Glorious March, Just Cause

“Let freedom ring. … If America is to be a great nation, then this must be so!” - Martin Luther King Jr.

The glorious weather, certainly, had something to do with making Monday morning’s annual Martin Luther King Jr. Day march a ringing success.

A crowd of perhaps 1,500 people commemorated the birth of the slain civil rights leader with a slow and peaceful one-mile walk through downtown Spokane.

“I think it’s really important for my kids to grow up with the same mentality Martin Luther King had,” Jennifer Compau said when asked what had brought her here.

Compau had her hands full, pushing 2-year-old daughter, Ava, in a stroller while sons, Trevor, 11, and Garret, 8, hoofed it alongside.

But there was more accounting for the day’s exuberance than mere sunshine. Credit also must go to a revamped program that scheduled the rally in Cavanaughs Ridpath Hotel before the march.

A prayer for unity by Bishop Walton Mize and a brilliant recitation of King’s “I Have a Dream” speech by the Rev. Happy Watkins would have put the dead in a marchin’ mood.

Then there was the walk itself. The parade route wound through the heart of the downtown banking and business district for the first time, adding to the event’s credibility.

Some marchers held balloons. Others carried “We Are One” signs. Three people held a banner declaring “One race … the human race.”

Every now and then a few strains could be heard of the old protest song, “We Shall Overcome.”

“People need to know this is important,” said Dave Shill, who walked with his wife, Karen, and their friend, Levi Fisher, 9.

Those participating came in all races and ages.

Jesse Mayhan, 15, and his pal, Noah Dimit, 14, were skateboarding when they saw the crowd and decided to tag along.

“I’m down with it,” said Mayhan of the parade, flipping a yo-yo as he spoke. “We’re against prejudice.”

It’s heartening to see Martin Luther King Jr. Day becoming a bonafide serious event.

Spokane may be a far cry from the “in-your-face” racism of the deep South. But there is an insidious layer of intolerance here that often slithers just underneath the surface.

“It’s very subtle as opposed to where I’m from,” said Freda Gandy, 27. A black woman, Gandy moved here seven years ago from West Point, Miss.

Gandy is the family services coordinator for the Martin Luther King Jr. Center. She tells of incidents in supermarkets where white checkers will make a point of not touching her opened palm as they hand back her change.

“Sometimes to be mean I’ll reach up and touch them,” she said, flashing a grin. “It’s my way of coping with it.”

Brenda Kane moved to Spokane with her husband, Mike, six years ago from the Los Angeles area. The black couple were employed. They owned a home back in L.A. Their credit was excellent.

Yet they had a difficult time renting an apartment in Spokane.

One potential landlord told them he was out of rental applications despite the fact the Kanes had seen a pile of them on a kitchen table.

Kane, who directs children’s programs at the Martin Luther King Jr. Center, says she looked at another rental unit. When she called later the landlord told her it was taken.

Suspicious, she had her husband call. He hadn’t been with her and had never spoken to the landlord.

“Why don’t you come out and look at it this afternoon,” invited the landlord over the phone.

Be honest and ask yourself:

How would it feel to stand in a line of people paying by check and be the only one asked for ID? How would it feel to walk into a store and be shadowed by a wary clerk as if you were a shoplifter?

“To me, that’s mean,” said Kane, who has experienced such things while living here. “It’s real,” she added of racism, “it’s still alive today.”

But as evidenced Monday in downtown Spokane, so, too, is King’s dream alive. And well.