by Donald Eng
HARTFORD, CT — Remembrance met resolve Monday at the State Capitol in Hartford, as Connecticut honored the civil rights legacy of Martin Luther King, Jr. while vowing to continue to fight for inclusion and justice.
Jeffrey Hines, director of diversity and inclusion initiatives at UConn, keynoted the event, which also included music, personal reflections and comments from state civil rights and elected leaders.
“We gather, not to simply remember Dr. King, but to recommit ourselves to the unfinished work that he left us to do,” Hines said. “We gather not only to admire the dream from a distance, but to ask what’s required of us here, now, tomorrow and together.”
Many of the speakers drew parallels between the civil rights movement in the 1960s and the current climate in the country. In both situations, protesters have been met with state-sanctioned violence.
“The brutality shown by our own government against peaceful protesters, people who are doing what the civil rights marchers did when they marched across the Edmund Pettus Bridge and they were met with the same kind of brutality from people wearing badges but doing injustice,” said Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-CT.
That incident took place on March 7, 1965 when about 600 protesters set out to march from Selma, Al. to Montgomery along Route 80. At the bridge, which spans the Alabama River, state and local law enforcement officers attacked the group with tear gas and clubs, according to the National Park Service.
Gov. Ned Lamont also commented on the era’s revision, citing President Donald Trump’s removal of the bust of King from the Oval Office, where it had been since the 1990s.
Trump also has removed Martin Luther King Day and Juneteenth from the list of free admission days to national parks, replacing them with his own birthday.