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King tried his best to make it sound like everything would be okay. Nevertheless, Dry. King’s letter is one of the most important piece of writings in history ND it is one of the most analyzed letters there is. One of the things that Dry. King’s letter has is the three rhetorical appeals. He demonstrates the ethos appeal when he says, “… L feel that you are men of genuine good will and that your criticisms are sincerely set forth… ” (Cling). He uses ethos to convey the message he Is trying to get across.
The message that Martin Luther King Is trying to get across is that he knows that we’re all sinners and that at times people have sinful reasons to do whatever they need to do, however, we all have a good side to us no matter the type of person we are. No matter what they did to him during that time in his life, he never held grudges. He always forgave the white people who tried to hurt him both physically and emotionally. They tried to break him as much as they could, but he never cracked, he never have up on his dream. Dry. King also uses the appeal pathos in several Instances In the letter.
For example, when he writes, “l felt we would be supported by the white church, felt that the white ministers, priests and rabbis of the South would be among our strongest allies” (King). It is a low spirited feeling because at that time he was in need of all of the support he could get ND the white ministers neglected any civil right movement. Nobody wanted to get their hands dirty, nobody wanted to get Involved for fear of what could be done to them. It was a disappointment for Marin Luther King Jar. When the people he believed were of God were the first to turn their backs on him.
The people that Dry. King really expected a lot from were the ones that disappointed him the most. They neglected him because they were afraid to lose followers or that the white people would stop showing up to their services. The letter not only contains ethos and pathos but also egos which Is the most dominant appeal for most of the letter. One example of him using logos Is when he writes, “Just as the prophets of the eighth century B. C. Left home towns” (King). Dry. King is trying to demonstrate that he is going to follow the path of the prophets and accomplish the same thing.
They brought their ideas outside of their hometown and that is exactly what he is planning to do, bring his ideas out and achieve the same thing they did. All he wanted to accomplish was stop the segregation and have equality no matter what race you were. Martin Luther King seed different types of rhetorical devices to prove his point throughout the whole letter. Dry. King even used the words they said to him against the white people that said he was onto good man. One of the most obvious devices he uses throughout much of the letter is the opposition’s argument.
He brings out everything they said about him and about his actions. For instance, one of the things he writes is, “l came across your recent statement calling my present activities ‘unwise and untimely” (King). People were always criticizing his actions and the things that he said that is why they said that his actions were “unwise and untimely’. Untimely because they believed that Dry. King was out of his mind because the timing to make the change was completely off and all he was going to do is get many people dead.
However, what many didn’t realize back then was that all those that followed him were not forced to be there. Every person that followed him was there voluntarily. Nevertheless, that was not the only thing that people who did not like him said. Whites also felt that they needed order, Mimi warmly commended the Birmingham police force for keeping ‘order’ and ‘preventing violence” (King). People wanted order; however, Dry. King did nothing to disturb the peace of the white people or in general the people that were against him.
They not only mentioned that they wanted order but that they also needed to prevent the violence from happening, when in reality all of his marches were non-violent. Dry. King thought that if they applied violence to their marches or to any thing they did they were never going to get anywhere. In his letter he made the whites seem ridiculous and cruel for what they were doing he said to them, “l doubt that you would have so warmly commended the police force if you had seen its dogs sinking heir teeth into unarmed, nonviolent Negroes” (King).
They were hurting the people just for being in the march was completely unjust and cruel. In the end however, the ones that looked ridiculous were the people trying to “prevent violence” because the people that were with Martin Luther King were UN-harmful and had nothing to protect themselves with. The people marching with Dry. Martin Luther King Jar. Were completely defenseless. So, because this letter is written in such a furious way but in a respectful way it can be inferred that the readers of this letter were probably the people that put him in Jail in the first place.
It is inferred that the people that put him in Jail are the people who read his letter and it was mainly directed at them. He speaks in a furious way and when Dry. King wrote about the dogs hurting the innocent people he wrote, “l doubt that you would have so warmly commended the police force… ” (King). That means he was talking to the people who told the police to take actions and send the dogs in to hurt them. However, it is likely that those weren’t the only people who read the letter. It is probable that the people that were there in the march with him read this letter also. Dry.
King with this letter made people feel a certain way especially those who were on because he made them see that even if he was in Jail he believed there was going to be a change and they would eventually earn their freedom of being discriminated and segregated by whites and many other people. That was the main concern of the people that followed him, who was going to be their sense of hope and freedom now? However, being that Dry. King was in Jail he never left them alone he was always there for his people. His beliefs is what everyone hopeful for the future. They valued everything Dry.
King did for them, unlike the whites that were trying to get rid of him since the beginning. Those type of people don’t value anything but themselves, during Dry. Kings time the whites were very selfish. They valued nothing but their color and how much money they had in their power. While the colored people were very humble and did their best to earn their money, working from the very early mornings all the way through the very late evenings sometimes. All in all, Martin Luther King Jar. Made a statement with his letter and behaved in a courteous and respectful way when it came to this letter.