Page "We Shall Overcome" Paragraph 26

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. recited the words from " We Shall Overcome " in his final sermon delivered on in Memphis on Sunday March 31, 1968, before his assassination.

He had done so previously in 1965 in a similar sermon delivered before an interfaith congregation at Temple Israel in Hollywood, California: We shall overcome.

We shall overcome.

Deep in my heart I do believe we shall overcome.

And I believe it because somehow the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.

We shall overcome because Carlyle is right ; " no lie can live forever ".

We shall overcome because William Cullen Bryant is right ; " truth crushed to earth will rise again ".

We shall overcome because James Russell Lowell is right:.