As he lay sleeping last night, the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. appeared to Donald Trump in a dream. "Wear it with pride Donald. It is a badge of honor. John the Baptist was imprisoned by Herod, and Peter and Paul by Ceasar. There is a price to be paid for challenging the powers and dominions of this world. 'Blessed are ye when they shall revile you, and persecute you, and speak all that is evil against you, untruly, for my sake.' 'If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before you. If you were of the world, the world would love what is its own.'
"You don't have to be perfect to do good. Just know that if you do good, you will pay the price, just as Christ paid the price. Whether it is Caiphas or Pontius Pilate, Calvary is lived every day. And too often, it is lived in a legal system that ignores the America promised in the Constitution.
"As I wrote in my letter from jail in Birmingham, 'We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.' You cannot effect great change without great cost. 'Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly affects all indirectly.'
"As for those who question you about breaking the law, tell them what I said in Birmingham. 'The answer lies in the fact that there are two types of laws: just and unjust. I would be the first to advocate obeying just laws. One has not only a legal but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws. I would agree with St. Augustine that 'an unjust law is no law at all.'
"Now, what is the difference between the two? How does one determine whether a law is just or unjust? A just law is a man-made code that squares with the moral law or the law of God. An unjust law is a code that is out of harmony with the moral law. To put it in the terms of St. Thomas Aquinas: 'An unjust law is a human law that is not rooted in eternal law and natural law. Any law that uplifts human personality is just. Any law that degrades human personality is unjust.'
"Politically, Donald, I, too, had a problem with support from white moderates. As I said in Birmingham, 'I must confess that over the past few years, I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen’s Councilor or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to “order” than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: 'I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action'; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a 'more convenient season.' Shallow understanding from people of goodwill is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.
"I had hoped that the white moderate would understand that law and order exist for the purpose of establishing justice and that when they fail in this purpose they become the dangerously structured dams that block the flow of social progress.'
"Donald, learn from the civil rights movement. When the country sees injustice done, it will wake the sleeping giant. It will unite because people understand that a system of power that can only stay in power through injustice must be swept away. Wear your conviction with pride, Donald. It is a blessing if you join it to the sufferings of Christ."
Yes, jail, like politics, makes strange bedfellows, even in dreams. And while their dreams may have been different, the thread between Martin Luther King, Jr. and Donald Trump is the same. They wanted a government that treats people equally under the law and respects the Constitution. Elections are not free if you cannot vote based on the color of your skin. Elections are not free if the government moves heaven and earth to deprive a candidate of the freedom to campaign for office or be on the ballot.
The white moderates of Manhattan, along with their friends on a jury of twelve men and women, good and true, have convicted Donald Trump of a charge that is a mystery wrapped in an enigma. Thirty-four counts that each carry a four-year sentence. This is a life sentence for a 77-year-old man.
The world watches in wonder. There are a lot of black folks who know that this is just a modern version of using a newspaper in Chinese as part of a voting "literacy test." Anyone with family roots in Latin America knows what it means when you throw your political opponents in jail. Every minority group in America knows what the game is. Talk about creating a broad coalition of the dispossessed. Yes, Donald Trump should wear his conviction with pride. Even George Washington had a price on his head.
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