Remembering the Dream

Editor’s Note: Next week on August 28, the Prohuman Foundation will gather with esteemed guests, advisors, and supporters at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. to launch Renewing the Dream: a campaign to revitalize MLK’s stone inscription at the Lincoln Memorial and to renew his dream of brotherhood. To help honor and remember his dream, constitutional historian and Prohuman Ambassador James Masnov writes here about the philosophy at the core of one of America’s greatest minds and movements.

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Martin Luther King Jr.’s achievements in the 1950s and 1960s have made him an American icon, but the core philosophy that drove those achievements has been forgotten, misplaced, or in some cases wholly abandoned. While many speak readily of his practice of civil disobedience and nonviolent protest, or the influence of Mahatma Gandhi on his approach to activism, the most vital element of MLK’s political thought was classical liberalism and its appeal to natural rights.

The natural rights philosophy holds that every human being possesses fundamental freedoms—such as bodily integrity, freedom of conscience, self-determination, and equal moral worth—simply by virtue of being human. Popularized during the Enlightenment, these rights precede government itself. Natural rights are not privileges bestowed or revoked by the state; rather, legitimate governments are created for the sole purpose of recognizing, securing, and protecting the inherent rights that individuals naturally possess.

In the American tradition, this framework was explicitly memorialized in the Declaration of Independence, which asserts that every individual is endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, including life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Time and again, MLK wrote about and spoke to these principles. He aimed to hold the nation and its government not to radically new ideas about freedom and equality, but to the foundational promise enshrined in that 1776 charter.

It was no mere coincidence—nor was it simply a rhetorical flourish—that MLK, in his “I Have a Dream” speech, called the Declaration of Independence and its proclamation of universal equality a promissory note that had come due. Tragically, this aspect of MLK’s philosophy has been lost to the public; even as he has been rendered in stone in Washington and elsewhere, his natural rights edges have been smoothed down and fundamentally erased. This ought to be rectified.

Crucial as MLK’s appeals for social and economic justice were, his push for reform was ultimately anchored in the natural rights tradition. In appealing to the Declaration of Independence, MLK tapped into a philosophical lineage stretching from antiquity, to John Locke’s ideas on just government, to America’s founding charter. Framing the Declaration as a defaulted “promissory note” was a Jeffersonian argument regarding the state’s duty to protect individual rights. Just as Abraham Lincoln had summoned these same principles to preserve the Union during the Civil War, MLK drew on Lincoln’s moral blueprint to demand that America finally honor its original promise.

MLK’s own words attest to the undeniable influence of natural rights philosophy on his work. His Letter from Birmingham Jail is, in part, an essay on natural rights. Proclaiming the philosophy plainly, MLK wrote: “A just law is a man-made code that squares with the moral law or the law of God. An unjust law is a code that is out of harmony with the moral law.” Here, MLK relies on the classical natural rights sentiment that an unjust law is no law at all—that laws only bind in conscience when they observe the natural rights of individuals.

The King Memorial in Washington, D.C., when seen in this context, is more intellectually rich than a surface-level observation yields. Standing across the Tidal Basin looking toward Jefferson, with Lincoln in close proximity, the monument represents MLK not only as a beloved icon, but as a rightful heir to the American natural rights tradition.

Yet, within academic political thought and the wider culture, natural rights philosophy has become unpopular, and much of MLK’s foundational reasoning is evaded or ignored. The result is that many wish to honor MLK’s legacy while ignoring the explicit intellectual influences that compelled his mission, doing a disservice to his memory.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was the twentieth century’s most important advocate of natural rights, and the United States was constructively transformed as a result. His legacy should be honored by remembering the philosophy that energized his campaign for justice and equality for all.

Let us not only remember the man; let us also remember his message.

James M. Masnov is a writer, historian, lecturer, and a Columbian Distinguished Fellow at the George Washington University. He is the author of three books, a Prohuman Ambassador, and the founder and editor-in-chief of History is Human: A Journal of American Intellectual History.

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Opinions expressed by guest authors do not necessarily reflect those of the Prohuman Foundation. We value diverse perspectives and invite submissions from those who can enrich our understanding of topics close to our mission: to promote the foundational truth that we are all unique individuals, united by our shared humanity.

Learn more about our goal to restore the MLK marker and advance a culture of brotherhood over division:

Learn about Renewing the Dream