Comparative Essay Example: Martin Luther King Jr’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail” and Fredrick Douglass’ “Learning to Read”

Martin Luther King Jr’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” and Fredrick Douglass’ “Learning to Read” have had notably powerful impacts on the world. In similar and different ways, both use truthful rhetoric, an almost “how-to guide” within their writings, and the power of emotional empathy to draw in and impact their audiences and invoke the reader to strive for freedom for all. Appealing to emotions crosses all barriers, including conditioning, historical backgrounds and powerfully impacts consciences. 

The messages of Martin Luther King and Fredrick Douglass resonate honesty, truth, and love for humanity, sending a powerful message to all consciences and impacting the world around them.

In Letter to Birmingham by Martin Luther King, his main argument is found in his use of  “direct action” and how there is justice in breaking unjust laws. Many individuals question Martin Luther King’s peaceful protesting by asking him why he does not wait until these issues can be negotiated in court. He responds to these criticisms by stating, “You are exactly right in your call for negotiation. Indeed, this is the purpose of direct action. Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and establish such a creative tension that a community that has consistently refused to negotiate is forced to confront the direct issue.” This powerful quote  provides an insight into Martin Luther King’s logic and how negotiation is the end goal of his use of direct action; which in this case was the peaceful protest outside Birmingham city hall.

In the chapter “Learning to Read” from Frederick Douglass’ autobiography, The Life of Fredrick Douglass, his main argument is the importance of the freedom to learn. He especially highlights that the mental shackles he endured in slavery were more inhumane than physical slavery. His writings give an insight into the slave-master relationship and how slaveowners maintained power by keeping their slaves uninformed. Douglass refers to this when he states, “The more I read, the more I was led to abhor and detest my enslavers.” He is asserting the idea that, as slave children grow old, slave owners prevent them from learning to read and write. As access to learning would give them a sense of awareness and capability. Education provides power and encourages the development of thought processes, which unlocks potential to rise up against injustices.

Even though they are from different time periods, they both share a common goal in fighting for equality for all. Douglass and King pull in their target audience by using child-like innocence to look at the corrupted morality of their societies. King uses his daughter as a powerful, emotion-filled illustration when he writes, “You suddenly find your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you seek to explain to your six-year-old daughter why she cannot go to the public amusement park that has just been advertised on television, and see tears welling up in her eyes when she is told that Funtown is closed to colored children''.  King transfers his emotions onto paper with a colorful, bold description of racial inequality. As a father, King is heartbroken as he watches his daughter enter a world of exclusion. King knows this will have an emotional effect on his audience as he consistently uses emotional rhetoric in his writing. Douglass, similarly to MLK, uses emotional rhetoric to incapsulate the reader. When Douglass told the white boys, who helped him to learn how to read in exchange for bread, that he would remain a slave for the rest of his livelihood, Douglass states, “ they would express for me the liveliest sympathy, and console me with the hope that something would occur by which I might be free.” Once again, we are exposed to childlike innocence; why children?  Children, like adults, have a moral conscience telling them what is right or wrong. But unlike adults, children have a sense of innocence and are unfamiliar with the evils, cunning, and complexities of the world around them. King and Douglass realize this and use it very well to appeal to the emotions and consciences of every person, despite their views or prejudices. Douglass’and King’s use of children in their writing is a double-edged sword as they are looking to soften the readers' already hardened prejudices towards the issues of racism by using the innocence of children. While simultaneously referencing children as an example as to how slavery negatively affects the youth of society as King wrote that he watched his daughter “distort her little personality by unconsciously developing a bitterness towards white people”.5 MLK is stating that racial injustice negatively affects black youth as they “unconsciously develop” a wave of anger towards the society that mistreated them.

In conclusion, Douglass’ and King’s works are certainly revolutionary in their effect on society today. This demonstrates the effect that truthful rhetoric has in changing hearts and minds, thus impacting society for change. Both King and Douglass ask the reader to look at injustices through the eyes of a child. When Douglass verbalizes the entrapment in which slavery makes him feel, the little boys console him. King uses the heartbreak that he faces as a father having to explain to his daughter that she cannot go to the park, as she is a colored child. We, the reader feel these emotions just as profoundly as King or Douglass; these emotions invoke the reader to prevent any further racial injustices from happening. After reflecting on both these readings, I was moved by the power that truthful, emotional rhetoric to persuade an audience and make a lasting statement. The stories that King and Douglass shared are the most persuading aspect of the writings. They make us feel, which leads to thought and action, which leads to change.