The genius of the American Civil Rights Movement was its nonviolence. 

Martin Luther King Jr. was a man of faith and he was a shrewd activist who ascribed to a nonviolent means of protest from a place of principle and a place of practicality and effectiveness. 

In short, nonviolence was the right thing to do, and it was the best thing to do in order to affect change. 

The Gandhian view of nonviolent protest shaped King’s thinking and shaped America. 

While the method leans heavily on civil disobedience, the operative word is “civil.”

The movement was marked by civility on the part of the protesters while not on the part of those people and institutions they protested against. 

Social reform followed. 

From the 1955 Montgomery bus boycott through the tumultuous years of the Civil Rights Movement, King and those who rallied around him resisted the temptation to arm themselves and opted to “turn the other cheek” rather than to fight fire with fire. 

They did not show up at protests in riot gear or carrying clubs. 

Nonviolence was called the guiding light of the movement. 

Clearly, it was not easy, and black men and women were violently beaten and killed. There is no doubt those men and women were martyrs for a just cause. 

Civil rights leaders were more interested in winning the war of ideas and ideals than in winning battles on the streets. 

They believed what they were fighting against was evil and understood that the greatest weapon against evil is good and not more evil. 

They had to be willing to suffer without retaliation and that takes the greatest strength and courage of all. The power of restraint sent a powerful message to the government, to the authorities and even to their opponents. 

In a sea of hatred, King and other civil rights leaders talked about love and compassion.  

A fascinating report written by Max Fisher and published in the Washington Post in 2013 indicated that history has shown violent protests across the globe are 50 percent more likely to fail than peaceful protests. 

There are a lot of great civil rights leaders still among us, none of them greater than King. 

There are important civil rights causes that are worth fighting for, none of them more important than the segregation and discrimination that faced America in the 1950s and ‘60s. 

There remain egregious atrocities of racism and bigotry, none of them worse than the lynching of young Emmett Till. 

Racism, discrimination and bigotry are not over and done with. In many ways, we see a nation digressing. 

But in the words of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., “Violence as a way of achieving racial justice is both impractical and immoral. I am not unmindful of the fact that violence often brings about momentary results. Nations have frequently won their independence in battle. But in spite of temporary victories, violence never brings permanent peace.”

Neo-Nazis, white supremacist and the KKK are evil and dark. King rightly said, “Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.”

It is not time to abandon the philosophy of Dr. King. It is time to find it.