Dr. King would be occupied

Every leader who spoke at the Martin Luther King memorial dedication Sunday agreed that  the civil rights leader would have given two thumbs up to the Occupy Wall Street movement, and probably would have occupied a city or two himself.

Rather than accepting honors, King would be "occupying this place until there was a change in the economic system and the distribution of wealth," said his daughter, the Rev. Bernice King.

In fact, King and his Southern Christian Leadership Conference were in the midst of planning the Poor People's Campaign, which was to be the second phase of the Civil Rights movement, at the time of his asassination. The campaign would feature a march on Washington and would address issues of economic injustice  -- poverty, inferior education, joblessness and dilapidated housing. King also proposed that Congress pass an economic bill of rights.

The march, led by King's widow, Coretta Scott King, did go on as planned in the nation's capital in May, 1968, a month after King's death. A diverse group of protestors established a settlement there dubbed Resurrection City. It eventually closed a month later. The bill of rights never passed.

If he were alive today, "The living Dr. King would be occupying the [National] Mall and feeding the hungry," the Rev. Jesse Jackson said. "He'd be addressing the 48 million in poverty, the 52 million hunger-dependent.....That would be the living Dr. King, not the one frozen in in stone."

Click below to hear King's speech aout the Poor People's Campaign. Though he delivered it 43 years ago, it sounds as if it was written to address the nation's economic woes of 2011. Sadly, not much has changed.