“The Negro cannot win if he is willing to sacrifice the futures of his children for immediate personal comfort and safety. Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

In 1857, the U.S. Supreme Court heard the case of Dred Scott v. Sandford. Scott, an enslaved African American man, was suing for his freedom. The court decided that African Americans weren’t U.S. citizens and, therefore, could not sue in court. Additionally, they claimed that slaves were property of their slaveholders. The case is considered to be one of the catalysts for the Civil War.

Nearly 100 years later, an African American man named Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. led the Montgomery Bus Boycott in a fight against racial segregation. For his leadership, his house was bombed. For the next 13 years, King fought for the civil rights of African Americans until he was assassinated on April 4, 1968. Days later, Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1968.

While King was busy working to free African Americans from the laws that held them down, another group was quietly continuing a mission its founder described as the “salvation of American civilization.” Margaret Sanger founded the American Birth Control League in 1921 with a clear focus on controlling the population of “undesirables” in America. Using immigration laws as an example, Sanger stated:

But while we close our gates to the so-called “undesirables” from other countries, we make no attempt to discourage or cut down the rapid multiplication of the unfit and undesirable at home.

Included in Sanger’s lengthy list of those that should be weeded out of the population were African Americans. She called her solution “family planning,” which was achieved by sterilization; otherwise known as eugenics. Shortly before her organization was renamed the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, Sanger warned:

The most successful, educational appeal to the Negro is through a religious appeal. We do not want word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population, and the minister is the man who can straighten out that idea if it ever occurs to any of their rebellious members.

Using Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and other prominent African American leaders, Sanger launched the “Negro Project,” in which she successfully achieved endorsement from the population she was trying to exterminate. After Sanger’s death, and under the leadership of Dr. Alan Guttmacher, Planned Parenthood enthusiastically began providing abortion services.

Every year since Planned Parenthood began focusing on abortion, the organization has increased the amount of abortions they provide; it has become the main source of their income. To date, Planned Parenthood has performed over 5 million abortions. As of 2013, all clinics associated with Planned Parenthood are required to provide abortion services. The majority of women receiving abortions at Planned Parenthood (whose clinics are predominately in African American and Hispanic neighborhoods) are those who Sanger defined as “undesirable.” In 2014, it was revealed that more black babies are aborted in New York City than born.

Margaret Sanger has achieved her dream. Has Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.?

Today, the world is plagued by irreverence towards life. Poverty, human trafficking, abuse, racism and so many more issues can be traced back to a society that has completely devalued life. Abortion supporters and abortionists today openly define the unborn child as one’s property, to be disposed of however the slaveowner owner sees fit. The lie that unborn children are not humans has led to babies being murdered after being born alive, put in the garbage, thrown out of windows and, recently, set on fire. The cure to what ails humanity can be found in the understanding that all life is of value. If humans don’t value life at it’s very beginning, how can they understand and care for those suffering around the world today?

While both sides of the political aisle try to claim Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. as theirs, the truth is that he belongs to all of us. His fight for equality can be found in every social justice issue, his cry harkening back to Jesus’ desire for us to serve “the least of these.” It took over 100 years for African Americans to achieve full equality in America. It has been 42 years since the United States legalized the murder of pre-born infants. As King said, “If you can’t fly then run, if you can’t run then walk, if you can’t walk then crawl, but whatever you do you have to keep moving forward.” And move forward we shall.

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