Re: MLK Added to State Pantheon

Lew, you mention the sour grapes of the MLK sculptor’s disappointed competitor, who whined “Dr King would be ‘turning over in his grave’ if he knew his memorial had been made by someone living under a Communist regime.” One complaint about the monument might be more justified, however. As reported in the NY Post, MLK’s family used state copyright to wrangle $800,000 out of the foundation that built the monument, to get “permission” to use King’s image and words on the monument.

King historian David Garrow thinks King would have found this offensive: “I don’t think the Jefferson family, the Lincoln family [or] any other group of family ancestors has been paid a licensing fee for a memorial in Washington …. [He would’ve been] absolutely scandalized.”

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5:29 pm on August 23, 2011