Lewis V. Baldwin

The Domestication of Martin Luther King Jr.: Clarence B. Jones, Right-wing Conservatism, and the Manipulation of the King Legacy Lewis V. Baldwin

Clarence B. Jones, close King advisor and draft speechwriter, has done much to reinforce a conservative hijacking of King's image with the publication of his controversial books What Would Martin Say? (2008) and Behind the Dream (2011). King emerges from Jones's books not as a prophetic radical who attacked systemic racial injustice, economic exploitation, and wars of aggression, but as a fiercely conservative figure who would oppose affirmative action and illegal immigration. The Domestication of Martin Luther King Jr. offers a critique of Jones's work and the larger effort on the part of right-wing conservatives to make King a useful symbol, or the sacred aura, in a protracted campaign to promote their own agenda for America. This work establishes the need to rethink King's legacy of ideas and activism and its importance for our society and culture.

Contributors include:

Lewis V. Baldwin
Rufus Burrow Jr.
Adam Fairclough
Walter Earl Fluker
Shirley T. Geiger
Cheryl A. Kirk-Duggan
Michael G. Long
Rosetta E. Ross
George Russell Seay Jr.
Traci C. West