PBS Wisconsin Originals

- The following program is a PBS Wisconsin Original Production.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.: Because I have a dream... [crowd responds] that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.

I have a dream today!

[applause] - Hello, I'm Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers, and it is my pleasure to welcome you to Wisconsin's 41st Annual Tribute and Ceremony honoring the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.-- the oldest official state ceremony in our nation.

The 2021 MLK theme is "Together As One."

While the ongoing pandemic continues to require us to gather safely virtually-- we still join together from afar to celebrate and reflect, not only on the legacy of Dr. King, but to renew our commitment to creating a more equitable, more just, and more fair state and country.

This year has been an extraordinarily difficult one, from the ongoing pandemic impacting families, communities, and businesses; to the nationwide movement demanding justice for Black lives.

We come together today to celebrate hope, raise our voices, and work together to create and sustain meaningful change-- change that ensures every family and every Wisconsinite can thrive.

And now, please welcome the executive producer and director of Wisconsin's Annual MLK Tribute and Ceremony, Dr. Jonathan Overby.

– Overby: Governor Evers, thank you.

For over four decades, it has been my distinct honor to be part of Wisconsin's Annual Tribute and Ceremony honoring Dr. King.

Sadly, as Wisconsin, the nation, and the world continues to suffer from the COVID pandemic, we also continue to suffer from the other lingering pandemic: hatred for those who are different.

Today's celebration, despite limitations, remains dedicated to King's dream, with a call for increased understanding and empathy for our neighbors near and far.

As we move forward together as one, I'm convinced today that it will take all of us-- working together as one-- to find a lasting cure leading to freedom and justice for all Americans, and not just some.

For the next hour, let us transition from the ever-present cloud of despair, distrust, and genuine suffering that consumes our nation, to a place of peace, celebration, and good community, as we watch and listen to past highlights from previous MLK events presented at the State Capitol.

I hope you enjoy Wisconsin's 2021 Tribute and Ceremony honoring Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. [applause] ["I Need You Now" Smokie Norful] - Curtis Eubanks: Not a second Or another minute Not an hour Or another day At the State Capitol With my arms outstretched Lord, I need you to make a way As you have done So many times before You made a way through a window or an open door I stretch my hands to thee Come rescue me I need you right away I need you now [vocalizing] I need you now I need you now [vocalizing] I need you now Not another second or another minute Not an hour or another day God, I need you Right away [vocalizing] The agony of being alone The fear of having to do things on my own The test and trials that come to make me strong [vocalizing] I've had feelings of guilt, hurt, shame and defeat The waves of trials that beat on me But to know Lord, that in you I've got victory [vocalizing] [cheers and applause] I need you now Whoo!

Oh, I need you now I need you right now Right now, right now I need you now, now Not another second Or another minute Not an hour Or another day But God, I need you No one loves like you God, I need you No one heals like you God, I need you Oh As we travel through this strange land I need you I need you Like Martin Luther King had a dream No one makes dreams come true like you I need you And I need you right a... [speaking] Clap your hands and say, "I need you right away" [clapping hands] [cheers and applause] [sparkly piano melody] - Rabbi Andrea Steinberger, who serves at the UW-Madison Hillel Foundation Jewish Student Center, renders today's invocation.

– Rabbi Andrea Steinberger: Ribono Shel Olam, Creator of all the world, We ask your blessings today as we celebrate the life of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and we declare that we are Together As One.

That my future is connected to your future.

We come from a summer of the largest protest movement of all time; when we opened our minds, our hearts, our paths to allow the young people to lead our way: demanding the end to brutalizing Black and Brown people in our country; demanding racial justice; demanding reparations for past wrongs; demanding that this country take responsibility for the ways that we have not allowed all people access to the American Dream.

O Lord, make us uncomfortable; remind us not to be, as Dr. King said, "more devoted to order than justice."

Urge us not to wait for a "more convenient season."

Merciful One of Understanding, remind us that we are Together as One.

Ken Y'hi Ratzon, may this be your will.

Amen.

- Each year, the MLK event recognizes citizens for their unsung service to citizens of Wisconsin.

The first recipient is Donna Lee, an Assessment Professional Supervisor of Social Workers, and a 2019 Wisconsin Law Journal honoree.

Lee's work with the Legal Aid Society of Milwaukee is dedicated to providing free legal services to 8,000 of Milwaukee's most vulnerable residents: abused children, battered women, immigrants, the elderly, prisoners, the unemployed, and the homeless.

On behalf of the Governor's Office, I am pleased to announce that Donna Lee is the recipient of the Wisconsin 2021 MLK Heritage Award.

- Hi, my name is Donna Lee.

I would like to thank Governor Tony Evers for the MLK Award.

It's an honor and I'm excited to be a recipient of the award.

I appreciate everyone that has been involved in the production of this wonderful event, and I embody the Martin Luther King spirit; I live for him daily.

It's an honor, and it's very exciting, and it's overwhelming to be a recipient of this award.

I would like to thank my family, friends, and co-workers that have worked with me throughout the years and will be a part of me receiving this award.

Again, thanks to Governor Tony Evers.

- Here to serve up some food for your soul, from Chi-Town, please give a warm Wisconsin welcome for the return of the G-M-A-C (Gospel Music According to Chicago) Mass Choir.

Give them a big hand, folks!

[cheers and applause] ["Dwell in the House" by GMAC] One thing that I desire of the Lord One thing that I desire of the Lord And that will I seek after That will I seek after That I may dwell in the house Dwell in the house That I may dwell in the house Of the Lord One thing have I desired of the Lord - Yeah!

One thing have I desired of the Lord And that will I seek after That will I seek after That I may dwell in the house Dwell in the house That I may dwell in the house Of the Lord All the days of my life!

To behold, to behold, to behold, to behold The beauty of the Lord!

To inquire in his temple To inquire in his temple This is my heart's desire That I may dwell in the house Dwell in the house That I may dwell in the house of the Lord All the days of my life!

All the days of my life!

All the days of my life!

To behold, to behold, to behold, to behold The beauty of the Lord!

To inquire in his temple To inquire in his temple This is my heart's desire That I may dwell in the house Dwell in the house That I may dwell in the house of the Lord That I may dwell in the house - Yeah!

Dwell in the house That I may dwell in the house of the Lord That I may dwell in the house Dwell in the house That I may dwell in the house of the Lord That I may dwell in the house Dwell in the house That I may dwell in the house of the Lord That I may dwell in the house Dwell in the house That I may dwell in the house of the Lord That I may dwell in the house Dwell in the house That I may dwell in the house of the Lord That I may dwell in the house Dwell in the house That I may dwell In the house [applause] Of the Lord [cheers and applause] - This year, the MLK event honors Dr. John Odom, who earned his Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin- Madison.

Odom forged his legacy as a lifetime champion for civil rights and racial equality, as he advocated for and mentored countless women and men.

Dr. Odom, the author of several books and countless newspaper and magazine articles, served on the boards of Dane County Big Brothers and Sisters, The Urban League, The Greater Madison Convention and Visitors' Bureau, Edgewood High School Board of Trustees, and on the Diversity Oversight Committee for the University of Wisconsin- Madison.

On behalf of the Governor's Office, I am pleased to announce that Dr. John Odom is posthumously awarded the Wisconsin 2021 MLK Heritage Award.

- My name is Nikki Odom Dibley, and I am accepting this award on behalf of my father, Dr. John Y. Odom.

Thank you to Governor Evers for recognizing my father's lifelong commitment to civil rights and the equal treatment of all people in the state of Wisconsin and the city of Madison.

A special thank you to my mother, Annie Odom, my father's cheerleader, supporter, and confidant for 50 years.

When preparing these remarks, I decided to let my father's words speak for me, as they represent the essence of his civil rights philosophy.

In his book, Saving Black America, my father wrote, "There comes a time to swim against the current, "to struggle upstream in order to redirect the flow "to achieve the time-honored goals "of justice, equality, and fairness more efficiently and effectively."

If this year has taught us anything, it's that there's still a lot of work to do.

Wisconsin faces a unique set of civil rights challenges.

While my dad was encouraged by the visible progress that has been made, he would encourage each of us to pick up the baton, think big, and get to work.

Thank you, again, on behalf of my father, Dr. John Odom, and the Odom family.

- In 2011, Wisconsin's MLK celebration featured guest speaker Michelle Alexander, a highly acclaimed civil rights lawyer, advocate, and legal scholar.

At the time, Alexander, who held a joint appointment at the Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity and the Moritz College of Law at Ohio State University, had just published her book, The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness.

This is Alexander speaking Monday, January 17, 2011.

[cheers and applause] - Michelle Alexander: Thank you so much!

Thank you so much for having me.

It is beyond an honor to be here, to join in this extraordinary celebration of Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr's life and his legacy.

We are living in confusing times today.

It's a time of great paradox.

One is tempted on a day like today to focus entirely on Dr. King's achievements and his contributions, the way he helped to transform our nation and our collective public consciousness.

But if there is one principle that Dr. King demonstrated consistently as much as his commitment to nonviolence, it was his commitment to the principle of honesty.

The principle of telling the whole truth about matters of race.

And as he put it quite bluntly just months before his death, he said, quote, "I do not see how we will ever solve the turbulent problem of race confronting our nation until there is an honest confrontation with it and a willing search for the truth, and a willingness to admit the truth when we discover it."

So, in Dr. King's honor today, I'm going to do my best to tell the truth about race in America.

It's a truth [applause] that many Americans will deny just as they denied the truth about slavery and Jim Crow in those times.

But the truth is this.

We, as a nation have taken a wrong turn, a tragic detour in the stride toward freedom.

As a nation, we have betrayed Dr. King's dream.

A vast new racial undercaste now exists in America, though their plight is rarely mentioned on the evening news.

Obama won't mention it.

The Tea Party won't mention it.

Media pundits would rather talk about anything else.

The members of the undercaste are largely invisible to most people who have jobs, live in decent neighborhoods and zoom around on freeways, passing by the virtual and literal prisons in which they live.

They are part of the other America.

In 1968, Dr. King gave a speech entitled, "The Other America" at Grosse Pointe High School.

He said, quote, "There are two Americas, "one America is beautiful.

"In this America, "millions of people have the milk of prosperity "and the honey of equality flowing before them.

"This America is the habitat of millions of people "who have food and material necessities for their bodies, "culture and education for their minds, "freedom and human dignity for their spirits.

"In this America, "children grow up in the sunlight of opportunity, "but there is another America.

"This America has a daily ugliness about it "that transforms the buoyancy of hope into the fatigue of despair."

He then went on to cite the inadequate, overcrowded and fundamentally unequal schools.

He described the high rates of unemployment in the Black community.

The official rate of Black unemployment at that time was about 9%.

But he noted the figure didn't include all those who had given up all hope of looking for work.

He said the unemployment figures, quote, "Do not take into consideration the thousands of people "who have given up, who have lost motivation for work, "the thousands of people "who have had so many doors closed in their faces "that they feel defeated "and they no longer go out and look for jobs.

"The thousands who have come to feel "that life is a long and desolate corridor "with no exit signs.

"The vast majority of Negros in America "find themselves perishing on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity."

On this day of all days, I think we owe Dr. King and ourselves an answer to this question: What really has changed?

Most people today of all colors will tell you that so much changed.

They'll say, "Just look at all the black lawyers and doctors.

"We're free now to eat in any restaurant, "sit at any lunch counter.

"Just look at Barack Obama.

"Just look at Oprah Winfrey.

"Just look at Colin Powell, and Condoleezza Rice.

Our nation has come a long way."

And then they add, "But, of course, we still have a long way to go."

This kind of talk.

And this familiar line implies that we're on the right path.

That if we just keep plodding along, keep forging ahead, sooner or later, we'll reach the promised land.

But is that right?

Are we truly on the right path, the same path Dr. King was traveling?

Or have we made a tragic U-turn?

Could we be heading right back to where we began?

Most of the indicators of Black well-being today that Dr. King cited in his "other America" speech are actually worse today than they were back then.

Now, I've promised to tell you the truth and to do my best to tell the truth as boldly and fearlessly as Dr. King once did, even when few Americans wanted to hear it or were willing to listen.

[applause] So here it is.

During the past 30 years, a vast new system of racial and social control has emerged from the ashes of slavery and Jim Crow, a system of mass incarceration that no doubt would have Dr. King turning in his grave.

The systematic mass incarceration of poor people of color in the United States has emerged as a new caste system.

One that shuttles children from decrepit underfunded schools to brand new high-tech prisons.

[applause] This system locks poor people of color into a permanent second-class status for life.

It is the moral equivalent of Jim Crow.

Now I must confess, there was a time when I rejected this kind of talk.

There was a time when I thought that people who made comparisons between mass incarceration and slavery or mass incarceration and Jim Crow were engaging in exaggerations, distortions, hyperbole.

I thought people who made those kinds of claims were actually doing more harm than good to efforts to reform the criminal justice system and achieve greater racial equality in the United States.

But what a difference a decade makes, because after years of working on issues of racial profiling, police brutality, drug law enforcement in poor communities of color and attempting to assist people released from prison-- quote, unquote-- "re-enter" into a society that never had much use for them in the first place, I had a series of experiences that began what I call "my awakening."

I began to awaken to a racial reality that is so obvious to me now that what seems odd in retrospect is that I had been blind to it for so long.

As I write in the introduction to my book, The New Jim Crow, what has changed since the collapse of Jim Crow has less to do with the basic structure of o ur society than the language we use to justify it.

In the era of colorblindness, it's no longer socially permissible to use race, explicitly, as a justification for discrimination, exclusion, and social contempt.

So, we don't.

Rather than rely on race, we use our criminal justice system to label people of color criminals, and then engage in all the practices we supposedly left behind.

Today, it is perfectly legal to discriminate against criminals in nearly all the ways it was once legal to discriminate against African Americans.

[applause] Once you're labeled a felon, the old forms of discrimination-- employment discrimination, housing discrimination, denial of the right to vote, exclusion from jury service-- suddenly legal.

As a criminal, you have scarcely more rights, and arguably less respect, than a black man living in Alabama at the height of Jim Crow.

We have not ended racial caste in America.

We have merely redesigned it.

Now, I'm sure there's many people listening right now that are thinking to themselves, "What is she talking about?"

Mass incarceration is not a system of racial control.

It's a system of crime control.

If the Black people would just stop committing so many crimes, they wouldn't have to worry about going to prison and being stripped of their basic civil and human rights.

But again, I promised to tell you the truth today, the whole truth.

And the truth is that our prison population has quintupled for reasons that have stunningly little to do with crime or crime rates.

In less than 30 years-- In less than 30 years, the US penal population exploded from about 300,000 to now, well over 2 million.

We now have the highest rate of incarceration in the world, a penal system unprecedented in world history.

But this is not, I repeat not due to crime rates.

Crime rates have fluctuated over the past 30 years, gone up, gone down.

And today, as bad as they are in some places, are actually at historical lows.

But incarceration rates have consistently soared.

Most criminologists and sociologists today will acknowledge that crime rates and incarceration rates in the United States have moved independently of one another.

Incarceration rates-- particularly Black incarceration rates-- have soared, regardless of whether crime is going up or down in any given community or the nation as a whole.

So what does explain this vast new system of control, if not crime rates?

The answer: the War on Drugs and the Get Tough Movement; the wave of punitiveness that washed over the United States.

Convictions for drug offenses alone, explain more than half of the increase in the state system and two thirds of the increase in the federal system between 1985 and 2000, the period of the greatest expansion of our prison system.

To get a sense of how large a contribution the drug war has made to mass incarceration, consider this: There are more people in prisons and jails just for drug offenses than were incarcerated for all reasons in 1980.

Now, those who imagine that the drug war has been focused on rooting out violent offenders or drug kingpins, think again.

The overwhelming majority of people arrested for drug offenses are arrested for relatively minor, nonviolent offenses.

In the 1990s, for example, the period of the drug war's most dramatic escalation, nearly 80% of the increase in drug arrests were for marijuana possession, a drug less harmful than alcohol or tobacco, but at least, if not more prevalent in middle-class white communities and on college campuses and universities as it is in the hood.

But the drug war has been waged almost exclusively in poor communities of color.

With our young people being stopped and searched, frisked, their cars pulled over in the search for drugs.

It is our communities that have been targeted in a drug war and made the enemy.

Studies have shown now for decades that contrary to popular belief, people of color are no more likely to use or sell illegal drugs than whites.

Now this defies our basic stereotypes.

Our basic stereotypes of a drug dealer is, you know, a Black kid standing on a street corner with his pants sagging down.

And plenty of drug dealing happens in the ghetto, but it happens everywhere else in America, as well.

[applause] In fact, studies have shown that, where significant differences in the data exist, it frequently indicates that white youth are more likely to engage in illegal drug dealing than Black youth.

But that's not what you would guess by taking a peek inside our nation's prisons and jails, which are overflowing with Black and Brown drug offenders.

In some States, 80 to 90% of all drug offenders sent to prison have been African American.

But that's just the beginning, 'cause when released from prison, people find themselves ushered into a parallel social universe.

They find that they face a lifetime of discrimination, scorn, and social exclusion.

Many people branded felons find it difficult even to survive.

For the rest of their lives they must check that dreaded box on the employment application asking, "Have you ever been convicted of a felony?"

It doesn't matter if that felony happened three weeks ago or 35 years ago.

For the rest of your life, you've got to check that box on employment applications knowing full well the odds are that application's going straight to the trash.

To make matters worse, people released from prison are barred from public housing for a minimum of five years and may be legally discriminated against by both public and private landlords for the rest of their lives.

Even food stamps may be off limits to people convicted of drug offenses.

What are folks released from prison expected to do?

Can't get a job, you're barred from housing, even food stamps may be off limits to you.

What do we expect folks to do?

What is the system designed to do?

It seems it's designed to send people right back to prison, which is what in fact happens about 70% of the time.

About 70% of released prisoners return within three years.

And the majority of those who return do so in a matter of months because the challenges associated with mere survival on the outside are so immense.

One day, I believe historians will look back on the era of mass incarceration and they will say it was there, right there at the prison gates, that we abandoned Dr. King's dream and veered off the trail he had blazed.

[applause] We took a detour, a tragic U-turn, that would result in millions of African Americans locked up and permanently locked out.

We have now spent a trillion, a trillion dollars on the drug war since it began.

Funds that could have been used for schools, for economic investment in our poorest neighborhoods, for job creation, for small businesses.

A trillion dollars could have been used to promote our collective wellbeing.

Instead, those dollars paved the way for the destruction of countless lives, families, and dreams.

So what do we do now?

Where do we go from here?

My own view is that nothing short of a major social movement has any hope of ending mass incarceration in America and inspiring a recommitment to Dr. King's dream.

Now, if you doubt that such a movement is necessary today, consider this.

If we were to return to the rates of incarceration we had in the 1970s, before the drug war and the Get Tough Movement kicked off, we would have to release four out of five people who are in prison today.

More than a million people employed by the criminal justice system would lose their jobs.

Most new prison construction has occurred in rural communities, already teetering on the edge of economic collapse.

Those prisons across America would have to close down.

Private prison companies listed on the New York Stock Exchange would be forced to watch their earnings vanish.

[cheers and applause] This system is not going down without a major fight, a major upheaval, a radical shift in our public consciousness.

Of course, there are those who say, there's no hope, no hope of ending mass incarceration in America.

Just as many were resigned to Jim Crow in the South, today, many people view the millions of people cycling in and out of our prisons today as an unfortunate but inalterable fact of American life.

I know Dr. King would not have been so resigned.

And so I believe that if we are to truly honor Dr. King, we must be willing to continue his work.

We must be willing to go back and pick up where he left off.

We must do the hard work of movement building on behalf of poor people of all colors.

In 1968, Dr. King told advocates, the time had come to transition from a civil rights movement to a human rights movement.

Meaningful equality could not be achieved through civil rights alone.

Basic human rights must be honored: the right to work, the right to housing, the right to quality education for all.

"Without basic human rights," he said, "Civil rights are an empty promise."

In honor of Dr. King, I hope we will commit ourselves to building a movement to end mass incarceration, a human rights movement, a movement for education, not incarceration, jobs not jails, a movement to end discrimination against those who are released from prison, discrimination that violates their basic human rights to work, to housing, to food.

But before this movement can get underway, a great awakening is required.

We must awaken from our colorblind slumber to the realities of race in America.

And we must be willing to embrace those labeled criminals; not necessarily their behavior, but them-- their human-ness-- because it has been the refusal and failure to recognize the dignity and value of all people that has been the sturdy foundation for every caste system that has ever existed in the United States or anywhere else in the world.

It is our task today, I firmly believe, not just to end mass incarceration, but to end this history and cycle of caste in America.

Thank you very much for having me.

[cheers and applause] - And now, the Latino Strings Program.

They've performed in Mariachi Bands, Youth Orchestras and Guitar Ensembles at over 300 concerts since the program's inception in 2002, including Summerfest, and multiple times here at Wisconsin's annual Tribute to Dr. King.

From Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and back again by popular demand, under the direction of Dinorah Marquez, here is the Latino Arts Strings Program, from Milwaukee.

[cheers and applause] - Dinorah Marquez: Thank you so much.

There are not words to describe the gratitude that we feel-- every one of us in our group here-- for being invited, once again, to form part of such an important event.

Thank you, Brother Jonathan, for believing in our young people and for thinking that they have something to share with our community.

Thank you to our... [applause] Thank you for letting us be part of the dream.

["El Cascabel"] [playing solo] [cheers and applause] [playing solo] [cheers and applause] [cheers and applause] - And now, presenting an adapted excerpt from Dr. King's 1963 speech, "I Have a Dream," here are 7th grade students Jada Matson, Chelsie Uscanga and Tadaria Ross, 6th grade student, all from James C. Wright Middle School in Madison, Wisconsin.

[cheers and applause] Please welcome the James C. Wright Middle School Scholars Dream Team.

[cheers and applause] - And so, even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream.

- It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: - All: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal."

- I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at a table of brotherhood.

- I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression... - ...will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.

- I have a dream that one day my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin... - All: ...but by the content of their character.

I have a dream today!

- I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, and 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."

This is our hope.

And this is the faith we go back to the South with.

– All: 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, - All:...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 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... - All: ...let freedom ring.

- From the mighty mountains of New York... - All: ...let freedom ring.

- From the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania... - All: ...let freedom ring.

from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado.

– All: Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California.

But not only that: - Let freedom ring from the 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 to 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, - All: ...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!

[cheers and applause] - Here they are, the Victory Travelers Gospel Quartet!

[cheers and applause] ["Forgive Me, Lord"] Forgive Me, Lord ( Forgive me, Lordy Lord ) Try me one more time ( Try me one more time ) Forgive Me, Lord ( Forgive me, Lordy Lord ) Oh, lord, try me one more time ( Try me one more time ) I know I've been wrong ( I know I've been wrong ) Oh, Lord [vocalizing] ( Give me one more chance ) Don't you know I'm lookin' for a better place ( Lookin' for a better place to live ) C'mon, clap those hands like that Said I'm lookin' for ( a better place to live ) Said I'm lookin' for ( a better place to live ) Yes, I am ( Oh, I'm lookin' for a better place to live ) Can I get one witness to say, "I'm lookin'" ( Lookin' ) I'm seekin' ( Seekin' ) Lord, I'm prayin' ( Prayin' ) Yes, I am ( Ah, prayin' ) You know I'm lookin' for ( a better place to live ) ( Ah, I'm lookin' for a better place to live ) And I say it one more time now You know that I am Lookin' ( for a better place to live ) Yes, I am ( I'm lookin' for a better place to live ) Oh, yeah, ( I'm lookin' for a better place to live ) Have I got one witness to say, "I'm lookin'" ( Lookin' for a better place to live ) Yes, I am You know, I'm lookin' ( Lookin' ) And I'm seekin' ( Seekin' ) Lord, I'm prayin' ( Prayin' ) Yes, I am ( Ah, prayin' ) You know ( I'm lookin' for a better place to live ) Yes, I am Ah, I'm lookin' for a better place to live Hey!

You know that I'm Lookin' here and there And I keep on ( Searchin' everywhere ) I keep on lookin' ( Lookin' here and there ) Ohhhhh ( Searchin' everywhere ) Is it in your blood?

( Lookin' here and there ) It don't matter ( Searchin' everywhere ) Just come on ( Lookin' here and there ) Clap your hands ( Searchin' everywhere ) And tell somebody ( Lookin' here and there ) I know I am ( Searchin' everywhere ) Tell somebody ( Lookin' here and there ) I know I am ( Searchin' everywhere ) No matter ( Lookin' here and there ) What I have to face ( Searchin' everywhere ) No matter ( Lookin' here and there ) What I have to go through ( Searchin' everywhere ) One of these days ( Lookin' here and there ) I don't know when ( Searchin' everywhere ) And I don't know where ( Lookin' here and there ) All I know ( Searchin' everywhere ) I see Jesus ( Lookin' here and there ) I see Him ( Searchin' everywhere ) I see Jesus ( Lookin' here and there ) I see ( Searchin' everywhere ) Lookin' here and there ( Lookin' here and there ) Yeah ( Lookin' here and there ) Yes, I am ( Lookin' here and there ) Yes, I am ( Lookin' here and there ) Yes, I am ( Lookin' here and there ) Yes, I am ( Lookin' here and there ) Can I get a witness ( Lookin' here and there ) Can I get a witness ( Lookin' here and there ) Searchin' everywhere ( Oh, searchin' everywhere ) Yes, I am ( Searchin' everywhere ) Yes, I am ( Searchin' everywhere ) Yes, I am ( Searchin' everywhere ) And I ask one question ( Searchin' everywhere ) And I leave it alone ( Searchin' everywhere ) And I ask one more question ( Searchin' everywhere ) And I leave it alone ( Searchin' everywhere ) Anybody want to say ( Yeah ) Yes I do ( Oh, yeah ) My heart says ( Yeah ) My mind says ( Yeah ) My spirit says ( Yeah ) Everything about me ( Yeah ) I want to see Jesus ( Yeah ) Ayyyy Lookin' here and there ( Lookin' here and there ) Yeah ( Lookin' here and there ) Yeah ( Lookin' here and there ) Yeah ( Lookin' here and there ) Searchin' everywhere ( Searchin' everywhere ) ( Searchin' everywhere ) ( Searchin' everywhere ) ( Searchin' everywhere ) Know that I'm lookin' ( Lookin' for a better place to live ) ( Ah, I'm lookin' for a better place to ) ( Live ) [all vocalizing] ( Oooohhhh ) [cheers and applause] - Governor Evers: Dr. King's legacy, the numerous movements he led, and the seminal works he left behind laid the foundation for a collective recognition of structural inequality.

It also laid the groundwork for the continued advocacy towards the full realization of equity and justice for all people.

His work continues to inspire generations that came after him.

As we reflect on Dr. King's life and lasting legacy, we recognize that many of the injustices and inequities that he worked to address have nevertheless remained deeply entrenched in our country's culture and institutions.

We are likewise reminded that there is much work left to do.

Today, Wisconsin joins the country celebrating Dr. King's life, honoring his legacy, and reaffirming our commitment to the hard but necessary work to affirm Dr. King's work, and ensure his dream becomes a reality.

So with that, as the Governor of the great state of Wisconsin, it is my pleasure to proclaim January 18, 2021 Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. Day.

– Audience singing: We shall overcome - Jonathon Overby: As we conclude Wisconsin's 41st MLK tribute, it is worth remembering and reflecting on his life, when he marched, wrote, and used his voice to create social change in the 20th century.

Here in Wisconsin, let us follow King's example by moving forward Together As One, in an effort to overcome the ills that divide us.

On behalf of the Office of Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers, and those who helped to make this program possible, I'm Jonathan Overby.

Thank you and may your week be filled with peace and harmony.

["We Shall Overcome" continues] We shall overcome some day [applause]