3. Strain, Christopher Barry. “Civil Rights and ... - Freedom Archives

the power structure."~ In other words, it was not the abstract injustice of the segregated
South that later stirred the nation's conscience, but rather the spectacle of small children
escorted by bayonet-wielding troops at Little Rock, protestors in Birnungham assaulted with
police dogs and high-pressure water hoses, and marchers beaten and trampled at the Edmund
Pettus Bridge in Selma .
Gandhi intrigued King, who devoured his writings . He also read War Without
Violence , written by Krishnalal Shridharani in the late 1930'x . Shridharani, a follower of
Gandhi, conceptualized ~--the power of truth, or "soul force" as it came to be
known during the civil rights movement--as a weapon more formidable than anything
oppressors could wield .Z~ King would later reflect upon his reluctant acceptance of Gandhian
philosophy and satyag~a. He wrote that, during seminary, he felt that the "turn the other
cheek philosophy" and the "love your enemies philosophy" were valid "only when
individuals were in conflict with other individuals" ; when racial groups and nations were in
conflict "a more realistic approach seemed necessary ." Za As he "delved deeper into the
philosophy of Gandhi," his "skepticism concerning the power of love gradually diminished" ;
but, he confessed to having "merely an intellectual understanding and appreciation of the
position, with no firm determination to organize it in a socially effective situation ."
26Rustin, Strategies for Freedom , 24.
I~Krishnalal Shridharani, War Without Violence : A Study,of Ga~~h~'s Method and Its
Accomplishments (New York: Har+court Brace, 1939).
28King, "How My Mind Has Changed in the Last Decade ;' undated manuscript draft,
Box 4, I-21, Martin Luther King Collection, Department of Special Collections, Boston
Universify.
1 5