Martin Luther King Jr.-Letter from a Birmingham Jail Essay
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English [1]
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AP Language [9]
The Upside of Extremism In 1963, at the height of racial segregation in the southern United States, Martin Luther King Jr. was arrested for a non-violent protest in Birmingham, Alabama. King?s arrest caused many of his religious peers to examine his methods. Eight of his fellow clergymen responded to his actions in a letter that questioned why he found it necessary to protest segregation. In his Letter from a Birmingham Jail, Martin Luther King Jr. addresses his fellow clergymen on the necessity of civil disobedience in overcoming segregation. His primary rhetorical strategies are appeals to religion and patriotism, and while the biblical allusions may at first appear to be his primary method, patriotism takes precedence.