Reverend King discouraged his children from taking jobs with white families, fearing they would learn to tolerate servitude and condescension. He urged them to avoid Atlanta’s buses, which operated on a first-come, first-served basis, with white passengers taking the front seats and Black passengers filling in from the rear. He also taught his children that protest in response to injustice was a duty. When Atlantans went to the polls to vote on whether to repeal Prohibition laws in 1935, white supporters of the laws sought the support of Black Baptist preachers. King and three other ministers issued a statement saying that while they surely hoped to preserve the government’s ban on alcohol sales, they regretted that their “white friends” were only interested in seeing Black people vote when it suited white people’s interests. “If our white ministers are really interested in our voting,” King and the others wrote, “let them courageously join us to fight for our elemental rights.”
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