KING OF THE NORTH

MLK above the Mason-Dixon line.

For decades, biographers have focused on Martin Luther King Jr.’s successful leadership in the South while suggesting that his Northern activism failed because it lacked direction and local support. Theoharis, a professor of political science at Brooklyn College, upends this narrative by painstakingly documenting King’s relentless and impassioned battles against Northern discrimination and police brutality, an effort that had its origins in his experiences as a graduate student in Pennsylvania and Massachusetts. Author of The Rebellious Life of Mrs. Rosa Parks (2013), Theoharis also presents a fully developed picture of Coretta Scott King’s activism, both in tandem and apart from her husband, whom she met as a student in Boston. Neither of the Kings forgot the racism they encountered as students in the North, and they worked with local organizers to address it throughout their lives. Yet time and time again the same white Northern politicians who praised King’s civil rights work in the South either fell silent or became combative when King turned his attention to the systemic racism of the North. Chicago Mayor Richard J. Daley did everything in his power to stop civil rights progress in the city and defended his white neighbors who “threw rocks, eggs, and firecrackers” at civil rights marchers as “fine people, hard-working people.” The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, and other mainstream news outlets often ignored or actively refuted King’s accusations of Northern racism, creating a documentary history that has shaped King’s legacy ever since. By looking beyond these sources, Theoharis depicts a complex, radical King whose fight against Northern racism alternately inspires and infuriates.

A powerful must-read that sheds new light on King and the Civil Rights Movement.