Martin Luther King walked so Barack Obama could run: We sing Happy Birthday, Dr. King!

“Martin Luther King walked so that Barack Obama could run,” said one boy in the Nineteenth Street Baptist Church service remembering MLK.

“Barack Obama ran so that all children could fly,” added another, standing a few feet away from the first African-American ever elected president on Sunday Jan. 18 before the big celebration at the Lincoln Memorial where MLK shared with us his dream.

In honor of King and in response to President-elect Obama’s call to service, hundreds of thousands of Americans are helping those in need. Projects range from giving out free meals to cleaning up blighted areas, distributing winter clothing and repairing dilapidated homes.

Find service events near you through the website USAService.org and give back to your community.

The version above integrates historical photos and gospel music. Below is “Spiritual High,” Moodswing’s version of MLK’s speech   which shows up about midway through the song; this is part 3–part 2 features Chrissie Hynde of Pretenders fame. Here’s the unadorned text of Martin Luther King’s “I Have a Dream” speech; a portion of which is below.

This will be the day when all of God’s children will be able to sing with a new meaning, “My country, ’tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing. Land where my fathers died, land of the pilgrim’s pride, from every mountainside, let freedom ring.”

And if America is to be a great nation this must become true. So let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire. Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York. Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania!

Let freedom ring from the snowcapped Rockies of Colorado!

Let freedom ring from the curvaceous peaks of California!

But not only that; let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia!

Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee!

Let freedom ring from every hill and every molehill of Mississippi. From every mountainside, let freedom ring.

When we let freedom ring, whem we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God’s children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual, “Free at last! free at last! thank God Almighty, we are free at last!”