Resurrection City and the Poor People’s Campaign: MLK’s final protest

Digital Originals

By the late 1960’s, civil rights activist and leader Martin Luther King Jr began to focus his attention on the problem of poverty in the United States.

During one of his final speeches at the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C., King called poverty a major challenge to the country.

He would focus his energy, with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, the civil rights organization he lead, into creating the Poor People’s Movement. The organization planned a summer rally to bring the impoverished of America to the U.S. Capitol to voice their grievances to the government.

Sadly, Dr. King’s life was cut short by an assassin’s bullet in April 4, 1968.

However, activists and protesters would continue his work on poverty in the U.S. and would lead a month long protest to Washington, D.C. Learn more about the “Poor People’s Campaign” and what would culminate in Resurrection City, when thousands would take up residence on a camp on the National Mall.