King the Plagiarist:

Boston University concluded that Martin Luther King, Jr. had plagiarized large portions of his doctoral thesis. ons of his doctoral dissertation, completed there in the 1950s." However, King's doctoral degree was not withdrawn.

King's "I Have A Dream" speech plagiarized Archibald Carey's speech to the Republican National Conventio.n Moreover, Samuel Smith's hymn "America" exclaims, "Let Freedom Ring".

Dear Oliver,

A committee of scholars at Boston University along with provost Jon Westling said that, "It was impractical to reach, on the available evidence, any conclusions about Dr King's reasons for failing to attribute some, but not all, of his sources. The committee's findings, although important from the point of view of historical accuracy, do not affect Dr King's greatness, nor do they change the fact that Dr King made an unequalled contribution to the cause of justice and equal rights in this nation."

They did not recommend the revocation of his degree.

The claim that Martin Luther King "stole" his famous "I have a Dream"
speech from black pastor Archibald Carey is also largely overblown.

The only similarity between Carey's speech and King's speech is that both speeches end with a recitation of the first verse of Samuel Francis Smith's popular patriotic hymn, "America" (composed in 1832), and a listing of several American geographic locations from which the speakers exhort their listeners to "Let Freedom Ring."

Foxy,

Thank you.

No one in their right mind would dispute King's valuable contribution to civil rights. A great leader and significant historical personage.

My undestanding is Boston U. did place a letter of reprimand for not acknowledging [block] sources on their copy of his dissertation. He does seem to have borrowed words more readily than a person with post-graduade training should.

I will look at the claim more closely. Catch is one needs to dodge the racist agenda of some posters, if the Net is used as a source. Some claim he was not an outstanding student and a serial plagiarist from his teenage years. It is usually quite hard to be accepted on a doctoral programme, without first demonstrating research potential in an Honours or Maters by Thesis degree.

Hello Foxy,

This appears to be unbiased comment from standford.edu:

http://www.stanford.edu/group/King/additional_resources/articles/palimp.htm

O.

Good Evening Oliver,

You might be interested in the following website:

http://www.famousplagiarists.com/politics.htm

I wonder how many other famous men/women actually wrote the speeches
that we know and love today? People like Winston Churchill,
John F. Kennedy, et al?

Would they mean any less to us if we knew that someone else had written them?

Hello Foxy,

Churchill also used body doubles. So in a way be was a fabrication required at time. He was certainly right about Hilter though when no one would listen (in 1930s). Lincoln is fabricated too. He would have allowed slavery to preserve The Union.

I guesss those with a political agenda feel they require the power of smooth rhetorical expression in speechs. Self-plagiary is an other issue, for example, acamademics giving the same/similar paper at/in different venues/journals without acknowledement. Politicians would do this all the time on the hustings.

I do think block plagiary in a dissertation is very serious. People who achieve "a substantial and original contribution to human knowledge" [assuming a theologic doctorate has the same standard as a PhD?] work very hard.

I don't know how doctoral theses were examined in the US in the 1950s, but King's knowledge or lack of knowledge should have been picked up at his "topic" defence six months or a year into his canditature, when he presented his conceptual model and was quized by about twenty people, if that happened at BU: not just a slack supervisor. Moreover, the Thesis should be externally examined outside of BU.

Regarding Dr. Martin [Michael] Luther King Jr., I think his extremely grand achievements stand side-side with a less desirable tendency to play other people to present a pretence. He was a great man, who was also a cheat. Probably not uncommon in politics.