King and country.

• Author: Foster, Kmele
• Position: Briefly Noted - Brief article

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When the Martin Luther King Jr. National Memorial was formally dedicated in Washington, D.C., critics began to grumble. Representatives of organized labor condemned the choice of white Chinese granite--and Chinese artisans. Chicago Tribune columnist Clarence Page complained that the memorial's quotes from King "sidestep direct mention of race." The Washington Post's Courtland Milloy expressed his own disappointment that the memorial's sculptor wasn't black.

The chorus of complainers demanded forms of nativist or racialist symbolism that would directly contradict King's admonition...