"I think we are here to be invited to be a part of Dr. King's love, power and justice dream team. We are here to help pull [down] the walls that separate people in communities," he said. "And build up levees."
Throughout the speech, Forbes urged the audience to receive his altar call and to make a commitment to find their place in King's dream, instead of simply celebrating it once a year. Forbes continually used personal anecdotes and theatrical gestures to relate the dream of King to the tragic Hurricane Katrina.
"In this presentation tonight, I propose to show that Katrina has revealed the depth of the dream of Dr. Martin Luther King in a dramatic way," said Forbes.
"Katrina has brought in our time what I call a cat scan of the nation" he said. "From Katrina I understand that we have been given a lesson in life and death."
Forbes asked children to stand so that he could tell a childhood story. He recited the Dutch legend about the boy who sticks his finger in a hole in a dike.
"This means that when you see trouble, it doesn't mean you always have the whole solution, but if you could be like the little Dutch boy who stuck his finger in the levy, if you will, you can make a difference," he said. "If we don't have levees high enough or strong enough, what's good can turn bad."
Emphasizing that King worked hard to pull down barriers, Forbes said Dr. King decided to build up levees to restrain the overflowing waters of oppression.
Susannah Heschel, the Eli M. Black associate professor of Jewish studies and associate professor of religion, spoke about her father and his relation to King, paralleling the struggles of Jews and blacks. She spoke strongly of King's non-violent beliefs with respect to the violence, war and prison systems in America. Heschel called prisons, "the American way of enslaving black people and the poor."
Like Forbes, Heschel implored the audience to become inspired by King's work.
"To live off the inspiration of the past is spiritual plagiarism," she said.
College President James Wright spoke of Dartmouth's long history regarding civil rights.
"Dartmouth has been a pacesetter in African-American education, as uneven as our own record has been, and it surely has been uneven, very few institutions can match it," Wright said.
Wright reminded the audience that Dartmouth can claim a longer history of diversity than most universities, as six of the 28 blacks who attended higher education prior to the Civil War went to the College.
Before the keynote address, the brothers of Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity led the 15th annual candlelight vigil to remember King. The process, which began at Cutter-Shabazz and ended at the Top of the Hop, concluded with a discussion on refocusing the holiday and combating the remaining perils of racism.
On Sunday afternoon, the Tucker Foundation hosted a Community Celebration honoring King. Held in Rollins Chapel, the event featured Rev. H. Carl McCall '58.
Forbes's address was part of Dartmouth's extensive celebration of King, titled "Between Heaven And Hell: Religion, Politics and Civil Rights." This year's selection of Forbes as the keynote speaker was less controversial than last year's choice of white lesbian activist Dorothy Allison, which some students thought took away focus from black civil rights.
