Diane Nash had helped initiate the Freedom Rides and cofounded SNCC.
Ella Baker had long served as one of the movement’s best organizers. Aurelia Browder, Claudette Colvin, Susie McDonald, and Mary Louise Smith had served as plaintiffs in the federal lawsuit that led to the Supreme Court decision that desegregated the city’s buses. In Montgomery, Parks had sparked the bus boycott and Jo Ann Robinson and the Women’s Political Council had launched it. Still not convinced, Martin turned to me and said, “Well, somebody has to take care of the kids.” “I’ve been called by God, too, to do something ” I responded, “I have always felt that I have a call on my life, too. In a memoir written years later, Coretta recalled a conversation in which she told Martin she wanted to take a more active role in the movement:ĭuring one exchange, he told me, “You see, I am called, and you aren’t.” Instead, the Kings relied on friends and family to watch Yolanda, Martin, Dexter, and Bernice.
Martin, on the other hand, almost never spent time home alone with the children when Coretta traveled. “But I would like to make a more complete witness by marching, and, if necessary, going to jail.” “My husband feels it important that one parent remain at home to give them security,” she told a reporter in Seattle. Thirteen years later, however, she expressed frustration with her limited role in the civil rights movement. King was attracted to Coretta in no small part because her experience as an activist exceeded his own. She was pleasantly surprised to find that he seemed determined to fight racial discrimination, even if he was not yet sure how to do it. Coretta, having attended the progressive and integrated Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio, thought she would have the edge on this well-bred young man when it came to passion for social reform. He explained that he intended to devote himself to the fight for racial justice. On their first date, they had discussed the merits of capitalism versus communism. It was Coretta’s passion for activism that had first attracted Martin, back in 1952, when she had been enrolled at the New England Conservatory of Music and he had been pursuing his doctorate at Boston University. “I said, ‘Why do you think we got the Nobel Prize? It was not just for civil rights. “I talked about how it would continue to drain resources from education, housing, health, and other badly needed social programs,” she recalled. Earlier that year, at an SCLC retreat, Martin had asked Coretta to speak about Vietnam and whether the organization had a responsibility to take a stand against the war.
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