Dr Martin Luther King, Jr in Arizona
The MLK, Jr Holiday Controversy in Arizona
Resources on the Arizona Memory Project site documenting the Martin Luther King Jr Holiday in Arizona
Governor Bruce Babbitt declared Martin Luther King Jr. Day an Arizona holiday on March 18, 1986, but his proclamation was repealed by Governor Mecham in 1987 on the grounds Babbitt did not have the authority to declare such a holiday. Arizonans were for and against repeal of the holiday for a variety of reasons, and in 1992, Arizona voters reinstated the holiday.
Victory Together book
Victory Together for Martin Luther King, Jr by ISBN: 9780996212601Publication date: 2015-04-10I was handed the responsibility for seeing that Arizona would never return to the days when its citizens did not officially honor Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. with his day. At 12:01 a.m., Monday, January 18, 1993, Arizona joined forty-eight other states in the nation in honoring Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. on the third Monday in January. VICTORY TOGETHER's prophecy had come to pass with the official paid state holiday labeled Martin Luther King, Jr./Civil Rights Day. I gathered with thousands of others at Eastlake Park for the beginning of the MLK Day "Victory March" at around 9:00 a.m. No more would our trek to the State Capitol be a protest march demanding, "We want a holiday!"
The ASU Library acknowledges the twenty-three Native Nations that have inhabited this land for centuries. Arizona State University's four campuses are located in the Salt River Valley on ancestral territories of Indigenous peoples, including the Akimel O’odham (Pima) and Pee Posh (Maricopa) Indian Communities, whose care and keeping of these lands allows us to be here today. ASU Library acknowledges the sovereignty of these nations and seeks to foster an environment of success and possibility for Native American students and patrons. We are advocates for the incorporation of Indigenous knowledge systems and research methodologies within contemporary library practice. ASU Library welcomes members of the Akimel O’odham and Pee Posh, and all Native nations to the Library.
