Speech: Remarks at Funeral of Coretta Scott King

February 7, 2006
Atlanta, GA

I thank you for that wonderful reception. You might not feel like repeating it after you hear what I've got to say. Bishop, President and Mrs. Bush, Yolanda, Martin, Dexter, Rev…we are honored to be here.

I'm honored to be here with my president and my former presidents. When President Bush 41 complained that he was at a disadvantage because he was an Episcopalian then he came up here and zinged Joe Lowery, like he did, I thought that ain't bad for one of the frozen chosen. He's done a pretty good job.

We've had a wonderful time running around the world doing good together. And I thank the president for giving us a chance to do it. Let me say a couple things briefly and then ask Hillary to join in these remarks.

I don't want us to forget that there's a woman in there: not a symbol—not a symbol—a real woman who lived and breathed and got angry and got hurt and had dreams and disappointments. And I don't want us to forget that.

You know, I'm sitting here thinking, I wish I knew what her kids were thinking about now. I wonder if they were thinking about what I was thinking about at my mother's funeral—said all this grand stuff.

I wonder if they're thinking about when she used to read books to them, or when she told them Bible stories, or what she said to them when their daddy got killed.

We're here to honor a person.

Fifty-four years ago, her about-to-be husband said that he was looking for a woman with character, intelligence, personality and beauty, and she sure fit the bill. And I have to say, when she was over 75, I thought she still fit the bill pretty good with all those categories.

But I think that's important: this is a woman, as well as a symbol, as well as the embodiment of her husband's legacy and the developer of her own.

The second point I want to make is the most important day in her life for everyone of us here at this moment in this church except when she embraced her faith, the next most important day was April 5, 1968, the day after her husband was killed. She had to decide, "What am I going to do with the rest of my life?"

We would have all forgiven her, even honored her if she said, "I have stumbled on enough stony roads. I have been beaten by enough bitter rods. I have endured enough dangers, toils and snares. I'm going home and raising my kids. I wish you all well."

None of us, nobody could have condemned that decision. But instead, she went to Memphis—the scene of the worst nightmare of her life—and led that march for those poor hard-working garbage workers that her husband...

Now, that's the most important thing for us. Because what really matters if you believe all this stuff we've been saying is what are we going to do with the rest of our lives?

So her children, they know they've got to carry the legacy of their father and their mother now. We all clap for that; they've got to go home and live with it. That's a terrible burden.

That is a terrible burden. You should pray for them and support them and help them. That is a burden to bear. It's a lot harder to be them than it was for us to be us growing up. Don't you think it wasn't. It may have been a glory, it may have been wonderful, but it's not easy.

So what will happen to the legacy of Martin Luther King and Coretta King? Will it continue to stand for peace and nonviolence and anti-poverty and civil rights and human rights?

What will be the meaning of the King holiday every year? And even more important, Atlanta, what's your responsibility for the future of the King Center?

What are you going to do to make sure that this thing goes on?

I read in the newspaper today, I read in the newspaper coming down here that there's more rich black folks in this county than anyone in America except Montgomery County, Maryland.

What are we going to do?

This is the first day of the rest of our lives. And we haven't finished our long journey home.
The one thing I always admired about Dr. King and about Coretta when I got to know her, especially, is how they embraced causes that were almost surely lost right alongside causes that they knew if they worked at hard enough, they could actually win.

They understood that the difficulty of success does not relieve one of the obligation to try. So all of us have to remember that.

What are we going to do with the rest of our lives? You want to treat our friend Coretta like a role model? Then model her behavior.

And you know we're always going to have our political differences. We're always going to have things we can do. And this has been, I must say, a brilliantly executed and enormously both moving and entertaining moment.

But we're in the house of the Lord. And most of us are too afraid to live the lives we ought to live because we have forgotten the promise that was made to Martin Luther King, to Coretta Scott King and to all of us, most beautifully for me stated in Isaiah.

"Fear not, I have redeemed thee. I have called thee by thy name. Thou art mine."

We don't have to be afraid. We can follow in her steps. We can honor Dr. King's sacrifice. We can help his children fulfill their legacy.

Everybody who believes that the promise of America is for every American, everybody who believes that all people in the world are caught up in what he so eloquently called the inescapable web of mutuality, everyone of us in a way are all the children of Martin Luther and Coretta Scott King. And I for one am grateful for her life and her friendship.

Thank you.