According to the U.S. Department of Labor the unemployment rates are as follows:

Whites 6.6%

African American 11.9%

Latino 9.2%

These numbers are disheartening but we must also look inside, look to see where we have failed because while the numbers don’t lie, there are times we’ve used the numbers as an excuse for what we see in our communities. What a better way to pay tribute to Dr. King than to accept our shortcomings and strive to do better, as accepting responsibility and recognizing those truths will also set us free.

YES WE CAN do better, the proof is today, the eve of President-elect Barack Hussein Obama’s Inauguration. Let’s encourage each other to hope and to never give up on our dreams. Today I honor the man who led by example, the man who preached about equality for all and marched in protest to, “We shall overcome”, I honor Martin Luther King Jr., who died believing in his dream until his last breath and final speech,

“It really doesn’t matter what happens now…. Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place, but I’m not concerned about that now. I just want to do God’s will. And He’s allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I’ve looked over, and I’ve seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the Promised Land. And so I’m happy tonight. I’m not worried about anything. I’m not fearing any man. My eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.”

I would like to end with an excerpt of a brilliant speech delivered by a great man on a hot August day, on this, the eve of a historic day where we will once again look to Washington D.C. to another great man to deliver a monumental speech on what promises to be a cold, January day. May we be inspired to do as both speeches call and calls us to do…

I have a dream today!

I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of “interposition” and “nullification” — one day right there in Alabama little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.

I have a dream today!

I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, and every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight; “and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together.”2

This is our hope, and this is the faith that I go back to the South with.

With this faith, we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith, we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith, we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.

And this will be the day — this will be the day when all of God’s children will be able to sing with new meaning:

My country ’tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing.

Land where my fathers died, land of the Pilgrim’s pride,

From every mountainside, let freedom ring!

And if America is to be a great nation, this must become true.

And so let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire.

Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York.

Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania.

Let freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado.

Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California.

But not only that:

Let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia.

Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee.

Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi.

From every mountainside, let freedom ring.

And when this happens, when we allow freedom ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God’s children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual:

Free at last! Free at last!

Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!