MLK Legacy Remains Relevant Today

After one year of the Trump administration people in the United States and internationally are mobilizing against the rising threats of fascism and imperialist war

By Abayomi Azikiwe

Editor, Pan-African News Wire

Sunday January 25, 2026

Political Review

This year represented the 40th anniversary of the official adoption of the birthday of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., as an annual federal holiday.

Every January on the third Monday of the month is designated as MLK Day where federal office buildings and other public entities are closed in recognition of the contributions of Dr. King as a historical figure integral to the struggle for Civil Rights and peace in the United States. 

The proclamation of this federal holiday did not come about spontaneously. After King’s assassination on April 4, 1968, the late former U.S. Congressman John Conyers, Jr. of Detroit initiated the first bill aimed at creating the holiday. However, it would take nearly two decades for the proposal to become a reality. 

Thousands would rally in Washington, D.C. during the early 1980s demanding that MLK’s birthday be made a federal holiday. Stevie Wonder, the internationally renowned recording artist whose career was launched by Motown Records, released a song in honor of King and performed it at huge gatherings at the Lincoln Memorial.  

On January 19 there were hundreds of events commemorating the life, times and contributions of Dr. King. Many of the same issues which MLK was engaged in during the period between 1955-1968 remain today on a domestic and international level. 

In the United States, the current administration has ramped up the repressive and imperialist militaristic policies which made the state what it has become over the centuries. The degree to which democracy exists in the U.S. has been dependent upon the movements for national liberation, workers rights, civil rights and economic emancipation. 

Consequently, the federal holiday honoring Dr. King should be utilized to advance the struggle for complete freedom in the 21st century. Progressive forces note that to honor the legacy of MLK and the Civil Rights Movement as a whole, the present-day organizations must complete the struggles which arose during the post-World War II period to the present.

Detroit Honors Six Decades of Mass Struggle in the U.S. and Worldwide

At the Historic St. Matthew’s-St. Joseph’s Episcopal Church the 23rd Annual Detroit MLK Day Rally/March and Community meal was held as usual on the official federal holiday of Monday January 19. The event filled up the sanctuary and the fellowship hall of the religious institution. 

Banners and posters of MLK, Fannie Lou Hamer and Viola Liuizzo, evoking the legacy of the Civil Rights Movement, hung in the Church sanctuary. A large banner calling for the United States to leave the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela where the President Nicholas Maduro and First Lady Cicilia Flores were kidnapped and illegally imprisoned in New York City. There was another banner calling for the end of the genocide in Gaza and the liberation of Palestine.

This Church extends back to the mid-19th century in Detroit and played a role in the Underground Railroad. During the 1920s it served as a base for the local branch of the NAACP as well as for meetings in efforts to defend Dr. Ossian Sweet who was facing an extended prison tenure for defending his home against a racist white mob in 1925. By 1966, when the first Northern High School strike was held, the Church opened for volunteers to hold classes from anti-racist and pro-Black perspectives.

The Annual MLK event was conceived in 2004 during the height of the U.S. imperialist occupation of Iraq and Haiti. This event was founded by the Michigan Emergency Committee Against War & Injustice (MECAWI) with the expressed intent of continuing the civil rights, social justice, anti-war, peace and anti-poverty legacy of Dr. King and his contemporaries. The event was initially held at the Central United Methodist Church from 2004 to 2018. It was moved to its present location in 2019.

This year’s commemoration featured SEIU Home Care workers who have won a major concession from the bosses. These activities by workers are reminiscent of the labor struggles which Dr. King immersed himself in during the 1960s. 

Cultural workers were featured during the rally and community meal. These artists included The LaShell School of Dance, Kenneth Russell, along with spoken word artists, Jenna Edwards, J.C. A Creative, Daii Dreamiin, One Single Rose, Wardell Montgomery, and others.  

Movement Photographer and Activist Valerie Jean wrote in a social media post that:

“Aurora Harris and Abayomi Azikiwe emceed the event. There were profound speeches from folks like my dear friend, former president of UAW Local 909, Frank Hammer, who spoke about the long-haul Colombian workers’ struggle against GM, and a personal shero of mine, Hawaida Araf, who was arrested by the Israeli Occupation Forces while on the Global Sumud Flotilla that set out to deliver food and medical supplies to occupied Palestine…. There were powerful performances throughout the day. Zania Alake’ sang Lift Every Voice and Sing, with Allen Dennard on trumpet, Butter Hawkins on drums, and Bill Mayer on electric keyboard. Everyone in attendance stood together and sang along; it was truly beautiful. My friend and fellow Water Protector, Alexander Webb, played his drum and sang an Anishinaabe Dream Song to honor Dr. King’s legacy. There was poetry, children dancing, and music that filled the room. The youngest singer of the day, Jenna Edwards, delivered an awe-inspiring rendition of Stand Up. It was a day full of deep cultural Detroit roots that left my heart full.”

This same writer went on to describe the tribute that was paid to the “Long Distance Runners” for their perseverance in the protracted efforts to achieve advances in the struggle. Those who received recognition were Dorothy Dewberry-Aldridge, Chair of the Detroit MLK Committee, Dan Aldridge, Professor Dr. Gloria Aneb House, Bob Fletcher, Frank Joyce, Terry Shaw, Charles Simmons, William G. Anderson, John W. Hardy, Marian Kramer-Baker, Maryam Lowen, and Martha Prescod Norman Noonan. The event program contained recognition of several people who have transitioned to the ancestral realm in recent months such Imam Jamil Al-Amin (H. Rap Brown), Claudette Colvin, Rene Litchtman, David Rambeau, Ruby Curl-Pinkens and Assata Shakur.  

According to the above-quoted writer: 

“The 2026 MLK Day Detroit 23rd Annual Rally and March fell on a bitter cold day, but that didn’t stop hundreds of people from making their way to the historic St. Matthew’s & St. Joseph’s Episcopal Church on Woodward in the North End…. After the program, all who could manage the below-zero temperatures marched through the neighborhood. We then shared a community meal and listened to poetry from some of Detroit’s most amazing poets.

Deep gratitude to the Detroit MLK Day Committee for planning this historic day, filled with so many profound and beautiful moments to share with comrades.” 

Atty. Mark Fancher, spoke on the interconnectedness of the domestic and international struggles for emancipation. Fancher, a longtime member of the National Conference of Black Lawyers (NCBL) and the All-African People's Revolutionary Party (Intl.), discussed the progressive legacy of Dr. King while emphasizing the need to internationalize the movements for liberation both inside and outside the territorial boundaries of the U.S. 

The event was co-sponsored and endorsed by a host of organizations and individuals including: The Anti-Fascist Organizing Coalition (AFOC), Detroit Justice Center, Detroiters for Tax Justice, General Defense Committee, IBEW Local 558, May Day Detroit, Michigan Coalition Against Genocide, Moratorium NOW! Coalition, People’s Assembly, Nakba Survivors Association, Mosaic Design Group, Buck Dinner Fund, General Baker Institute, Communist Party, USA, Michigan District, Rev. Denise Griebler and Rev. Bill Wylie-Kellerman, Nancy Hurston Carter, Jewish Voice for Peace, James and Grace Lee Boggs Foundation, Metro Detroit A. Philip Randolph Institute, Broadside Lotus Press, ACLU of Michigan, Central United Methodist Church, Detroit Wobbly Kitchen, Gwen Winston, Palestinian Youth Movement, among others.

Lessons for 2026

A planned stayaway in Minneapolis which gained widespread support within the labor movement was announced from the pulpit on MLK Day in Detroit. A solidarity demonstration was indeed held in downtown Detroit to coincide with the Minnesota actions on January 23. 

Over 100,000 people marched through the streets of Minneapolis while hundreds of businesses along with schools were closed. The people of Minnesota are responding resolutely with mass and labor actions against the fascist occupation by the Trump White House. 

The following morning after the overwhelming successful mass demonstrations and one-day strikes in Minnesota and around the country, the federal agents occupying Minneapolis shot to death Intensive Care Unit (ICU) Registered Nurse (RN) Alex Pretti (37). Immediately the news rapidly spread of Pretti’s death at the hands of Custom and Border Patrol (CBP) agents while the White House soon labelled this Veteran Administration Hospital employee and American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) a domestic terrorist. This was the same tactic used against Renee Nicole Good (37), a poet and community activist, who was shot at point blank range by another federal agent. 

Both of these killings by federal agents are being justified by the administration. Such homegrown and foreign policy atrocities illustrate the nexus between domestic repression, exploitation and imperialist militarism as Dr. King described as early as 1967. Therefore, these contradictions will not be resolved until the social conditions which give rise to them are eliminated.