Letter from Birmingham

Martin Luther king uses logic, character driven, rhetoric and emotional appeal in his letter to Birmingham to give his letter multiple dimensions all while saying his one clear message of equality. When Martin Luther first starts his letter with logic, clearly stating he was in Birmingham for a conference, “ I have the honor of serving as president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, an organization operating in every southern state, with headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia. We have some eighty-five affiliated organizations across the South, and one of them is the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights. Frequently we share staff, educational and financial resources with our affiliates. Several months ago the affiliate here in Birmingham asked us to be on call to engage in a nonviolent direct action program if such were deemed necessary. We readily consented.” Martin then takes logic by breaking down injustice with “ In any nonviolent campaign there are four basic steps: collection of the facts to determine whether injustices exist; negotiation; self purification; and direct action. We have gone through all these steps in Birmingham.” After he has broken down how to eradicate injustice, he then goes to answer how Birmingham lacks in these categories. Martin then gets to the point to say he is in Birmingham to fight injustice, in which he uses character driven appeal to show the readers that not only is he logical, but also he can get the reader engaged by giving his message a relatable theme so the reader can understand. Martin uses biblical scriptures of the men carrying the gospel through the town to connect to the theme of martin’s journey of giving the gospel to the injustice town of Birmingham, “ I am in Birmingham because injustice is here. Just as the prophets of the eighth century B.C. left their villages and carried their “thus saith the Lord” far beyond the boundaries of their home towns, and just as the Apostle Paul left his village of Tarsus and carried the gospel of Jesus Christ to the far corners of the Greco Roman world, so am I compelled to carry the gospel of freedom beyond my own home town.” Lastly, Martin uses emotional appeal by describing his experience with the Birmingham economic leaders by using many metaphors describing the dissapointment and pain martin and his collegues feel for being let down, “Then, last September, came the opportunity to talk with leaders of Birmingham’s economic community. In the course of the negotiations, certain promises were made by the merchants–for example, to remove the stores’ humiliating racial signs. On the basis of these promises, the Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth and the leaders of the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights agreed to a moratorium on all demonstrations. As the weeks and months went by, we realized that we were the victims of a broken promise. A few signs, briefly removed, returned; the others remained. As in so many past experiences, our hopes had been blasted, and the shadow of deep disappointment settled upon us. We had no alternative except to prepare for direct action, whereby we would present our very bodies as a means of laying our case before the conscience of the local and the national community. Mindful of the difficulties involved, we decided to undertake a process of self purification. We began a series of workshops on nonviolence, and we repeatedly asked ourselves: “Are you able to accept blows without retaliating?” “Are you able to endure the ordeal of jail?” We decided to schedule our direct action program for the Easter season, realizing that except for Christmas, this is the main shopping period of the year. Knowing that a strong economic-withdrawal program would be the by product of direct action, we felt that this would be the best time to bring pressure to bear on the merchants for the needed change.” Near the climax of the letter, Martin uses rhetoric to get his ideas of how to take down injustice as a way to get the reader to be engaged with his main point of writing his letter with “ we felt that our direct action program could be delayed no longer. You may well ask: “Why direct action? Why sit ins, marches and so forth? Isn’t negotiation a better path?” You are quite right in calling for negotiation.” Martin use of answering questions the reader might have then having his answer lead into his main point as a way to get his main point across while having the reader have clearer undestanding of what was going on.