King would speak out on Iraq, immigration.

Byline: GUEST VIEWPOINT By Carol Van Houten For The Register-Guard

April 4, 1968, will always be remembered as the date when one of the most powerful voices of our national conscience was snuffed out. On that date at sunset, while standing on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tenn., Martin Luther King Jr. was shot and killed by a sniper.

The previous evening, King delivered what was to be his last speech, in support of the striking sanitation workers of Memphis. He closed that speech with remarks that have since become famous for revealing an apparent prescience regarding his impending death:

`Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about that now. I just want to do God's will. And he's allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I've looked over. And I've seen the promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight that we, as a people, will get to the promised land.'

Exactly one year earlier, on April 4, 1967, King made another speech, one that perhaps turned him into the marked man destined to die a year later. In that speech, delivered at the famous Riverside Church in New York City, King took a strong public stand against the war on Vietnam and linked his opposition to the struggle for social justice at home. It was a courageous move for which he received a lot of criticism.

`I come to this magnificent house of worship tonight because my conscience leaves me no other choice. I join you in this meeting because I am in deepest agreement with the aims and work of the organization which has brought us together, Clergy and Laymen Concerned About Vietnam. The recent statements of your executive committee are the sentiments of my own heart, and I found myself in full accord when I read its opening lines: `A time comes when silence is betrayal.' That time has come for us in relation to Vietnam.'

King then launched into one of the most impassioned testimonials he had ever delivered, perhaps surpassing even his `I Have a Dream' address at the August 1963 March on Washington. A week later, he agreed to become co-chairman of Clergy and Laymen Concerned About Vietnam, a post he held until his death.

CALCAV was the first group to support King when he chose to broaden his perspective to include not only the downtrodden in America, but also the peasants of Vietnam. CALCAV later changed its name to Clergy and Laity Concerned, which had dozens of local chapters across the nation. Eugene's own chapter, now Community Alliance of Lane County, has been a force behind local peace and justice organizing for 40 years.

We at CALC strongly believe that if Martin Luther King were alive today, he would not remain silent about two pressing issues of this era - one domestic, and one in a faraway land.

The U.S. Senate is embroiled in an effort to establish what rights, if any, should be accorded to the 12 million undocumented people living in the United States. The House of Representatives already has passed a draconian bill that would criminalize the very existence of these men, women and children. It is up to the Senate to rectify this and to persuade the House of the wisdom of an approach that would provide a way for these workers to earn U.S. citizenship.

King would surely also speak out, much as he did in 1967 regarding Vietnam, about the unprovoked U.S. invasion and occupation of Iraq, which, far from having been transformed into a bastion of democracy, is now descending into a vicious civil war. King's words then speak to us now with an uncanny urgency:

`We must stop now. ... I speak for those whose land is being laid waste, whose homes are being destroyed, whose culture is being subverted. I speak for the poor of America who are paying the double price of smashed hopes at home and death and corruption in Vietnam. I speak as a citizen of the world ... as it stands aghast at the path we have taken. I speak as an American to the leaders of my own nation. The great initiative in this war is ours. The initiative to stop it must be ours.'

Carol Van Houten leads the Community Alliance of Lane County. A public commemoration of CALC's 40th anniversary will be held at 7 p.m. today at the First Christian Church, 1166 Oak St. It will feature a dramatic reading of King's April 4, 1967, speech, `A Time to Break Silence.'