Martin Luther King Day 2012 Report | Dissident Voice: This January 16, 2012, marks the 25th anniversary of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. federal holiday. We all know the story of Dr. King being called to Memphis in April 1968 on an environmental and economic justice mission involving 1,300 striking sanitary public works employees from AFSCME Local 1733. The strike shut down garbage collection, sewer, water and street maintenance. Clearly, the Memphis struggle was much more than a garbage strike. It was also about human dignity and human rights. Although Memphis was Dr. King’s last campaign, his legacy lives on in modern day garbage and environmental justice struggles.
If Dr. King were alive today, there is a good chance the 83-year-old civil rights icon would be standing side-by-side with the African American Harry Holt family in Dickson County, Tennessee, located just 160 miles east of Memphis, whose 150-acre farmland and well were poisoned with the deadly trichloroethylene (TCE) chemical from the leaky Dickson County Landfill. The landfill is located just 54 feet from the Holt family’s property line.
