Monthly Archives: June 2021

20th Century, African American, church history, ekklesia, History, Minnesota, omnipresent history

Martin Luther King Jr. Speaks at U of M

MLK at University of Minnesota. April 27, 1967. mprnews.org

April 27, 1967
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. speaks about racism, poverty, and the Vietnam War to a crowd of 4,000 students at the University of Minnesota. Civil rights legislation, King says, has “rectified some evils of the South, but did little to improve conditions for millions of Negroes in teeming ghettoes of the North.” Congress has passed the 1964 Civil Rights Act, but King cites continuing inequalities in northern cities, such as a high black unemployment rate, segregated schools, and the growth of ghettos surrounded by suburbs. *

One can be inspired by only reading the words of Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King. Yet to those who heard the timbre of his voice and saw the gravitas with which he carried himself that clear Thursday on the lawn of the Agriculture Campus of the University of Minnesota; it must have felt like a dream. Sometimes, one just knows that they are witness to greatness.

King begins his speech with an acknowledgment of the success of de-segregation and passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, but goes on to state that legislative victories “did very little to penetrate the depths of Negro deprivation.” ** He wonders, aloud, if our society is more opposed to Commissioner Bull Connor and Sheriff Jim Clarke of Birmingham, Alabama than positively for equality and justice. He suggests of the civil rights movement, that the “need is for legislation strongly enforced”, and this would best occur if we were to “make civil rights crimes Federal” offenses. ** (For readers outside the U.S., Federal jurisdiction means that our national government would enforce these laws rather than the city, county, and state.)

Moving on to the economic issues and disparities Black Americans faced in the cities, Reverend King underscores the urgency to both make and enact plans to better their lives stating “our summers of riots are caused by our winters of delay.” ** Dr. King opined that many in white society were not aware or accepting of the type of unemployment and price gouging faced by these neighbors, or that there is “literally a color tax in the ghetto.” ** His solution to this problem could be summed in his phrase “to attack poverty directly by guaranteeing an annual income for all the families of this country.” **

Addressing another political “hot potato”, Dr. King challenged the perceptions of his audience, and our nation’s worldview. Though criticized by some as being overly empathetic to socialist causes, his outlook could be construed as running parallel with the logic of libertarians; if we practice human rights at home, it is natural that we exude healthy human rights in our foreign affairs. Please, try to read and consider his quotes on Viet Nam with this in mind?

“We’re on the wrong side of a world revolution. We tend to see every revolution in the world as a communist revolution. And our tragedy is that we’ve based our total foreign policy on a huge miscalculation…” **

And

“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. I’m concerned about justice for everybody the world over.” **

At the end of his speech, Martin brought things back to the folly of the human heart. Do we believe in the freedom of our rivals, of our detractors, and of those who genuinely oppose us? You make recognize pieces of his, perhaps most famous speech; “ I Have a Dream”.
“I believe we can build right here, if we will only do these things, a nation where everyman will respect the dignity and worth of human personality and this will be that glad day when all of G-d’s children: black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, protestants and Catholics, will join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual;
“Free at last! Free at last! Thank G-d Almighty we’re free at last!

University of Minnesota Professor, John Wright, an attendee of King’s speech, gives us insight into the personal and public impact of that day in 1967. Because of King’s presence, He committed himself to the civil rights of Minnesotan’s, and participated in the 1969 student protest and take-over of Morrill Hall. ***
“I think we can be proud of the staying power of several of the institutional outcomes of the whole protest and take-over process. Of course, the creation of the Martin Luther King Programs in the College of Liberal Arts, and the formation of the Department of African American and African Studies.” **

Now, Eternal Father, we make a request to sit with You in the presence of the Council of Heaven as we meditate on April 27th, 1967. Today we remember the future the Apostle John recorded and prophesied of Your peoples.
“And they sang the song of Moses the Servant of God and the song of The Lamb. They were saying: “Great and marvelous are your works, LORD JEHOVAH God Almighty. Just and true are your works, King of the universe.” “ **** Revelation 15:3 Aramaic Bible
We thank You for the reminder in this single verse of the revelation that we, humanity, have been shown through the Law (Moses), and through the unparalleled grace and forgiveness of all separation through the Cross, the Blood, and the Resurrection of our Messiah! We cannot say thanks enough for the favor shown to all peoples at all times throughout the history of the human race!

Lord of Lords, will You help us today as we revisit this speech of Reverend King some 54 years ago? What in his message brings You glory, and what in his message does not? May we have a conversational prayer with You and acknowledge to You, first, the offenses of our society past that we can be freed from their misbeliefs and unbeliefs?

We applaud the successes of King’s movement of de-segregation. The ground at the foot of the Cross is completely flat, and so should our civic laws be completely apportioned; an even application of rights and privileges for all Americans! We remember this core “heart value” within the Civil Rights movement. We invite You into the brokenness of 1967, and acknowledge the offense of our society to misuse the Law (Moses), and bitter root judgments that created a legal system that negated justice to black Americans. Will You forgive us this offense against You and Your Image within all Americans of African descent; in King’s era, the present, and until Your return?

As a second thought in this conversational prayer, we hear and ponder Dr. King’s words very carefully. As a paraphrase, we hear this message; local laws and enforcement have failed, thus King suggests making “civil rights crimes Federal offenses”. While understandable the King could arrive at this conclusion given the context of intense conflict, it is understandable while these words would also cause conflict. To Americans who connected with King’s heart, it was completely logical.


However, to those who are aware of the positive and negative limits on our Federal, State, County, and City governments, it presents a drastic change. Our Founders, for many reasons, sought to create a legal system like a family walking in the rain: father’s umbrella covers mother, mother’s umbrella covers the kids, and the kid’s umbrella covers the dog. Our system is reliant on leadership and authority to be: relational, nearby, and accountable to the governed.

Is this, perhaps, a logistical fallacy or root misbelief in Reverend King’s logic? If local government has failed it’s people, which is in a much more direct relationship to its citizens, how will moving the center of responsibility to Washington D.C. make it more accountable to locals? For example, “It’s the government that has failed African Americans of Alabama, so we will look to the government, far away and less accountable, to provide a more equitable solution?” Lord, I may be simple, but doesn’t that sound like repeating the same action and expecting a different result?

So, we come humbly to You with a broken spirit over this question; “What do we do when those closest to us deny us justice?” Will You unravel these tangled root judgments of the 1960’s and bring them up, out, and onto the Cross of Christ? Will You bring Your justice to these places, where every rung of authority from City, to County, to State, to Federal had failed our citizens? Will You forgive us where we placed more hope in the law (Song of Moses), than in Healing Presence and unmerited favor of the Redeemer (Song of the Lamb)? Come and bring Your civil rights to our civil wrongs!

For the next item of this meeting, we start with a point of order brought so eloquently by MLK; “Father, when is the right time for collective responsibility versus individual responsibility as it applies to economics?”
I refer here to the words of King’s speech, Lord:
“our summers of riots are caused by our winters of delay.”
“literally a color tax in the ghetto.”
“to attack poverty directly by guaranteeing an annual income for all the families of this country.”
Bring Your insight, Holy Spirit, let us move with You, see from Your point of view, and hear from Your Word.

In Your Eternal Word we see examples of individual responsibility towards YHWH:
“Love LORD JEHOVAH your G-d from all your heart and from all your soul and from all your possessions.” Deuteronomy 6:5 Aramaic Bible ****

“I am YHWH your Elohim, there will not be for you another god before me.
You will not make for you an idol and you will not bow down to them, for I am YHWH your Elohim.
You will not take the name of YHWH your Elohim in vain.” Exodus 20:1-4 Ancient Hebrew *****
(Lord, we notice that every pronoun is personal in these 10 Commandments.)

In Your Eternal Word, we also see examples of collective responsibility for the sin of an individual:
“But the Israelites were unfaithful in regard to the devoted things; Achan son of Karmi, the son of Zimri, the son of Zerah, of the tribe of Judah, took some of them. So the Lord’s anger burned against Israel.” Joshua 7:1 NIV ****

Or we see collective judgement for the offense of an individual ruler:
“Now at midnight the LORD struck down every firstborn male in the land of Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh, who sat on his throne, to the firstborn of the prisoner in the dungeon, as well as all the firstborn among the livestock.” Exodus 12:29 BSB ****

Lord, hear our prayer! Let us first love You, with all we are including our possessions and property whether small or great! We are guilty of making our economic worth an idol, therefore, breaking the first of Your commands! We have tainted Your Name, our family name, our ethnicity’s name through our own individual actions; even in the plunder of an enemy?! Individual leaders in our history, separated from You and hard of heart, have brought suffering and death on the innocent and powerless! We acknowledge our guilt, collectively and as individuals, to You and our neighbor! Will You heal the past, free the present, and bless the future of these economic wounds: within us, in our society, and in Your Body the Ekklesia?

As a third petition and reflection, help us ponder Reverend King’s views on war, and the Viet Nam war in particular. Living Word, let’s think on King’s words given this Thursday in 1967; “We’re on the wrong side of a world revolution. We tend to see every revolution in the world as a communist revolution.” What say You, Rauch Ha’ Kodesh (Holy Spirit)?

Granted, as the political entity known as the United States, we surely had a foreign policy bent on containing Communism in Southeast Asia. Further, President Eisenhower had warned our nation of the drive to power and profit of the “military industrial complex”. Help us remember a bit more, Lord?

China, once an ardent ally of the United States with a proud heritage for millenia, had fallen to Mao in 1949. (Mao’s social justice record was stained by the blood of tens of millions of his own people at the time of this speech.)
Korea, again an ancient people, was split in two with the military support of China and Russia 27 July 1953. (Again, Russia’s record of social justice was stained with the blood of tens of millions of Stalin’s own people.)
The Second Indochina War, commenced on 1 November 1955 had already ravaged the nations of Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia for 12 years at the time of Dr. King’s statement.

All this to say that the politically aware in 1967 could plausibly see the wasting of human lives in Southeast Asia as a threat to human dignity and human rights. On this issue, Lord, Dr. King’s views seem at odds with his present tense realities at the time of this speech. As a man with such empathy for the downtrodden, I suspect his heart overruled his head on this matter. Even the FBI alleges that close friendships within King’s circle like Hunter Pitts O’Dell, Abner Berry, and Miles Horton had formed in communist schools and camps in the South like the Highlander Folk School in Monteagle, Tennessee about 1957. A counter-argument to this narrative is that it was one of the few forums in the South where black Americans were welcomed with open arms to: speak, listen, receive free education, and socialize in a multi-cultural setting. ******

This information creates tension in me. On the one hand, it appears Your Body, the Church, had failed to welcome Dr. King and African Americans in general into community. What does this say about Your Body of Believers in the Southern United States of King’s era? Had it calcified the warmth of the Gospel into a stiff, arthritic religion? Were the various denominations more subject to the beliefs, misbeliefs, and unbeliefs of their regional culture than the relational culture of Your Kingdom?

Hear our prayer; will You forgive us, the Ekklesia (those called out of the past and into Your Presence and future), of the judgments of their siblings and Your children; the black American human being? Will Your release Your Body from the “sleeper hold(s)” of the Enemy of all humanity: our religious spirit, of our embrace of cultural lies, of our collective and individual beliefs, unbeliefs, and misbeliefs that so deeply offend the Holy Spirit? Bring healing to this memory of Dr. King’s generation, and empower us to practice Your Healing Presence for ourselves and especially our neighbors of a differing race?

On the other hand, how does a Baptist preacher, (Rev. King), align his Biblical worldview with an atheist one? How does King marry the Gospel’s view of history, one that all men can believe in Your Son and be saved, with a Marxist historiography that is often deterministic and pegs human beings into camps limited by one’s external racial markers rather than one’s internal markers? Father, it’s not my heart to judge Dr. King for having friends of various political views, but perhaps it can explain some of sympathies in the Vietnamese War.******

Billboard in the South circa 1957. appalachianhistory.net

In sum, we appeal to heaven with MLK of April 27th, 1967 that we learn and practice to be “Free at last”! We acknowledge to You that even our icons and heroes of history are human like us with motive conflicts. We so fully believe and misbelieve in You at the same time! We judge our judgers as they counter-judge us! May we radiate the justice of our Eternal King everywhere through confessing our threats and unjust hearts everywhere! May we respect the dignity and worth of Your Infinite Personality first! All our racism, human to human, is first an offense to the Author, Creator, and Lover of the human race! May we avoid the wrong side of a world revolution! May we align with the Song of Moses (Judgement and Just Law) and with the Song of the Lamb (Unending Mercy)! May we love our enemy and do good to those who oppose us until we are all children of our heavenly Father again! We love You and need You to survive! Amen.

One Nation with One King
“Again the word of the LORD came to me, saying, “And you, son of man, take a single stick and write on it: ‘Belonging to Judah and to the Israelites associated with him.’ Then take another stick and write on it: ‘Belonging to Joseph—the stick of Ephraim—and to all the house of Israel associated with him.’ Then join them together into one stick, so that they become one in your hand.” Ezekiel 37:15-17 BSB

Joseph (Yosef)- means ‘he will add”
Ephraim- means simultaneously “ashes” and “to make doubly fruitful”

Father, is this a symbol or foreshadowing of the Cross? Christ takes our ash pile, adds His life to it, and makes us doubly fruitful? You took the divided nations of Judah and Israel and made them one nation. May You join our divided nation(s) again!

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20th Century, ekklesia, History

Minnesota Governor Harold LeVander: A Quiet Storm

The appointment of the first Met Council by Gov. Harold LeVander, seated center, in 1967. minnpost.com

January 2, 1967-January 4, 1971
About 1966, a Minnesota attorney unknown to many outside legal circles decided to throw his hat in the ring. He was, by definition, a true outsider who had no political experience other than vaguely supporting the Republican Party. Yet, Governor Le Vander arguably changed the premise of Minnesota’s politics more than his peers in a single four year term.

To backpedal, Karl Harold Phillip Le Vander was born in Swede Home, Nebraska on October 10th, 1910. His parents were Swedish immigrants, and the family followed his father’s call as a Lutheran minister to St. Paul. This calling led the family to move frequently before settling in Watertown circa 1926.

Young Harold loved high school and sports and excelled at both until his graduation in 1928. He went to Gustavus Adolphus for his undergraduate degree where he competed in the debate team, played football, but excelled in hurdles and pole vault for their track team. * Le Vander matriculated in 1932 from the famed Swedish institute, and headed for the University of Minnesota to study law receiving his LL.D. in 1935. ** Other than his brief time as Governor, he remained active as an attorney with Le Vander, Gillen & Miller through the remainder of his life.

So, what of his years as a politician as the 32nd Governor of Minnesota 1967-1971? Perhaps this moderate Republican’s term could be summed up with the phrase “clarification and consolidation”. His cornerstone accomplishments sought to clarify gray areas in law, and to consolidate the structures of leadership to operate more efficiently.

Governor Le Vander differed with many of his party, and acted to demonstrate that big government could be a force for good. Out of the gate he re-organized the structure of the Executive Branch, and dove headlong into a series of “firsts” in Minnesota politics. He greatly expanded the funding of regional governments and schools supported by the first sales tax and $1 billion budget. The term “Le Vander’s pennies” entered the local vernacular in reference to this major change. ***
Another of his famous “firsts” was that Minnesota became the first state to ratify the 26th Amendment of the U. S. Constitution. This law lowered the voting age to 18 years old, and clarified the issue and the dissonance brought by the Viet Nam War. He believed along with many of these draftees, that if they were “old enough to fight, then they were old enough to vote.” ***

Next, he sought to elucidate our legal boundaries: human to human, and human to nature. As to the former, he created the Department of Human Rights to protect our civil rights through the Minnesota Human Rights Act largely considered to one of the strongest in the nation. **** To the latter, he created the Pollution Control Agency “ensuring that every Minnesotan has healthy air, sustainable lands, clean water, and a better climate.” *****

His coup de gras, in terms of consolidating regional authority, came with the formation of the Metropolitan Council. Le Vander wanted this agency for long-range planning: of a transportation for the 21st century, and to aid in regional development. As an institution, it is an anomaly in that it is granted power to override the decisions and actions of local governments.

Despite the honor of receiving the most votes to date as a Republican, Governor Le Vander declined the opportunity before his primary. *** His decisions, and the institutions of government they initiated in his one and only term, are still with us today. No longer would Minnesota be a place without a plan, or disengaged decentralization.

We pivot to You, Father. We come to You for clarity. We get disjointed and need Your “consolidatus”; (Latin) make us solid again. Our first step towards this is remembering that You are El Roi, (the Strong One who continually sees), and reveals Himself more and more. Yet, You are King of the Universe, the True Judge, and though a never ending enigma, You reveal Your laws in ways we all can easily understand. Glad to increasingly know You, dear Father, and to be known!

Let’s start with giving You praise for the wisdom of Governor Le Vander and his heart to make clear our laws, and to facilitate consolidated efforts across the spectrum of civic leadership from the state level down to every township. It seems good and right that the weight of our legislation is much lighter when spread out, and the horses are all hitched and pulling in the same direction! Your Word bears witness to this principle in many places, but this is the specific word I hear now.
“Two are better than one because they have a good return for their labor. For if either of them falls, the one will lift up his companion. But woe to the one who falls when there is not another to lift him up.” Ecclesiastes 4:9-10 NASB

Can we mull some of his noteworthy accomplishments with You now, dear Source? Will You bring discernment into these milestones of Le Sander’s administration from 1967-1971? Help us identify what is pleasing, what is honorable, and what may be an offense in these actions towards Your Kingdom.

As a first cause, we take note of the Department of Human Rights. While any sentient person could easily agree with the notion that everyone deserves equality, dignity, and freedom from discrimination based on any sort of physical markers or attributes. Do not all of G-d’s children deserve a life free from discrimination?

However, we can also attribute some inherent motive conflicts when Minnesota’s government attempted to become the authors and enforcers of virtues of the heart. Those critical of civil rights in this era, often were skeptical of such legal changes because they inserted the power of government into relationships it formerly had no authority over. It raised the question of “who” gets to differentiate wise and unwise choices in Harold Le Vander’s epoch; the government or the individual?

Further, Civil Rights were posited as a solution to the failures to treat people equally under the law. Yet, doesn’t this very notion betray that the government was also a guilty party in denying the rights of its citizens before its ratification? For example, did the neighbors living in the Rondo neighborhood create a system of “redlining” to shut out unwanted ethnicities, or was this the work of those well-familiar with the law such as: the City Council of Saint Paul, Ramsey County, and the Federal Housing Authority?

So we appeal our broken track record, as individuals and as State institutions, of our failures to acknowledge the image of G-d and the civil rights of our people. Will You forgive us as individuals when and where our discrimination denied Your Image within our neighbors? Will You similarly forgive us our misapplications of the laws and denials of justice as extensions of city, county, Minnesota, and Federal governments? Will You take this root offense up, out, and onto the Cross of Christ? Will You impart to us the gifts necessary to govern ourselves as You give the Department of Human Rights the same humility?

My next point of prayer touches Your environment in the formation of the Pollution Control Agency. Again, at first glance, who could rationally be opposed to “healthy air, sustainable lands, clean water, and a better climate”? Enforcing laws is normally a cut and dried issue when it comes to shared resources, but perhaps, the dirty little secret of compliance is that even “good” laws can become overly bureaucratic and subject to corruption.

May I offer You a brief example, Father? Allegedly, Dr. Stan Reminiski, formerly of the University of Minnesota, invented a state-of-the-art water purification system in the same timeframe that could capture heavy metals from various industries that were polluting our rivers. His system used some type of magnetism or ionic bonding to “grab” these polluting metals, and far exceeded the requirements of the technology then in use; perhaps a million times more effective. Yet, his labor of love was denied even as an experiment on the Mississippi River because environmental officials could not tick the box that it had a filter to change!?!

How many innovations and revelations, Eternal Father, have You given us through bright humans like Dr. Reminiski that have been blocked from better preserving Your lands and waters? Will You forgive us where our environmental protectors act as simpletons who only follow orders, and as the corruptible officials who are seduced by temporal power and or other types of gains? Will You build a heart and awareness of true compliance, and a humility in our expressions of environmental law such as the Pollution Control Agency? Will You forgive us where we have despoiled Your land, waters, and atmosphere for gain?

As a final point, we ponder the achievement of streamlining regional development through the creation of the Metropolitan Council. We see the same undercurrent of thought in Governor Harold’s push for this over-arching planning body; how can we better harness the energy of various counties to achieve a common goal such as public transit? Or to use his words more exactly, then-Governor LeVander said the Council “was conceived with the idea that we will be faced with more and more problems that will pay no heed to the boundary lines which mark the end of one community in this metropolitan area and the beginning of another.” ******

Eternal One, my point here is not to belittle the accomplishments of this organization, but to wrestle with some of the limitations of its organizational theory. For the sake of my argument, this body’s authority encompasses 188 communities, 22 special purpose districts, and 7 counties with a current 2021 budget of $1.164 billion. ***** If this cost were evenly spread across these cities and townships, it would be a price tag of $6,191,489.36 each. This appear to be a significant price tag for planning, not executing, the various developmental projects. To compound this cost, this body is able to override the will of local governments. Lord, I am probably making this too simplistic, but isn’t that a big ask?

In simple terms, if I asked my kids to pay me a fee to plan their future, and then also told them that I could override their dissent; would they see me as an “aid” to their growth? How can the member-communities maintain motivation to participate with this body, when there is an atmosphere of “voluntary compliance”? Does not this mandate created in 1967, supersede the roles defined by our State Constitution? Where is the accountability in this authority? What are the checks and balances that govern the Metropolitan Council?

Granted, I am only scratching the surface in this plea, and my knowledge is very limited. I simply wish to acknowledge to You this conundrum of compliance. In Ephesians 5:21, you ask us to “submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.” Yet how does one submit to a friend that won’t? Doesn’t this set us up for a co-dependent and unhealthy relationship? Dear G-d, how was this basic aspect overlooked by such brilliant minds 53 years ago? Will You remove this bitter root sown in 1967? Will You create a new way of planning that does not negate the will of the beneficiaries in the 7 county metro area? Will You take this weight; up, out, and onto the Cross of Christ?

In sum, Governor Le Vander brought marked changes that are still with us in Minnesota. No one, however brilliant and wise, can forsee all the potential strengths and weaknesses of their actions. To his credit, he surely did make the levers of government work more efficiently. Yet, one is left with a new awareness of why righteousness and humility are virtues so reinforced in Your kingdom; even a good system is as good as the hearts and wisdom of those who operate it. May we forever plan, build, move, create, honor the lowly, respect Your nature under Your authority. May we walk out our new laws and new paths with grace and truth. May we forever love the law like governor Le Vander, but remain cognizant that we are all lawbreakers in need the mercy of Our Father and our neighbor! Amen!

LeVander, Harold. “What I Remember Most.” Minneapolis Tribune Picture Magazine. January 1, 1967. Print.
** Roberts, Chad. Internet. July 29, 2011. https://patch.com/minnesota/mendotaheights/dakota-county-history-101-harold-levander-1910-1992-g99bcd2ad36
*** Minnesota Historical Society. Internet. “Harold P. LeVander Biography” https://mnhs.gitlab.io/archive/governors-of-minnesota-collections/collections.mnhs.org/governors/index.php/10004227.html
**** https://mn.gov/mdhr/
https://www.pca.state.mn.us/about
***** https://metrocouncil.org/About-Us/Who-We-Are.aspx
****** https://metrocouncil.org/About-Us/Publications-And-Resources/History-of-the-Council.aspx

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