To Stuart LeRoy Anderson
Author: King, Martin Luther, Jr.
Date: June 5, 1961
Location: Atlanta, Ga.
Genre: Letter
Topic: Freedom Rides
Martin Luther King, Jr. - Travels
Details
King apologizes to Anderson, president of the Pacific School of Religion in Berkeley, for canceling his scheduled commencement address at the last minute because four SCLC staff members were in jail and one had been shot in Montgomery.1 Anderson replied on 9 June 1961 expressing his disappointment, but professing to “understand perfectly the pressures” that forced King to cancel.
Dr. Stuart LeRoy Anderson, President
Pacific School of Religion
1798 Scenic Avenue
Berkeley 9, California
Dear Dr. Anderson:
It is always a painful experience for me to have to cancel a speaking engagement. I am sure you can realize the feeling of regret that came to me when I found it necessary to get word to you that it would not be possible for me to make your commencement exercises at the Pacific School of Religion.2 I had looked forward to this experience with such great anticipation. The honor of delivering the commencement address and receiving an honorary degree from such a great theological seminary is a privilege that comes only once in a lifetime.3 I can assure you that I would not have missed this if I could have found any other alternative. But I need not tell you of the critical state of things here in the south at this time.
At the very hour that I was planning to leave for San Francisco, four of my staff members were in jail and one had been shot. Certain emergency contacts and situations faced me that could not have waited until I made a trip to California.4 Nothing short of my concern for and commitment to the struggle for freedom and human dignity could have made me miss your commencement.
May I thank you again for inviting me and for offering the honorary degree. I do hope it will be possible to come at another time. Please do not hesitate to call on me.
Very sincerely yours,
[signed] Martin L. King Jr.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Km
Dictated by Dr. King, but signed in his absence.
1. King was scheduled to arrive in San Francisco on the afternoon of 25 May; however, that same day, Fred L. Shuttlesworth, Wyatt Tee Walker, Ralph Abernathy, and Bernard Lee were arrested when they accompanied seven freedom riders led by Yale chaplain William Sloane Coffin into the Montgomery Trailways bus station. Just a day before, two groups of freedom riders had been served at the lunch counter at the station without incident. Two days after their arrest, Shuttlesworth posted $1,000 bond, while the other three were released on 29 May. Also on 25 May six white youths fired shots at Reverend S. S. Seay’s house in Montgomery, hitting him in the wrist (Dora E. McDonald to Frank Clarke, 22 May 1961; “Six Charged in Shooting of Rev. Seay,” Montgomery Advertiser, 28 May 1961; “Yale’s Chaplain among 11 Seized in Montgomery,” New York Times, 26 May 1961; and “Drive Pushed Inside Jail, Mixers Say,” Montgomery Advertiser, 30 May 1961). Stuart LeRoy Anderson (1912–1995), born in Elmore, Ohio, received a B.A. from Albion College in 1933 and B.D. from Chicago Theological Seminary in 1936. Following graduation from the seminary, he was ordained as a Congregational minister and pastored churches in Los Angeles, Glendale, and Long Beach, California. In 1950, he became president and a professor of homiletics at the Pacific School of Religion, and held both posts until 1971. Anderson also wrote A Faith to Live By (1959), a book of sermons and religious addresses.
2. Pacific School of Religion professor Georgia Elma Harkness spoke in King’s place.
3. King was to receive an honorary doctoral degree in divinity from the school, and the announced topic of his commencement address was “The Church in a New Age” (Pacific School of Religion, Program, “Ninety-fourth annual commencement,” 26 May 1961).
4. Immediately upon hearing the news of the arrest and shooting of SCLC staff members, King sent the president and attorney general telegrams urging them not to remove federal troops from Montgomery: “There is still need for federal marshals to remain in Montgomery. Knowing of your determination to preserve law and order and to protect all citizens, I strongly urge you not to withdraw federal marshals from Montgomery at this crucial moment” (“King Asks Feds Stay on Job Here,” Montgomery Advertiser, 26 May 1961).
Source: CBPaC, Pacific School of Religion, Berkeley, Calif.