King's words applied to today's issues
Holt cites Vietnam; Valentin, gang violence, at memorial breakfast
BY LAYLI WHYTE Staff Writer

The 18th annual Memorial Breakfast Celebrating the Life of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and his legacy served as a platform for some local officials and representatives to draw similarities between the social and moral issues of King's time and those of today.

Luis A. Valentin

The event was sponsored by the Community YMCA of Red Bank and the YMCA of Western Monmouth County.

Rep. Rush Holt (D-12) spoke at the event, which took place at Branches, Monmouth Road, Monday. He discussed the similarities between the war in Vietnam during the 1960s and 1970s, which King was a vocal critic of, and the current war in Iraq.

"[King] said 'We should set a date to be out of Vietnam.' Similarly," said Holt, "we should set a date to be out of Iraq."

Holt spoke of King, not just as a great orator, but as a scholar of philosophy.

Rush Holt

"Although Dr. King could preach with the tongue of angels," Holt said, "and could speak with a cadence and a rhythm which would be the envy of any rapper, he was not just a great speaker, but a political philosopher."

Holt discussed the letter King wrote from the Birmingham jail where he was imprisoned during the Civil Rights Movement, in which he quoted, not only scripture, but the words of the great philosophers from memory.

Holt said King's ideas in that letter were "not a prescription for going slow" and that "the tranquilizing drug of gradualization can get in the way."

"[King] spoke out against the great moral and political issue of the day," he said, "the war in Vietnam. Although it is hard to impose the views of someone who has been dead for 40 years on modern day issues, I believe that right now, the war in Iraq is the major moral and political issues of the day. King said that 'the war is but a symptom for a deeper malady in the American spirit.' "

Monmouth County Prosecutor Luis A. Valentin, who annually presents the Humanitarian Award to a Monmouth County high school student at the breakfast, also used the event to speak out on a current issue: gang violence.

"We are losing too many brothers and sisters to gang violence," he said. "When I think about Dr. King, I wonder what thoughts would he walk away with at this incredible and senseless loss of life? When we lose a life, we lose a potentially important contributor to our society."

Valentin called for every member of the community to work together in the effort to stem gang violence, which has had a recent surge, especially in Asbury Park and Long Branch, where there have been four fatal shootings in as many months.

"Let's make an honest effort and pledge collectively to work together to end the scourge of violence," he said. "We cannot afford to stand on the sidelines and sacrifice our most promising future, our young people."

Valentin presented the Humanitarian Award to Lindsay R. Cohen, Howell High School, who was chosen for the award for being an exceptional high school student.

Cohen is a member of Howell High School's Scholar Center for the Humanities, and has participated in the Relay for Life, benefiting the American Cancer Society, as team captain for four years, as well as the Mitzvah Day Clothing Drive for the Jewish Community Center of Western Monmouth County.

Other officials in attendance at the breakfast, who did not speak, included Sen. Ellen Karcher( (D-12), Assemblyman Michael Panter (D-12), Red Bank Mayor Pasquale Menna and Red Bank Councilwoman Sharon Lee.

Two other high school students were honored at Monday's breakfast for essays they had written about King's legacy of peace.

Jamai A. Brown, a senior at Red Bank Regional High School, read her essay, "Keeping the Dream Alive."

"The best way I can think of promoting Dr. Martin Luther King's legacy is just having the knowledge of his teaching and preaching his word to let people know that he will never be dead, especially if we don't let his words die, and that by teaching his words is in fact keeping him alive in our hearts," she read. "I think we as Americans have forgotten his teachings and need to remember all the things he has done and not only see Martin Luther King Day as a day off, but as a day of importance to a great man."

Adedayo Adu, a junior at Howell High School, was also a finalist in the essay contest.

"I feel that as a teen living in today's world," she read from her essay, "and also being African American, that it is vital to uphold Dr. King's legacy of peace and acceptance of diversity. The best way to do this is to lead by example. The best way to promote diversity is to promote individuality, sensitivity and self-esteem. Prejudice is a learned behavior, passed on in both subtle and not-so-subtle ways. However, acceptance is also a learned behavior."