Dr. King had big plans for the next phase of the civil rights movement when he died.
He was going to expand it all — fighting nonviolently against war, imperialism and poverty.
Now, Rev. William Barber, the leader of North Carolina’s chapter of the NAACP, is leaving that post in order to pick up where King left off.
Next summer will mark the 50th anniversary of the start of King’s campaign against poverty, and Barber is already making preparations to launch his action then.
As the head of North Carolina’s NAACP, Barber has helped to spearhead the battle against the state’s controversial bathroom bill as well as the struggle against a state constitutional amendment passed in 2012 that banned gay marriage.
The “Moral Mondays” protests Barber led in front of the North Carolina state legislature building also focused on voter registration laws and voter access — the protests demanded that initiatives like voter ID laws not be put on the books and that poor and minority voters not be disenfranchised.
All of this work led Barber to the national stage — you may remember seeing him onstage at last year’s Democratic National Convention, where he called on all Americans to vote, saying then that voters are “the moral defibrillator of our time,” that in their hands is the power to make America a more loving, just, and merciful place.
Now that voters haven’t shocked the nation’s conscience back to life, Barber is taking matters into his own hands.
“We need a narrative shift that’s … not just about the normal discussion of left versus right and conservative versus liberal, but really a reset of our deepest values,” Barber told the Associated Press, “Dr. King said in 1968 we needed a moral revolution of values, and we say we need a moral revival.”
Barbers says more details about what form the campaign will take are forthcoming. However, he did announce that he will be working with his personal nonprofit, Repairers of the Breach, the Union Theological Seminary and the Kairos Center across 25 states focusing on eradicating poverty and on ending voter suppression.
Watch here for more information on this new front in the struggle for civil rights and for info on how you can help contribute to Barber’s campaign.
