John Nichols: Dr. King's Candidate

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from The Nation:


BLOG | Posted 08/12/2007 @ 12:02am
Dr. King's Candidate
John Nichols


The Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. did not make many political endorsements. As the most recognized leader of a civil rights movement that enjoyed support from both Democrats and Republicans at the national level, and as a key player in the often life-and-death struggle to end American apartheid, he tended to stand above the political fray.

But in the spring of 1966, King traveled to Alabama with the explicit purpose of making an endorsement in the Democratic primary for governor. The man whose candidacy King supported was Richmond McDavid Flowers, one of the first "Deep South" politicians to embrace the promise of the civil rights movement.

Flowers died last Thursday at age 88. At the time of his passing, Flowers was an all-but-forgotten figure.

While others who lacked his courage or his prescience are now regarded as elder statesmen of the South, Flowers lived his last years in the obscurity reserved for those white southerners who came "too quickly" to the conclusion that Jim Crow had to go.

In a more just circumstance, Richmond Flowers would be a iconic figure -- not just in Alabama but in a nation where those who rejected racism in dangerous times and places ought to be seen as the greatest Americans.

In a period when so many around him failed and faltered, Flowers stood tall. .....(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.thenation.com/blogs/notion?bid=15