Dr. King: Reparations means paying unpaid wages 

This April 4, 2026, will mark the 58th anniversary of the assassination of Civil Rights leader Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. while he was supporting striking sanitation workers in Memphis, Tennessee. The following quotation from Dr. King comes from his 1964 book “Why We Can’t Wait” on the ongoing struggle for reparations for people of African descent.

“No amount of gold could provide an adequate compensation for the exploitation and humiliation of the Negro down through the centuries. Not all the wealth in this affluent society could pay the bill. Yet a price can be placed on unpaid wages. The payment should be in the form of a massive program of special, compensatory measures which could be regarded as a settlement in accordance with the accepted practice of common law.”