Man Who Aided MLK With 'Dream' Speech To Get Award
WASHINGTON (AP) -- A man who wrote speeches for Martin Luther King Jr. and served as his personal lawyer is being honored in Washington.
Clarence Jones will receive an award during an annual Martin Luther King Jr. Day celebration co-sponsored by Georgetown University and the Kennedy Center.
Jones, an author and Stanford University scholar, is best known for helping King craft the opening paragraphs of his "I Have a Dream" speech. When King was jailed in Birmingham, Ala., it was Jones who took his "Letter from a Birmingham Jail" out to local clergy.
He is receiving the 2012 John Thompson Jr. Legacy of a Dream Award. The award, named for the former Georgetown men's head basketball coach, honors scholars, activists and humanitarians fight for social justice.
(Copyright 2012 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
