One of the most serious problems we face as a nation in 2025 is recovering our national history. Our history has been smeared and distorted by a deliberate Jacobin academic culture that hopes to make young minds despair about the nation’s good name and purpose. Because MLK day falls on inauguration day, there will be vicious deceits abounding to maintain the afro-pessimist framing of black history in America. In reality, King’s dream was substantially accomplished by powerful dimensions of Christian political idealism that eviscerate pretentious academic fearmongering such as “Christian nationalism” and “separation of Church and State.” Prior to his ascendancy to Christian pulpits of leadership in the churches of the South, Martin Luther King was preceded by two noteworthy Methodist thinkers and advocates dedicated to racial equality: James Farmer Jr. and James Meredith. King’s rightful vision preached on August 28, 1963 was to hope: “my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.” Though this vision is specifically repudiated today by many contemporary academic programs on diversity, King’s purpose was not only true but substantially accomplished.
Loc” class=”post-image-right” height=”294″ data-src=”https://images.americanthinker.com/ri/ri9khvmoebctnyygcjjc_640.jpg” width=”350″>Born June 25, 1933 in Kosciusko, Mississippi, James Meredith grew up as a Methodist believing that he is on a mission from God to end white supremacy in his home state. Meredith is arguably the most significant living civil rights leader. Meredith is perhaps the most conservative of all the American civil rights leaders. Meredith believes that the United States Constitution guarantees equal rights to both black and white people. Meredith did not believe in the social activism urged and practiced by Farmer and King. He believed non-violence was foolish and that guns were necessary to enforce civil rights. He believed strictly in individual rights. He served in the United States military and for him, the crisis that brought 30,000 federal troops to the campus of University of Mississippi on September 30, 1962 was precisely what was necessary to stop the outrageous white supremacy of the Democratic Party of Mississippi. His forceful entry onto the campus led to the murder of French journalist Paul Guihard and our nation to the brink of a second civil war as local white supremacists sought to defend Meredith’s exclusion from the campus. Meredith continues to believe that Christian churches must play an important part in preserving black life in America. His conservative stances about American politics have caused him to be ostracized in contemporary academic settings. When the Harvard Graduate School for Education awarded him the Medal for Education Impact in 2013 for integrating Ole Miss, he criticized schools for being out of touch with the reality of black students and said that children need to learn religious and moral values from their elders. “The problem with public school education in America today is that the Kingdom of God has been removed from the process,” he said, because teachers and adults “fear… what will happen to me if I help this child? The question should be, what will happen to this child if I don’t do my duty?” Meredith’s present exclusion from current discussions and celebrations of black equality are a testament to the neo-racist convictions of our current academic culture.
Many political critics today rightly decry critical race theory. Denouncing such theory does little to correct the national problem. Critical race theory reifies failed afro-pessimist dogma such as the early Malcolm X and Stokely Carmichael. Their visions of killing and violence harmed black bodies and hurt black equality. Malcolm X in his final speech before his assassination acknowledged this reality and complained that afro-pessimists in the Nation of Islam already were trying to kill him and his family. He expounded a new vision of love and desegregation — repudiating his violent rhetoric of the past. For that, he was assassinated by Thomas Hagan the next week. Recovering the stories of dozens if not hundreds of afro-idealists like Farmer and Meredith is essential to our new and greater American future. They represent a true, ideal, and successful path whereby King’s vision was substantially accomplished. Censorship will not correct our presently misguided path. Recovering the afro-idealist history will point the path to defeating the current Neo-racist radicals who dominate our college campuses today. Christianity played an inescapably critical role in the success of the American Civil Rights movement. King’s dream is great because of its American pragmatism and its success in improving the human condition here in the United States and even around the world. We are the new generation connected to that fresh 21st century challenge to do the same.
Dr. Ben Voth is professor of rhetoric and director of debate at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas. He his the author of several academic books regarding political communication, presidential rhetoric, and genocide. Professor Voth’s book — James Farmer Jr.: The Great Debater — exposes much of the hidden civil rights history of America involving men like Malcolm X, James Meredith, and Martin Luther King.
Jesus Christ is King
