the public ltter as a rhetorical form_richard fulkerson

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The public letter as a rhetoricalform: Structure, logic, and stylein king's “letter from Birminghamjail”Richard P. Fulkerson aa Associate Professor of English and Coordinator ofComposition, East Texas State University

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T H E QUARTERLY JOURNAL OF SPEECH,

65 (1979), 121-36.

The QUARTERLY JOURNAL

of SPEECHVOLUME 65 APRIL 1979 NUMBER 2

THE PUBLIC LETTER AS A RHETORICAL FORM:STRUCTURE, LOGIC, AND STYLE IN

KING'S "LETTER FROM BIRMINGHAM JAIL"

Richard P. Fulkerson

IN Birmingham, Alabama, on 12April 1963, the Reverend Martin

Luther King, Jr., in order to have him-self arrested on a symbolic day (GoodFriday), disobeyed an Alabama SupremeCourt injunction against demonstra-tions.1 That same day, in the Birming-ham News, King saw a public lettersigned by eight leading (white) Birming-ham clergymen calling on the protestersto cease their activities and to workthrough the courts for the redress oftheir grievances.

On the morning following his arrest,while being held in solitary confinement,King began to write in response to theclergymen the now famous "Letter fromBirmingham Jail." As he wrote later,"Begun on the margins of the newspaperin which the statement appeared whileI was in jail, the letter was continued onscraps of writing paper supplied by a

Mr. Fulkerson is Associate Professor of Englishand Coordinator of Composition, East TexasState University.

l David L. Lewis, King: A Critical Biography(New York: Praeger, 1970), p. 182.

friendly Negro trusty, and concluded ona pad my attorneys were eventually per-mitted to leave me."2 The "Letter" wascompleted on Tuesday, and the Ameri-can Friends Service Committee had50,000 copies printed for distribution.3

Later, after polishing, it became acentral chapter in King's Why We Can'tWait (1964).4

Judged by the frequency with which ithas been reprinted, the "Letter" hasalready become an American classic.5 It

2 Martin Luther King, Jr., Why We Can'tWait (New York: Harper & Row, 1963), p. 78.

3 Alan F. Westin and Barry Mahoney, TheTrial of Martin Luther King (New York:Crowell, 1974), p. 140.

4 My analysis is based on the first publishedversion. In all major respects the two versionsare almost identical. King's editing was restrictedto minor alterations of diction and syntax inmore than 200 sentences. Six other sentenceswere deleted, and one was added. In fourteeninstances two sentences were combined in re-vision; and four original sentences were divided.The changes seem to have been made in theinterests of economy and a move toward slightlymore formality. Anyone reading the two versions,however, must search carefully to find thechanges. The overall difference in impact isnegligible.

5 The "Letter" is included in a number ofcollege anthologies: Charles Muscatine and

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122QUARTERLY JOURNAL OF SPEECH

has been characterized as a "compellingargument,"6 "a virtuoso performance,"7

"a model of effective persuasive writ-ing,"8 and "one of the strongest piecesof persuasive writing to come out oftwentieth-century America."9 Despitethese comments, the "Letter" has beenthe subject of only one rather cursorystudy.10 Most of the published com-mentary on it constitutes praise ratherthan criticism.

The "Letter" deserves more extensivestudy, for it is an instance of superbrhetoric in action. Designed apparentlyas a refutative response to the clergymen,King's essay actually addresses two audi-ences simultaneously: the limited andprecisely defined group of eight clergy-men and a broader and less exactly de-fined group of intelligent and religiousmoderates. The purposes of this studyare, first, to consider the nature and

Marlene Griffith, eds., The Borzoi CollegeReader, 3rd ed. (New York: Knopf, 1976);Arthur M. Eastman et al., eds., The NortonReader, 4th ed. (New York: Norton, 1977);Caroline Shrodes, Harry Finestone, and MichaelShugrue, eds., The Conscious Reader, 2nd ed.(New York: Macmillan, 1978); Richard E. Young,Alton L. Becker, and Kenneth L. Pike, Rhetoric:Discovery and Change (New York: Harcourt,Brace & World, 1970); Halsey P. Taylor andVictor N. Okada, eds., The Craft of the Essay(New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1977);and Forrest D. Burt and E. Cleve Want, eds.,Invention & Design: A Rhetorical Reader (NewYork: Random House, 1978). It also appears inEdward P. J. Corbett, Classical Rhetoric for theModern Student, 2nd ed. (New York: Oxford,1971); Staughton Lynd, ed., Nonviolence inAmerica: A Documentary History (Indianapolis:Bobbs-Merrill, 1966); George Ducas and CharlesVan Doren, eds., Great Documents in BlackAmerican History (New York: Praeger, 1970);and Herbert J. Storing, ed., What Country Have1? Political Writings by Black Americans (NewYork: St. Martin's, 1970).

6 Craig Bradford Snow, A Guide to TheNorton Reader, Fourth Edition (New York:Norton, 1977), p. 173.

7 Richard L. Larson, Rhetorical Guide to TheBorzoi College Reader (New York: Knopf, 1967),p. 87.

8 Burt and Want, p. 354.9 Taylor and Okada, p. 310.

10 Haig A. Bosmajian, "Rhetoric of MartinLuther King's Letter From Birmingham Jail,"Midwest Quarterly, 8 (Jan. 1967), 127-43.

APRIL 1979

relationship of King's two audiences andthe rhetorical benefits King gained fromusing one audience to provide a focusthrough which the other could beaddressed, and, second, to demonstratehow carefully and effectively Kingadapted his presentation to suit bothaudiences on three levels: structural,logical, and stylistic.

THE CLERGYMEN'S LETTER

In their letter, the eight clergymen,representing both Christian and Jewishfaiths, address not the issue of racism,but the propriety of civil disobedienceand the timing of the protest. A re-strained document of seven paragraphsand slightly more than 400 words, theclergymen's letter supports the thesesthat "these demonstrations are unwiseand untimely," and that, "When rightsare consistently denied, a cause shouldbe pressed in the courts."11 It is a clearstatement of the moderate position: In-justice may exist, but the methods ofremediation must lie in compromise andin the appropriate legal channels.Typically moderate also is the tone ofoptimism; the clergymen refer to a "newconstructive and realistic approach" and"increased forbearance" which makethese "days of new hope." Such positivesigns, along with the patience and re-straint now being shown by the police,make this an especially inappropriatetime for protest.

Specifically the clergymen accuse Kingand his followers of (1) being led "inpart by outsiders," (2) failing tonegotiate, (3) inciting hatred andviolence, (4) choosing an inappropriatetime to act, (5) using extreme measures,(6) ignoring the courts as the correct

11 The clergymen's letter along with theearlier version of King's response is reprinted inMuscatine and Griffith, pp. 233-34.

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QUARTERLY JOURNAL OF SPEECH

avenue o£ redress, and (7) not observingthe principles of "law and order."

Two "FICTIONALIZED" AUDIENCES

Since King's response to these chargesis a "Letter" to "My dear Fellow Clergy-men," one might assume the eightclergymen to be the audience. On theother hand, it is a public letter in thetradition of Emile Zola's Dreyfus letter.Thus, because the letter has an apparentaudience (the clergymen) and a larger,more diverse one (King's public reader),the question of audience is complex.

Ong has recently argued that "thewriter's audience is always a fiction,"since no writer addresses the audience atthe moment of writing but mustimaginatively project both the audienceand its potential response.12 This be-comes more true and thus presents amore difficult rhetorical problem as thedistance between writer and readerwidens. While seeming to address theclergymen and to respond to theircharges, King had also to address hisbroader readership; thus as he wrote hehad to fictionalize two audiences, onesharing his clerical perspective, the othermore diverse. Such a perspective obvious-ly creates some difficulties. The writer,for example, must not assume (i.e.,fictionalize) anything about the osten-sible audience that would not also applyto the broader real audience. Structure,logic, and style, all have to be appro-priate not just for a single defined audi-ence but for the larger one as well.

Yet King turned the rhetorically com-plex situation into an advantage. Hadhe chosen to defend his actions directlyto a public audience, he would have hadto fictionalize his audience with virtuallyno guidelines. Instead, he wrote as if he

12 Walter J. Ong, "The Writer's Audience IsAlways a Fiction," PMLA, 90 (1975), 9-21.

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were addressing the clergymen, aboutwhom he could reasonably make certainassumptions; he took them—or ratherhis fictionalized image of them—as ametaphor for his broader readership.

By using the clergymen as his osten-sible audience, King found the guide-lines for fictionalizing the broader audi-ence, much the more important one toaddress under the circumstances. Theclergymen, of course, were religious,white, moderate, educated leaders ofpublic opinion. Thus they were represen-tative of only a segment of the broaderpublic, but it was a segment which Kinghad both a need to and a possibility ofpersuading. Little, if anything, was tobe gained in addressing white segrega-tionists, black revolutionists, or peopleindifferent to civil rights. The situationcalled instead for an address to as widea range of moderate-to-liberal, involvedreaders as possible; so much the betterif a substantial number of them werealso leaders of public opinion.

All social movements face the po-tential problem of splintering; and thecivil rights movement, then in its in-fancy, was in danger of falling apartbecause of disagreement over the pro-priety of King's tactics. In addition topersuading a broad public, King thusneeded also to unify civil rights pro-ponents by persuading the more mod-erate among them that his course ofaction was the right one. By answeringthe clergymen, he in effect answered themental reservations held by those whosededication to equality fell short of sup-port of public demonstrations.

The rhetorical advantages of address-ing the broader audience in terms of theclerical audience are clearer if King andthe clergymen are perceived as op-ponents in a written debate. Debatersseem to address each other, and they dorespond to each other, but the response

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is determined by its intended effect on athird party, the judge or audience.

Despite the complexity resulting fromthe dual audience, this debater's stancegave King five argumentative advantages.First, the already existing document de-fined the key issues. Instead of havingto fictionalize all potential argumentsthat an audience might hold againstprotest, King had only to respond toassertions in the clergymen's letter.Fortunately for his purposes, their letterwas a synthesis of almost every likelycriticism. This allowed King the fullestrange of issues to discuss and thus al-lowed the greatest opportunity for per-suasion; had the clergy disagreed withKing on only one matter, such as timing,he could have answered that charge, buthis response could not have become arefutative manifesto for a broader audi-ence, a defense of his movement and thetheory of peaceful civil disobedience onwhich it was based.

Second, refutation of an existent paperallowed a clear, easy to follow, point bypoint organization. Purely by enumera-tion, if King wished, he could handleeach argument as it had been broughtup by the opponents. The only necessaryscaffolding was the transition, "You alsoargued..."

Third, refutation worked particularlywell since the clergymen were in a weakposition to begin with. They could notdeny the charge that Birmingham wasa thoroughly segregated city; at best theycould argue that the means being used toremedy segregation were improper and/or that they were pursued at the wrongtime.

Fourth, it is simpler to disprove some-one else's moral argument than to builda case for one's own. Demonstrating thatan opponent's position is unsoundlyargued does not logically validate one'sown argument, but rhetorically it often

APRIL 1979

seems to a reader to do so. A reader-judge does not engage in argument but,rather, compares the two cases presented.Instead of listening to King to decidewhether he is right, a public reader ismore likely to judge which of two pre-sentations is the more persuasive. And,although a reader might be unconvincedby the "Letter" as an independent entity,when it is compared with the clergymen'sargument, King's case is clearly superioron all counts.13

Finally, adapting his presentation tohis ostensible audience, instead of havingto launch it into the dark, allowedKing to create a warm, personal tone.His essay is stylistically and tonally a realletter with a real personality behind it.

THE "LETTER'S" STRUCTURE

King's essay is primarily a series ofrefutations of the arguments made bythe clergymen, a point made by severalcommentators.14 But saying this tends toobscure its more subtle features. In con-structing his essay King, by design oraccident, adapted the pattern of theclassical oration to suit the situation inBirmingham, the clergymen's letter, andthe wider audience as well. He reducedthe classical confirmatio to utmostbrevity and expanded the refutatio tocarry the burden of argument.

The letter opens without an impas-sioned exordium, and this seems entirelyappropriate to the already heated cir-cumstances. Instead, the salutation, "Mydear Fellow Clergymen," establishes im-

13 I do not mean to imply that a reader ofKing's essay must be familiar with the clergy'sletter. It is quite enough to "know" their letterthrough King's restatements of its main points.He "responds" to the clergy's arguments but doesnot allow them to structure his essay; they onlyseem to do so. If one knows the clergy's letterwell, it is even clear that King slightly restatessome arguments to make them more refutable.

14 The refutative structure has been pointedout by Larson and Bosmajian.

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mediately the warm, tactful tone pre-valent in the essay. How different wouldhave been the more formal "Dear Sirs,"or "Dear Clergymen," or even "MyFellow Clergymen." The body of theletter begins with the classical narratio,"the exposition of the state of affairs atthe moment,"15 the facts that have moti-vated the writing. Subtly emphasizingthe irony of a minister's being in prison,King notes, "While confined here in theBirmingham City Jail, I came across yourrecent statement calling our presentactivities 'unwise and untimely.' . . . Iwould like to answer your statement inwhat I hope will be patient and reason-able terms." Both the "patient and rea-sonable" tone and the intimacy of directaddress continue throughout the essay.

King quickly deviates (pars. 2 and 3)from the pattern of the classical oration,however, by addressing one point in theclergy's letter: "I think I should givethe reason for my being in Birmingham,since you have been influenced by theargument of 'outsiders coming in.' " Thereason for refuting this argument beforepresenting the constructive case seemsclear; if the argument about "outsiders"has any validity in the minds of eitheraudience, then King has no right to dis-cuss circumstances in Birmingham. Hemust earn the right to talk.

After his response to the "outsiders"argument, King states (par. 4) his pro-positio, that the Negro in Birminghamhas had no choice but protest. Then,using the classical partitio, King notes(par. 5) that four steps are necessary in aprotest campaign: "(1) collection of thefacts to determine whether injustices arealive; (2) negotiation; (3) self-purifica-tion; and (4) direct action." King nowtakes up successively (pars. 5-7) the firstthree steps to show that in fact the Birm-ingham protesters had gone through

15 Corbett, p. 27.

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them before determining to use directaction (par. 8).

These few paragraphs constituteKing's unusually brief confirmatio, hisconstructive case for civil disobediencein Birmingham at this time, an argu-ment built on what Bosmajian has calledthe "Method of Residues."16 Altogether,proposition, partition, and confirmationcomprise only five of the essay's forty-eight paragraphs.

King now turns (par. 9) to the firstof six major issues: "You may well ask,'Why direct action? Why sit-ins, marches,etc.? Isn't negotiation a better path?' "This was not the first point raised bythe clergymen, but King wisely adaptsthe order of his main arguments tomove from the obvious to the morecomplex, presumably for the benefit ofthe wider audience. By agreeing, Kinglogically and gracefully turns the argu-ment back on the clergymen: Certainlynegotiation is desirable; the goal of theprotest is precisely to make the other sidewilling to negotiate. In the succeedingparagraphs (10-20), King handles thesecond and third major issues, thecharges that the protests were ill-timedand violations of "law and order."

At this point King interrupts his ref-utative pattern with one of the personalsections that Larson calls digressions.17

If the section is digressive, it is progres-sive at the same time; and such asides,merged into the rigid refutative struc-ture, enhance the feeling that this is apersonal letter in which personal feelingand digression (of sorts) are acceptable.In this "digression," King moves by asso-ciation from the clergy's "law and order"argument to the first of "two honestconfessions." He feels compelled to "con-fess" (par. 21) that he has been profound-ly disappointed in the Southern white

16 Bosmajian, p. 130.17 Larson, p. 84.

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liberal for making arguments such asthe "law and order" one instead of join-ing the Negro cause. Suddenly the clergyare on the defensive; not just their argu-ment but their inaction is criticized.King does not attack angrily; he is mere-ly forced (against his own good will) toadmit that he has been saddened by suchbehavior and "almost" made to concludethat the people who make up his audi-ences are more dangerous to the Negrothan outright segregationists. This toneof sadness and compulsion is effectiveprecisely because it allows King to attackwithout seeming aggressive.

After two paragraphs (21-22) on hisfirst disappointment, King returns (par.23) to his refutative strategy and disposesof the argument that his nonviolentactions are evil because they precipitateviolence from others. Then he refutes(pars. 24-25) what he calls "the myth oftime," an argument that Negroes shouldwait for the natural course of socialevolution to solve their problems. Theclergymen had not made this argument,although it might have been suggestedin their assertion that the protest inBirmingham was untimely. So to pro-vide this view explicitly, and consequent-ly maintain his refutative pattern, Kingquotes another letter, one from "a whitebrother in Texas" who had argued, "AllChristians know that the colored peoplewill receive equal rights eventually, butis it possible that you are in too great ofa religious hurry? It has taken Christian-ity almost 2000 years to accomplish whatit has." The "white brother," and per-haps the clergymen, is answered quickly.Then King devotes three paragraphs(26-28) in response to the argument thathis actions are "extreme."

His second "disappointment," this onesadder and more pointed, follows; it isnot only disappointment with the whiteliberal Southerner, but also disappoint-

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ment with the Southern white church,which King sees as having sacrificed the"extremism" of moral commitment his-torically typical of the Christian faith.In the characteristic sad tone, King de-votes twelve paragraphs (30-41) to theirony of the Southern churches' profess-ing equality in the eyes of God, and thespirit of Christian fellowship, while al-lowing the ungodly and immoral prac-tice of segregation to continue un-opposed. By implication this is a directattack on precisely the behavior of theeight clergymen to whom he is respond-ing, for they profess a religiously rootedequality and fellowship but are arguingto allow the continuation of an ungodlysegregation. King cannot understandsuch an "other-worldly religion whichmade a strange distinction between bodyand soul, the sacred and the secular."18

Whereas the major confirmatio receivedonly five paragraphs, the refutatio withits two attendant confessions extends forthirty-three paragraphs.19

King then begins (par. 42) his movingperoratio, stopping once (pars. 43-44) torefute the clergymen's praise of the re-straint shown by the Birmingham police.The peroration, in its apology for hav-ing written at such length, recalls boththe calm tone and the prison referenceof the opening: "what else is there to dowhen you are alone for days in the dullmonotony of a narrow jail cell otherthan write long letters, think strange

18 It may not be too farfetched to argue thatthese two digressions actually constitute the realconstructive case of the essay. They do notdirectly support the proposition as I havedescribed it, but they do make a case for con-certed action against, rather than endurance of,segregation. And motivating such action may bethe real implicit purpose.

19 Actually one of the clergy's corollary claims,that King and his followers had ignored thecourts, is never answered. Since King, in fact,had chosen protest in the streets rather thanaction in the courts, he can scarcely answer sucha charge directly. The whole letter is, however,a justification of ignoring the courts.

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thoughts, and pray long prayers?" Theclosing paragraph reasserts the identityof his viewpoint with that of his osten-sible audience and speaks confidently ofthe future, when they may all meetand the "deep fog of misunderstandingwill be lifted from our fear-drenchedcommunities."

Schematically, then, the essay's struc-ture looks like this:

A. Narratio (pars. 1-4)1. Clergy's letter2. King's reasons for being in Birmingham

B. Propositio—"the white power structure of thiscity left the Negro communitywith no other alternative" (par.4)

C. Confirmatio—the four steps to protest (pars.5-8)

• D. Refutatio (pars. 9-41)1. Negotiation2. Timing3. Breaking laws

(First "Confession":Disappointment in whiteliberals for not breakinglaws)

4. Precipitating violence5. The myth of time6. Extremism

(Second "Confession":Disappointment in whiteSouthern church for notbeing extreme)

E. Peroratio (pars. 42-48)1. Confidence in the future2. Clergy's praise for police (refuted)3. Hope to meet in a better future

The interjection of the two "disappoint-ments" into the six main refutations, aswell as the length of some of the refuta-tions, may create the impression oflooseness.20 So may the informal,epistolary style. But the essay is actuallytightly and elaborately structured. Itcombines the clarity, efficiency, and per-

20 Larson, in his valuable set of notes on theessay, has characterized it as "randomly inter-connected" (p. 84); obviously, I disagree.

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suasive force of the classical oration withthe personal warmth and associativestructure of a letter to a friend.

THE "LETTER'S" REFUTATIVE LOGIC

Even more impressive than the overallarrangement of the "Letter" is its in-ternal logic in each refutative segment.King characteristically refutes thecharges brought against him with a dualpattern. Never satisfied with one re-sponse, he answers each argument onat least two levels, usually a practical,immediate level, perhaps most appealingto a public audience, and an abstract,philosophical level involving unstatedmoral premises, an argument appealingmore to the ostensible audience andothers with some concern for philosophi-cal abstractions. Multiple refutationis especially effective for the onlookingaudience because it creates the impres-sion that the other side's reasoning isnot just weak but so unsound as to beunacceptable.

For example, in response to the chargethat he is an outsider who has no busi-ness in Birmingham, King has fouranswers. First, he explains that the blackleaders of Birmingham had invited himto come assist in the protest (rather thanbeing a cause of it); second, that aspresident of the Southern ChristianLeadership Conference of which theAlabama Christian Movement for Hu-man Rights is an affiliate, "I am herebecause I have basic organizational tieshere." These are the practical answers.They establish (if accepted) that he isnot in fact an outsider, or at least not acomplete outsider. But beyond these,King moves to attack the concept of the"outsider." Thus his third response isthat, in the tradition of Paul and otherChristian prophets and missionaries, hehas gone wherever there was need. Sucha view is the direct consequence

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of a historical, religious precedent thatneither of his audiences could reject.Fourth, since all communities and statesin the modern world are interrelated,King argues, no man can be an outsiderin his own nation. With that he hasturned to the attack: "Whatever affectsone directly affects all indirectly. Neveragain can we afford to live with thenarrow, provincial 'outside agitator'idea."

For refutative purposes King, hereand throughout, expands the clergy-men's enthymemes into syllogisms, with-out using the dry and formidablephrasing of formal logic. In formalterms their reasoning had to be asfollows:

Outsiders have no right to protest.King is an outsider.Therefore, King has no right to

protest.

In response, King first attacks the minorpremise by showing the ties that makehim other than an outsider in Birming-ham. But if this is not convincing, healso attacks the major premise by citingthe tradition of Christian missionarywork and by arguing that in our inter-dependent nation, no citizen is an out-sider anywhere.

Perhaps the clearest example of King'sstrategy of dual refutation is his answerto the label "extreme measures." Thephrase masks a full syllogism:

Extremism is wrong.King and his followers' actions are

extreme.Therefore, their actions are wrong.

At first King attacks the minor premiseby pointing out that in fact among theNegro community his is precisely themoderate position, midway between thepassive complacency of some older

APRIL 1979

Negroes and the violent militance ofthe young. Then, upon rethinking thematter, King attacks the unstated majorpremise by citing historical precedentsof great extremists whom his opponentsand the observing audience cannot helpbut revere: Christ, Paul, Martin Luther,John Bunyan, Lincoln, Thomas Jeffer-son. To deny first that one is an ex-tremist, and then to argue that in factextremism in moral matters is desirable,not wrong, seems self-contradictory.Actually King works on two definitionsof extremism: The first is holding aposition far from the norm (which Kingsays he does not); the second is holdinga view, no matter what, without com-promise. Since the clergymen's briefletter did not define the term, King takesthe two possible definitions and shows 'his own position superior in either case.His position is not an extreme one, buthe holds to it with extreme commitment.

Throughout the essay similarly, pre-cise meanings of key terms are used asthe bases for arguments. In answeringthe most important charge, that it isimproper to break a law, in this instancea court-ordered injunction, King gra-ciously acknowledges the apparent incon-sistency: "Since we so diligently urgepeople to obey the Supreme Court's de-cision of 1954 outlawing segregation inthe public schools, it is rather strangeand paradoxical to find us consciouslybreaking laws." Because this is in factthe central issue and the one probablymost likely to evoke disagreement, Kingdevotes the longest refutation to it, eightparagraphs, and gives the greatest num-ber of different answers. This time Kingcannot attack the minor premise; hehad in fact broken a law. Instead heanswers the implied major premise (thatit is always wrong to break the law) onseveral levels, each carefully calculatedto persuade both his ostensible and his

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observing audiences, both of whom werelikely to be hostile to such a claim.

King's fundamental answer is drawnfrom the premise that laws are not endsin themselves but means of achievingjustice. If so, justice, and not the lawper se, must be served. In fact, he asserts,initiating another key distinction, thereare just laws and unjust laws, and itis one's moral duty to disobey unjustlaws because they subvert the purposeof law—justice. By subtle implicationthen, if he is right, his audiences havenot lived up to their moral duties.

King offers three definitions of thedifference between just and unjust laws,presumably in the event that one of thedistinctions proves less than persuasive.First, "A just law is a man-made codethat squares with the moral law or thelaw of God. An unjust law is a code thatis out of harmony with the moral law."Second, an unjust law is any law forcedon a minority not followed also by themajority. And third, an unjust law isany law that a minority had no voice inmaking.

On all three counts, King argues,segregation laws (and presumably lawsagainst or used against public protests)are unjust. His audience might notagree with his definitions, but few coulddeny that some laws are unjust. How-ever one defines injustice, the opponentsof protest are in the untenable positionof defending at least temporary obedi-ence to unjust law.

King then turns again to historicaltradition for key instances of disobedi-ence to patently unjust laws. Several ex-amples from the Judeo-Christian tradi-tion can scarcely be rejected by theostensible audience, and probably notby most members of the wider one. Asa more current instance King alludes toHitler, who in persecuting the Jews wasfollowing the law. Anyone who does not

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accept, at this point, the notion that it issometimes moral to break the law mustalso accept the implication of defendingon similar grounds obedience to theantisemitic decrees of the Nazi regime.21

In this instance King's argument restson premises similar to those under-lying the "Higher Law" argument of thenineteenth century abolitionists andthe "Natural Law" argument of theeighteenth century revolutionists. Thus,in outline, the argument is one withwhich his audience was likely to befamiliar and sympathetic. King's posi-tion, consequently, is well adapted toboth of his audiences and increases hischances of being persuasive. Moreover,King's use of the historical traditionhere (as throughout) has the rhetoricalvirtue of presenting him as a tradi-tionalist, an image likely to be valuedby his moderate audience, who tend toregard him as a radical bent on "extrememeasures."

Reading the "Letter" a first or secondtime, one is not yet fully aware of theshape of King's refutation, but, as inmany affective situations, awareness isnot requisite. King's combination ofdefinition, precedent, and multipremiserefutation is rhetorically effective, bothdirectly and indirectly. Because therefutation seems at once precise, clear,and elegant without ostentation, thereader-judge is encouraged to assumenot only "this is a sound position," butalso "this is a master at work. He knowshis subject, he knows his audience, heknows his art." And, I believe, a readercomes unconsciously to feel that "a manwho can perform these tasks is able andhonest and worthy of belief." In short,as he argues, King not only adapts to afictionalized audience, but creates forthat audience an image of himself

21 In his revision, King added a further his-torical example, the Boston Tea Party.

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through his adaptation. In classicalterms, he creates his ethos. To extendOng's argument, in any instance ofwritten communication, the rhetor—whether the image be true or false—isalways a fiction created for the audienceand based on the writer's fictionalizing ofthem.

Any rhetorical choice thus has twodimensions. A choice effective in its ownright becomes doubly effective becauseit fictionalizes a writer as the sort ofperson who makes such choices—a wise,shrewd rhetor worth listening to. Like-wise, a choice that fails presents an imageof a rhetor who had no better judgmentthan to make that choice. Persuasion re-sults not only from the logos of contentbut also from the ethos created throughthe performance, and King's "Letter" isoutstanding on both grounds.

STYLE AS PERSUASION IN THE "LETTER"

The positive ethical image does notresult only from the chosen audienceconceptualization and refutative stra-tegies discussed above, however. It alsoresults from the essay's style. Althoughthis is not the place for a complete de-scriptive analysis of King's stylistic ver-satility in "Letter from BirminghamJail," I would like to highlight some ofits more striking stylistic features and tospeculate on the ways they reinforce thetotal persuasive effort. The essay's styleis supple and sophisticated yet readable.An audience is likely to be favorablyimpressed, without being overwhelmed.The stylistic manipulations both createan image of competence and sincerityand operate on the reader's emotions.

Like all rhetorical choices, stylistic de-cisions have multiple effects. But toclarify the relation between stylisticchoice and persuasion, it may be usefulto assert that an effective stylistic choice

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will work in one or more of the follow-ing three ways. It may adapt the stylein order to carry meaning more effective-ly to the audience as fictionalized by therhetor, such as a decision to use a simplersynonym in place of a more elaborateequivalent. This is the adaptive dimen-sion of style. Or the choice may operateon the reader's emotions in a less thanobvious way, such as in a decision touse words that alliterate. This is theaffective dimension of style, as I hopeto clarify below. Finally the stylisticchoice may be effective primarily be-cause it helps enhance the rhetor's imageand thus the rhetor's credibility. Thisis the ethical dimension of style. Thesethree varieties of stylistic impact cor-respond closely to the three classicalmodes of persuasion; the adaptive choiceis a rational technique (logos), the af-fective choice works on the emotions(pathos), and the ethical choice is atechnique for enhancing ethos.

To illustrate these three persuasivedimensions of King's style, it may bewell to start with an obvious and rela-tively simple feature of the essay. Areader can scarcely help noticing howoften King refers to other famous menwhom he expects his reader to recognize.These allusions are directly effective intheir adaptive and affective appeals toboth the limited and broader audiencesand indirectly effective in the image ofhim they help create.

King unabashedly puts himself intoa great tradition of protest beginningwith Socrates, referred to three times,and extending down through primarilyChristian history, from the early proph-ets to Christ himself, to Paul, toAquinas, Augustine, Martin Luther, andBunyan. In addition to such historicalallusions, King also buttresses his argu-ment by quoting or paraphrasing Rein-hold Niebuhr, Martin Buber, and Paul

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Tillich, leading modern spokesmen fromboth Christian and Jewish faiths andthus presumably adaptive references forall of the eight clergymen at one timeor another as well as to virtually all ofKing's broader audience. He even man-ages to quote an unidentified justice ofthe United States Supreme Court andT. S. Eliot. This man, who is potentiallysuspect as an outsider, a rabble-rouser,even a criminal, reveals himself to beeducated, wise, and widely read. Atleast that is the impression such allusionsmake in discourse. They have multiplica-tive ethical impact, since an auditor as-sumes they, are a carefully chosen sampledrawn from a much larger store of infor-mation.

King's style in the essay is also markedby the extensive use of metaphors,generally of two types: either enduringarchetypal metaphors or metaphorsdrawn from contemporary technology.Two archetypal patterns are dominant,that of depth versus height and darkversus light. The present system andsegregation are repeatedly characterizedas being down and dark, while the hopefor the future involves rising and cominginto the light. The Negroes live in a"dark shadow" and must "rise from thedark depths." They are "plunged into anabyss of injustice where they experiencethe bleakness of corroding despair."Policy must be lifted from "quicksand"to "rock," and "we have fallen below ourenvironment"; Negroes are in a "darkdungeon"; in the emphatic and opti-mistic final paragraph (quoted below)America now suffers under the "darkclouds of racial prejudice" in a "deepfog of misunderstanding," but "to-morrow the radiant stars of love andbrotherhood will shine."

As Osborn has argued, "Because oftheir strong positive and negative asso-ciations with survival and developmental

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motives, such metaphors express intensevalue judgments and may thus be ex-pected to elicit significant value re-sponses." Such "argument by archetype"also appeals to an audience's desire forsimplification through its built-in, two-valued orientation.22

Other metaphors come from moderntechnology. The nations of Africa aremoving forward with "jet-like speed"while we go at "a horse and buggy pace";and the church stands "as a tail lightbehind other community agencies ratherthan a headlight leading men to higherlevels of justice." The church is nowmerely a "thermometer" recording pop-ular opinion instead of what it once was,"a thermostat that transformed themores of society."

Specifically medical metaphors unitethe technological imagery with thearchetypal metaphor of disease andhealth. Segregation is a disease and latera boil that must be exposed to the heal-ing sun. The liberal argument to waithas "been a tranquilizing thalidomide,relieving the emotional stress for amoment, only to give birth to an ill-formed infant of frustration."23 Somewhites have sensed the need for "anti-dotes" to segregation, but others haveremained silent "behind the anesthetiz-ing security of stained glass windows."All told, I count seventy-two metaphors,including both explicit and suppressedforms. Almost none are presentedthrough cliches (common verbal for-mulas). They share several stylistic func-tions. On the adaptive level they arememorable for their ingenuity, and they

22 Michael Osborn, "Archetypal Metaphor inRhetoric: The Light-Dark Family," QuarterlyJournal of Speech, 53 (1967), 117.

23 In the revised version, King cut out threeof his metaphors, apparently because they weretoo harsh. Both the "thalidomide" and the "taillight" images were omitted, as was a referenceto the few whites who had joined the blackprotest as "the leaven in the lump of race."

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help make an abstract philosophicalargument vividly concrete. On the af-fective level, the archetypal metaphorsspeak to fundamental urges in us alland thus enhance the message indirectly.Finally, like all rhetorical choices, thestylistic decision to use metaphors alsoaffects King's image. The archetypalreferences create the image of a sincereman of deep feeling who is fundamental-ly like the reader and who has confidenceboth in his own moral judgment and inthe inevitability of a better tomorrow.The technological images help build anidentification between King and hisreaders; both speaker and listener in-habit the same world of jet planes,thermometers, and wonder drugs, aworld of rapid change in which only oneelement—the status of blacks—has notkept up.

This same identity of rhetor andreader is also enhanced by a series ofstylistic choices which, taken together,constitute the conciliatory tone thatcharacterizes the essay and serves tounite a variety of other tones. From thesalutation onward, King is not out tocriticize or belittle, but merely to ex-plain patiently and sadly to those whodo not (yet) see the light of the truth.Throughout the essay King may berighteous, hurt, disappointed, ironic,sorry that he must say some unavoidablycritical things, but neither angry nordespairing. He has "almost reached theregrettable conclusion that the Negroes'great stumbling block in the stride to-ward freedom is not the White Citizens''Counciler' or the Ku Klux Klanner,but the white moderate": almost but notquite. And he has paid his clericalaudience the compliment of havinglistened carefully to their views. Hisessay thus fulfills Carl Rogers' demandthat one must first hear a position andbe able to repeat it with understanding

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and clarity before real communicationcan occur.24 Throughout the essay Kingshows his respect for his reader. Heknows that his clerical audience is com-posed of sincere and devout men, menwho share his basic religious valuesand whom he can call "My dearFellow Clergymen" and "My Christianbrothers." King even praises some byname for their own (limited) efforts tomove toward integration. He cancriticize such men only with regret.Echoing through the essay are phrasessuch as "I must say" and "I feel impelledto mention." Such a stylistic stance flat-ters him as well as his addressees. It servesthe positive image he wants; this writeris not a shouting, belligerent, trouble-maker, but a sincere and understandinghuman being whose views are forced outof him by his concern for their misguidedpositions.

The identification with the audienceand the conciliatory tone are furthercreated by one of the most subtle stylisticelements in the "Letter," the use of per-sonal pronouns. Since the "Letter" is adeeply personal apologia, it is not sur-prising that I occurs regularly—139 timesto be exact, 100 times as the subject of amain clause. Similarly King often ad-dresses his ostensible audience directly:in rephrasing their arguments ("youstated"), in asking for understanding ("Ihope that you can see"), in directaddress ("Each of you has taken somesignificant stands"), and in personal ap-peal ("I beg you to forgive me." "I hopethis letter finds you strong in the faith.").There are forty uses of you to refer tothe clergymen, not to mention othergeneric uses of the word, which alsocarry personal overtones. The net effectis an impression of informality as well

24 Carl R. Rogers, "Communication: Its Block-ing and Its Facilitation," in Young, Becker, andPike, pp. 284-89.

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133

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as personal commitment on the part ofthe/.

More subtle still is King's manipula-tion of ambiguous first-person-pluralpronouns. Often we and our and us inthe essay refer clearly to some or all ofthe Birmingham protesters: "Severalmonths ago our local affiliate here . . .invited us to be on call . . . We readilyconsented." In other places, the we ismore general, as in "Never again can weafford to live with the narrow, provincial'outside agitator' idea." Yet frequentlya we, our, or us seems to refer to theprotesters but may also include the audi-ence, in effect reinforcing the frequentdirect addresses by gathering King andhis opponents into a unit sharing asingle outlook. Consider this sentence:"I have tried to stand between these twoforces saying that we need not followthe 'do-nothingism' of the complacentor the hatred and despair of the blacknationalist." We here at first seems tomean "we the moderate protesters," butit may equally well mean "we who recog-nize the problem and want to see itsolved." We, all of us, you clergymen aswell as my followers, may take thismiddle road. The union is subtle, but isat least subconsciously forced on thereader by King's choice of pronouns.

A similar movement from "I-you" towe operates in the closing paragraph ofthe essay in conjunction with extendedarchetypal imagery:

7 hope this letter finds you strong in the faith.I also hope that circumstances will soon makeit possible for me to meet each of you, not as anintegrationist or a civil rights leader, but as afellow clergymen and a Christian brother. Letus all hope that the dark clouds of racial pre-judice will soon pass away and the deep fog ofmisunderstanding will be lifted from our fear-drenched communities and in some not toodistant tomorrow the radiant stars of love andbrotherhood will shine over our great nationwith all their scintillating beauty (italics added).

In the first two sentences, the currentseparation between I and you is bothstated and reinforced by the pronouns,but after the conciliatory "fellow clergy-men," in the third sentence, both groupsmerge in a vision of future unity in "ourcommunities" and "our great nation"under the scintillating beauty of thehigh, bright stars.

King's style in the "Letter," as Larsonhas pointed out,25 is primarily charac-terized by variety. It shows in the allu-sions and metaphors already discussedand in the range of tones united by thedominant conciliatory stance, but it isnowhere more obvious than in the essay'ssyntactic structures.

The original published text of King's"Letter" consisted of 48 paragraphs, 325sentences, and 7,110 words, with amoderate average sentence of 22 wordsand an average paragraph of almost 7sentences or 149 words. The averagesentence, not so long as that of normalAmerican intellectual prose, is con-sequently appropriate for King's exten-sive audience. But such statistics maskthe variety of King's syntax. Of the 325sentences, many are short; 62 have 10 orfewer words. Some are aphoristic, suchas "We are caught in an inescapable net-work of mutuality tied in a single gar-ment of destiny. Whatever affects onedirectly affects all indirectly." Thusparts of the essay are quite easy to readand eminently quotable. On the otherhand, 18 sentences are more than 50words long and 2 exceed 100 words. Iknow of no other modern public prose

25 Larson says, "It is, indeed, unfair to speakof the 'tone' of the 'Letter,' for in its variedtones the 'Letter' is more like a musical per-formance than a piece of argument" (p. 86).True, but, as in a piece of music, the variedtones are all brought into harmony by the tonicnote, in this instance the generous, conciliatorystance with which King states his uncompromis-ing case.

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including sentences of such length. Al-though some readers are likely to stum-ble over such sentences, my impressionis that, overall, the style is clear andvivid and relatively easy to read butwith no hint of condescension. The ex-treme variations in sentence length aswell as similar variety in clausal con-struction and levels of formality seemprimarily to work on the ethical level.That is, they dramatize for the readersa rhetor who is a master manipulatorof language.

The one syntactic feature that emergesas common within the variation iselaborate parallelism. In it, as in themetaphors, it is easy to hear the cadencesof the evangelist, another dimension ofKing's self-dramatization through style.Sometimes King's parallelism is tightand aphoristic as in "Shallow under-standing from people of good will ismore frustrating than absolute mis-understanding from people of ill will,"or "Whatever affects one directly affectsall indirectly." More often, however, itis spread out and rhythmic: "I say it asa minister of the gospel, who loves theChurch; who was nurtured in its bosom;who has been sustained by its spiritualblessings and who will remain true to itas long as the cord of life shall lengthen."Or,

I have almost reached the regrettable conclusionthat the Negroes' great stumbling block in thestride toward freedom is not the White Citizens'"Counciler" or the Ku Klux Klanner, but thewhite moderate who is more devoted to "order"than to justice; who prefers a negative peacewhich is the absence of tension to a positivepeace which is the presence of justice; who con-stantly says "I agree with you in the goal youseek, but I can't agree with your methods ofdirect action"; who paternalistically feels that hecan set the time-table for another man's free-dom; who lives by the myth of time and whoconstantly advises the Negro to wait until a"more convenient season."

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Frequently this extended parallelismcontinues through several sentences:

They have left their secure congregations andwalked the streets of Albany, Georgia, with us.They have gone through the highways of theSouth on torturous rides for freedom. Yes, theyhave gone to jail with us. Some have beenkicked out of their churches and lost the sup-port of their bishops and fellow ministers. Butthey have gone with the faith that right de-feated is stronger than evil triumphant.

In all, I count 15 instances of sus-tained parallelism, some involving asmany as 6 sentences and one (discussedbelow) a single sentence of more than300 words.

The effects of such parallelism mustbe largely conjectural, but it is difficultto imagine that they can lie in theadaptive domain. That is, there seemsto be no reason to think that parallelsyntax is any more clear or easy tofollow than are other syntactic struc-tures. On the other hand, the rhythmsand balance created by parallelism,especially when a series of parallel con-structions is used to build to a climax,probably have an affective impact, muchas they would in oral discourse but to alesser degree. The major effect is ethical,portraying the rhetor as a man who canbalance various views and who has hisideas under complete control.

The "Letter's" most impressive stylis-tic feat is its longest sentence. Uniqueform serves to emphasize unique con-tent since it is the one place in the essaywhere the evil of segregation, ratherthan the necessity of protest, is de-lineated. Because it contains in minia-ture so much that is syntactically andmetaphorically characteristic of theessay, I quote it in full. It occurs (par.12) within the refutation of the argu-ment that now is not the proper time forprotest. It opens, as do many of thesentences, with a conjunctive turn:

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But when you have seen vicious mobs lynchyour mothers and fathers at will and drown yoursisters and brothers at whim; when you haveseen hate filled policemen curse, kick, brutalize,and even kill your black brothers and sisterswith impunity; when you see the vast majorityof your twenty million Negro brothers smother-ing in an air-tight cage of poverty in the midstof an affluent society; when you suddenly findyour tongue twisted and your speech stammer-ing as you seek to explain to your six-year-olddaughter why she can't go to the public amuse-ment park that has just been advertised on tele-vision, and see tears welling up in her littleeyes when she is told that Funtown is closedto colored children, and see the depressingclouds of inferiority begin to form in herlittle mental sky, and see her begin to distorther little personality by unconsciously developinga bitterness toward white people; when you haveto concoct an answer for a five-year-old sonasking in agonizing pathos: "Daddy, why dowhite people treat colored people so mean?";when you take a cross country drive and find itnecessary to sleep night after night in the un-comfortable corners of your automobile becauseno motel will accept you; when you arehumiliated day in and day out by nagging signsreading "white" men and "colored"; when yourfirst name becomes "nigger" and your middlename becomes "boy" (however old you are)and your last name becomes "John," and whenyour wife and mother are never given the re-spected title "Mrs."; when you are harried byday and haunted by night by the fact that youare a Negro, living constantly at tip-toe stancenever quite knowing what to expect next, andplagued with inner fears and outer resentments;when you are forever fighting a degeneratingsense of "nobodiness";—then you will under-stand why we find it difficult to wait.

This most impressive periodic sentenceof 331 words is highlighted through con-trast with the preceding sentence of 19words and succeeding sentences of 33, 11,13, and 6 words. Its nine major sub-ordinate clauses are each addressed di-rectly to the audience with "when you,"and they comprise an elaborate cata-logue, frequently with metaphor, of theinjustices suffered daily by the Negro inAmerica. The sentence builds to a cli-

max after detail is piled on detail, only •to end with the one main clause ofmagnificently understated direct ad-dress: "then you will understand whywe find it difficult to wait." Here thepronouns create no union: you aredistinctly not we. It is appropriate thatthis single indictment of Americanracism, the only point in the essay atwhich pathos is used as a major suasivemode, should be the longest sentence.But it is also appropriate that it not bedominant. For the subject of the essay isnot racial injustice. That is, except here,a given.

CONCLUSION

Presumably a public letter, to becredible, must suit the ostensible audi-ence; one of the virtues of the form isthat it provides a relatively well-defined(ostensible) audience on which rhetoricaland stylistic choices may be based. Butthis fact in turn both defines and con-trols the onlooking audience. We cannever know who King's readers were (orwill be), but we can deduce who hisfictionalized audience must have been.The refutative logic, discussed above, iscareful and complex. Precise definitionsare used involving careful distinctions.Uncommon (primarily Christian) allu-sions, some impressive vocabulary, com-plex syntax, and elaborate metaphormark this, not as a piece of popularpropaganda, but as a moral argumentcarefully designed for an audience ofsome sophistication.

The "Letter" lacks the elaboratepathos that might be persuasive to apurely popular audience, the emotionalfireworks it could easily have employedabout the evils of segregation. It usesinstead a combination of logical andethical persuasion, effective for a broadbut generally well-educated audience,"sincere" readers "of genuine good will."

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Further, it is written for a concernedreligious audience, an essentially con-servative and traditional audience whowould generally oppose civil disobedi-ence but who would take the time tolisten and not be alienated by extensiveciting of other thinkers.

To lose the moral and social contentof King's argument in critical analysisof nuances would, of course, be a mis-take. Central to this examination is theattempt to bring about a more refinedappreciation of King's text as an in-stance of rhetoric in the classical sense, aconspicuously compelling effort to per-suade. It cannot be fully understood inisolation. As a public letter it stands inthe context of its time and place, andit has a precise dialectical relationshipto the document which provoked it. It is

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thus a very real effort to use languageas a medium of social-problem solving,as a medium of change. Nevertheless, italso exists, especially for readers today,as a permanent articulation of humanperception of an issue, which justifiesexamining it in all of its eloquent, rhe-torical complexities. As an exercise inclarity and logic, King's essay well de-serves the fame it has gained. Its struc-ture makes it both readable andthorough. Its refutative stance makes italive with the fire of heated butcourteous controversy, and the dual na-ture of the refutation makes it si-multaneously persuasive and logicallycompelling. Its stylistic variety andnuance portray a personality in print,manipulate a reader's emotions, andcreate a union of reader and rhetor.

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