Each year, the holiday dedicated to the memory of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. reminds us of his remarkable contributions in the fight for civil rights and freedom and his powerful legacy that continues to serve as a beacon of hope. In 2025, the holiday falls on Inauguration Day, when the nation will witness the swearing-in of Donald Trump as the 47th President of the United States.
These coinciding events will occur on the heels of a contentious election where the incoming president leaned heavily on narratives that questioned the continued necessity and efficacy of tools that have expanded opportunity, combatted discrimination, and opened doors to spaces that were historically closed to women, people of color, and other disenfranchised groups. These attacks often relied on inflammatory rhetoric and divisive stereotypes to stoke fears, belittle the abilities of those seeking inclusion, and cry reverse discrimination – the latest salvos deployed to unravel decades of work advancing the very progress sought by Dr. King.
Today, as we honor his legacy, there are important lessons we can learn from his work to help us maintain his fight for fairness and justice.
First, we must stay focused on the work that remains undone. Too often, lawmakers and politicians are quick to repeat selected familiar quotes from Dr. King to posture their alignment with his vision, while conveniently overlooking, over-simplifying, and sanitizing his critiques of the nation’s systemic biases, entrenched disparities, economic inequality, and failure to uphold its founding ideals.
We must be able to distinguish rhetoric from reality. Dr. King’s critiques are very relevant to our current fights, including the fight for women’s progress. The civil rights movement bolstered a women’s rights movement that sought to challenge stereotypes and barriers used for centuries to exclude women from opportunities. Right now, that fight for women’s progress is still needed to upend practices that confine women to narrow roles, to root out discrimination, to maximize women’s economic participation, and to give women the freedom to make decisions about their own bodies, careers, and futures.
Thus, we must consistently call out obstacles facing different communities – whether they are women, people of color, disabled folks, caregivers, those who are economically insecure, LGBTQ+ communities, immigrants, or others – and lift up concrete solutions to remove these obstacles. These solutions include strengthening access to abortion and reproductive health care. They also include enacting better equal pay protections and investing in stronger supports for our nation’s caregivers and care workers. And they include defending civil rights enforcement tools and diversity efforts, which remain necessary and vital.
Second, we have to be ready to remain in the fight for the long haul. Dr. King knew full well that the path of progress is rarely a smooth and straight line. In his final sermon the night before his assassination, he spoke about difficult days ahead, recognizing that there would be steps forward and steps backward. Just as he implored the churchgoers that evening to remain strong amid struggle, we must have the moral clarity and resolve to push for change, no matter the timetable and however insurmountable the odds may seem.
Dr. King famously said that the arc of the moral universe is long but bends toward justice. We must keep those words in mind and remain focused on our vision of justice and our vision for the future. We must be clear about the progress we are seeking, and we cannot be derailed by individual defeats or by the outcome of any single election.
Third, we have to know and leverage our power. This past November, despite the former president’s victory, the American public showed strong support for a host of progressive policies. Seven states voted to defend abortion rights, three states voted to guarantee paid sick days for their workers, and two states voted to increase their minimum wage. We must take every opportunity to build on this momentum at the federal, state, and local levels.
Moving forward, it will be up to us to carry on the mantle of the civil rights movement and to keep advancing the values Dr. King championed. We can do so by deepening our efforts to call out and combat the challenges confronting disenfranchised communities, by harnessing popular support for progressive solutions that can help solve these challenges, and by steeling ourselves for the extended journey ahead.
Regardless of any discouragement, frustrations, and setbacks we may experience in the coming weeks and months, we can learn from Dr. King’s example and remain unbowed, unflinching, and undeterred in opposing injustice and fighting for equality. As noted by his daughter, Bernice King: “Dr. King is still speaking to us… We cannot retreat or recoil. We have to commit ourselves to continuing the mission of protecting freedom, justice, and democracy in the spirit of my father.”
Our commitment must last well beyond January 20 – until the promise of democracy becomes a reality for all.
This piece originally appeared on Ms. Magazine.
