of Mrs. Coretta Scott King. I rise today along with my colleagues to celebrate and remember the life of a remarkable woman and support H. Res. 655. I know that I speak for my colleagues here today when I say that America has lost one of its great citizens.
Mrs. King's greatness lay in the special talents she had and her ability to use them in the numerous roles she played in her life. She started her adult life as an accomplished musician, receiving music degrees from Antioch College in Yellow Springs, OH, and the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston, MA. It was in Massachusetts that she met Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. They were married on June 18, 1953. In 1954, with her husband's installation at Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, AL, Mrs. King accepted the roles and responsibilities of a pastor's wife.
Mrs. King's singular talents may have been known just to members of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church if it had not been for the winds of change swirling around Montgomery in 1955. With the arrest of Rosa Parks for her refusal to give up her seat on a Montgomery public bus, the struggle for civil rights for Blacks in America formally began. Dr. King was at the epicenter of the civil rights movement, and Mrs. King was there by his side.
It is amazing that Coretta Scott King could play such a vital role in the civil rights movement while simultaneously raising a family. She was the mother of four at a time when a woman was expected to be a homemaker and not much else. Not content to stand on the sidelines of history, Mrs. King spoke on the cause of equality to church, civic, college, fraternal and peace groups. She also produced and performed in a series of freedom concerts as fundraisers for the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, the direct action organization of which Dr. King served as first president.
It is easy to forget the duress under which Mrs. King lived such an exemplary life. The threat of violent death was always present. The King family home was bombed in 1956. Death threats against her family arrived by phone and mail constantly, and Martin was stabbed and nearly killed in a New York department store in 1958. The threat became reality with Dr. King's assassination on April 4, 1968. No one would accuse Mrs. King of cowardice if she had retired from public life after Dr. King's death. But Dr. King's dream of an undivided America became her dream, and Mrs. King continued to work as an advocate for equality through nonviolent resistance.
Mrs. King devoted much of her energy to developing the Martin Luther King, Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change in Atlanta as a living memorial to her husband's life and dream. She led goodwill missions around the world speaking at massive peace and justice rallies. She was the first woman to deliver the class day address at Harvard University and the first woman to preach at a statutory service at St. Paul's Cathedral in London.
Mrs. King led the campaign to establish Dr. King's birthday as a national holiday. In 1983, the 98th Congress passed H.R. 5890 instituting the Martin Luther King, Jr. Federal Holiday Commission, which Mrs. King chaired for its duration. And in January 1986, Mrs. King oversaw the first legal holiday in honor of her husband--a holiday which has come to be celebrated by millions of people.
My thoughts and prayers are with the King family. I hope that this resolution honoring Mrs. King will be a comfort to them at this difficult time.
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