MLK Jr wasn’t a Republican?
This has been based on a poorly-researched article by Frances Rice written several years ago (she misidentified certain figures as Republicans when they were, at least in one instance, a (NY) Socialist Party politico). I debunked it almost immediately after it was written, but it has been frequently cited by some FReepers as correct.
While we do know that MLK, Senior (an important distinction) was a Republican up until 1960 (switching to JFK in that election), there’s never been any solid evidence of MLK, Jr’s voting record. He may have voted for Eisenhower in 1956 (not that unusual, and NY Democrat Congressman Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. crossed party lines to support Ike), clearly at no point after 1960 did he support GOP candidates for President. He denounced Goldwater (ironically a civil rights supporter, but who opposed the ‘64 CRA for being an anti-Constitutional overreach) as being a tool of Southern racists.
When some try to link MLK, Jr. to the GOP, they’re implying he would be for Conservatism today. It simply isn’t so. He was a big believer in big government intervention and Socialist policies, all of which have been a disastrous failure, not just for the country as a whole, but for the Black community especially. Were he still alive today on the trajectory he had taken ideologically, he would be very much in the Jesse Jackson, Sr. & Al Sharpton camp and an apologist for the current White House occupant.
My father saw him in person at Berkeley in the mid 60s and essentially said he was a political opportunist, always looking for the next issue (by then, he was migrating to the extremist anti-war position on Vietnam indistinguishable from Communist propaganda).