Today, we honor Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and reflect on his legacy of principled and powerful resistance. I am also reflecting today on Dr. King’s ability to speak plainly about injustice and fearlessly confront the forces that stood in the way of freedom while never losing his belief in the American people’s ability to walk together toward the Promised Land.

Our current moment demands such clarity and such fearlessness.

The forces reshaping our country are testing not only our institutions, but our collective capacity to defend them. And they require from all of us a clarity of purpose that is equal to the rising stakes.

We are seeing a sustained effort to abolish the Voting Rights Act — the crown jewel of the Civil Rights Movement and Dr. King’s legacy. We are witnessing the weaponization of the Department of Justice by the president to silence his critics and intimidate voters. We’re experiencing unprecedented mid-decade gerrymandering attempts designed to disproportionately disenfranchise Black and Brown voters as the president desperately clings to power like an insecure dictator.

But as dark as things may seem, we must remember that every generation has been similarly tested. Each time, Americans faced a critical question: Sit back and hope help comes along, or stand together and fight for what we believe in?

I know the scale of what we’re up against can feel overwhelming. It’s only human to hope for someone else to step in. To pray for a miracle or a savior. To look to the horizon, hoping to see the cavalry coming to the rescue.

But here’s the hard truth: There are no reinforcements on the way. No “miraculous rescue” is coming.

We are the cavalry.

Dr. King understood this acutely. “Human progress is neither automatic nor inevitable,” he once said. “Even a casual look at history reveals that no social advance rolls in on the wheels of inevitability. Every step toward the goal of justice requires sacrifice, suffering, and struggle; the tireless exertions and passionate concern of dedicated individuals.”

Dedicated individuals like you have always carried this work forward. Democracy does not defend itself. From the fights for due process to the struggle for access to the ballot, it’s been everyday Americans who have bent that arc of the moral universe towards justice.

We owe a profound debt to the generations who sacrificed so much to secure these rights, and I hope you’ll join me in spending some time reflecting on that sacrifice today.

And tomorrow, we’ll continue to honor them by picking up the torch they passed us — by doing the work we must do and carrying forward with the march they never finished. Because we owe a similar debt to generations yet to come. We can only truly honor our past by ensuring those who come after us will inherit an America truer to its promise.

I hope you’ll continue to support NDRC’s work, [[link removed]] and to fight for a fairer, more truly representative America.

Thank you,

Eric H. Holder, Jr.
82nd Attorney General of the United States

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