Dr. Martin Luther King, a prominent African American leader in the equal rights movement, delivered his most famous speech on the steps of the Lincoln memorial to an audience of hundreds of thousands of citizens white and black. His inspiring speech pleaded for African American rights to be fully and undeniably recognized by all. In his demanding "I Have a Dream" speech, wins over his crowd by appealing equally to logos in his inductive evidence and deductive argument, pathos by using powerful metaphors, and ethos when alluding to the bible, persona, and past American history.

King appeals to logos mainly in his deductive and inductive arguments. His strong deductive argument can be summed up as: All Americans citizens are created equal and are guaranteed the inalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, African Americans are American citizens, and therefore African Americans are equal and are guaranteed the inalienable rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. He states his major premise: "When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which e

He uses several metaphors that appeal to pathos. Besides appealing to logos in the inductive argument, the evidence that states "the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination" is laced with metaphors relating to slavery. He is equating modern segregation and discrimination, to classic slavery. He appeals to the fear of slavery and disdain for the present situation. His next metaphor is that of a check: "In a sense we have come to our nation's capital to cash a check." This check is that of inalienable rights. He uses a check to signify the importance of the rights. Money is a necessity in American society. King believes the same goes for the inalienable rights. He continues this metaphor by refusing "[...] to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt," and refusing "[...] to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation." He firmly believes that African Americans deserve these rights and that they are something that will one day be granted to them. "The dark valley of segregation" is a metaphor equating segregation to a dark valley. Metaphorically, the dark valley represents the lower places like the ghettos where the African Americans live. "The Negro's legitimate discontent," is metaphorically linked to a "sweltering summer." Sweltering connotes oppressive and threatening heat, while summer describes an eventual end. Concluding that all the fiery discontent and oppression will cool off. Yet he says it "will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality" meaning that freedom and equality are like autumn, a season where harvesters reap the rewards of hard work. One can see that the oppression will not end until the African Americans collect their rights of freedom and equality. King claims that "We will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope." In other words, if their faith is strong enough, they will be able to bring down des

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Approximate Word count = 1359
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page double spaced)