FRED DE SAM LAZARO: As one pastor put it, “This is a King among presidents.” A memorial to the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. was unveiled in Washington this week, the first individual who’s not a president to receive such a tribute on the National Mall. A 30-foot statue lies at the heart of the granite monument that displays words from King’s writings and speeches. The choice of a Chinese sculptor and royalty payments to King’s family drew controversy and complicated the $120 million private fundraising effort. Congress authorized the monument in 1997. Despite the postponement of the memorial’s dedication because of Hurricane Irene, this weekend was still a time of reflection. Here to share his thoughts is the Reverend Dr. Robert Franklin, president of Morehouse College in Atlanta, which is also the alma mater of the late civil rights leader. Dr. Franklin, welcome.
REVEREND DR. ROBERT FRANKLIN (President, Morehouse College): Thank you.
DE SAM LAZARO: This unveiling comes at a time of serious political polarization in this country. Do you think that the monument has the potential any way to provide some healing in that divide?
FRANKLIN: I believe so, and I certainly hope so. Dr. King was a man of healing and reconciliation even in the context of calling for justice. American politics is broken today, and Dr. King’s message, his life, his values and virtues can offer us a strategy for healing what is broken. It means political opponents must never dehumanize each other. They must speak truth to power, but they must also be willing to negotiate as well as confront, and I think the King memorial will be an inspiration and a reminder that that reconciliation is possible in America.
DE SAM LAZARO: What do you think his words would be today in this political environment?
FRANKLIN: Well, that we have to listen. We have to search for common ground, something that Dr. King learned from Howard Thurman and Benjamin Mays at Morehouse College, and that it’s never appropriate to dehumanize or demonize your opponent. We must always recognize their humanity and recognize their self-interest and try to appeal to that. That’s why King was such a genius as a moral leader. He confronted, but he balanced that with negotiation, and today all I hear from so many of our public officials, religious leaders, media commentators is confront, confront and polarize. Dr. King says no, you’ve gone overboard, and there’s another side to balancing this for the common good.
DE SAM LAZARO: One of the points of contention in the debate over this monument has been the whole issue of separation of church and state and the dedication of something to someone who is not—just not even a president but also at his core was a Baptist minister. Talk a little bit about it in that context.
FRANKLIN: Well, you put your finger on a fascinating question, because we’ve grappled for the past decade-and-a-half with the question of church and state and the appropriate presence of religion in our very diverse public life. I think that Dr. King actually offers a refreshing model of how you can be a religious person, a person of faith in the public square. How? Well, he was exceedingly ecumenical and interfaith. He respected the traditions, the texts, the beliefs and practices of other people without ever disrespecting or dismissing or marginalizing them, and although King was exceedingly particular, I mean, as you say, he was a black Baptist preacher from the South, he was also always in search of what’s universal in my particularity, and I think that’s an invitation to all Americans, and when we look at that monument I hope we see King saying I’m looking for common ground, not for the basis for further polarization.
DE SAM LAZARO: Well, Dr. Franklin, thank you so much for sharing your thoughts today.
FRANKLIN: Thanks very much.
DE SAM LAZARO: Almost everyone listens to the radio in Ghana and lively political give and take is a breakfast staple. Tempers flared close to boiling point at times in the studios but only until the show was over. All was quickly forgiven. In a continent where long-running dictatorships are the norm, Ghana has enjoyed two decades of thriving democracy. Two incumbent leaders have lost in general elections. In 2008, the margin was less than one percent. Yet on both cases the sitting president stepped aside, and power was transferred peacefully.
DEEGBE: Instead of having oil be a source of prosperity and progress for this nation we just allow a few people, very corrupt people, to amass this wealth and flaunt it to all of us, and we want to work towards this not being the story of Ghana.
DE SAM LAZARO: For now, Ghanaians are hardly sharing equally. There’s still deep poverty in rural areas, where the majority of Ghana’s 22 million people live. Development experts say the best way to attack poverty is to create jobs and improve the rural economy. A number of efforts have begun to do this. For example, shea nuts are a major export. They’re processed in Europe and America into shea butter, used in skin creams or as a food additive. Now several small processing enterprises have been set up in Ghana, supported by private aid groups as well as the US government. Some are mechanized but hundreds of women are employed in traditional processing, kneading a dough that comes from boiling and crushing the nuts to release the prized shea butter.
KOJO ADUHENE TANO: We need more money from you.
DE SAM LAZARO: Edhi moved to Karachi from western India not long after Pakistan’s creation 62 years ago. He began an ambulance service in the 1950s, trying to serve a city that was growing rapidly. It now has the largest fleet in the city—mostly simple vans with stretcher, lights, and siren. Partly because the country has few such services, the Edhi Foundation has also grown into one of its largest social service agencies. Edhi, who had little formal education, boasts that his entire budget of more than $10 million comes from ordinary Pakistanis. To demonstrate, he stood on a busy Karachi street for about 15 minutes. Dozens of passers-by thrust money in his hands. It has helped fund food relief in neighborhoods that have been under siege for days during the fighting.
BILQUIS EDHI: People had beards because they were practicing. Today there’s less practice but more beards. It is this high number of narrow-minded people that have created all of the trouble we have in our country.
HASAN: And it was from this city that that war was fought, supplies, training, ideological training, the heroin trade that financed that war to a great extent, it all took place from here. Today, if you look the city, the supplies to the NATO troops all go through the city. Because they go through the city almost everyone has an interest in the city. The Americans have an interest. The Pakistani intelligence agencies have an interest. The Taliban are here, the Afghan intelligence agencies are here. They all have a presence.
ABDUL SATTAR EDHI: Brother, if for the time being you have to say salaam to somebody, there’s no harm. If a civil revolution comes in there will be anarchy and millions will die. What is needed for three to six months is somebody should come and control the situation.
LAWTON: For decades, religious groups have been partnering with the government to provide a host of social services in the US and around the world. Those partnerships attracted new visibility—and new controversy—after President George W. Bush created his faith-based initiative—
LAWTON: Stanley Carlson-Thies heads the Institutional Religious Freedom Alliance, which helps faith-based groups protect their identity and practices. He says the law allows religious groups to create an organizational philosophy as other federally funded entities do.
PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: First, if you get a federal grant you don’t use that grant money to proselytize to the people you help, and you can’t discriminate against them, or against the people you hire, on the basis of their religion.
MICHAEL ANTHONY GROSS (Helping Up Mission): When I was in detox, I talked to a gentleman, and he recommended the Helping Up Mission, and he spoke about the spiritual basis that, you know, the program is run on, and I come to know that after all these years that’s what I was missing.
GEHMAN: It really gives secular organizations a real power-edge, because they’re fully funded. They can build their buildings, they can develop their programs, and the faith-based organizations are left to have to raise their own money, which is becoming increasingly difficult.