Black Voices on the Bomb: Coretta Scott King

The unknown and inspiring history of Black contributions to arms control and disarmament.

Martin Luther King, Coretta Scott King, and a long list of Black leaders and cultural figures in the 1950s, the 1960s, and 1980s were at the forefront of efforts to call attention to the danger of nuclear weapons. Our series, “Black Voices on the Bomb,” recalls that fascinating history.

Coretta Scott King

Biography

More than a pastor’s wife, Coretta Scott King was an agent of change during her life. She established herself as an activist in her own right, even as she worked to complement the work of her husband, Martin Luther King Jr.’s. Known as the “First Lady of the Civil Rights Movement,” Scott King inspired her husband, particularly his anti-nuclear stance. As early as 1946, she traveled around the world giving lectures on economic injustice, LGBT+ rights, and nuclear disarmament. Following her husband’s death in 1968, Scott King founded and led the Martin Luther King, Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change in training tens of thousands of activists in nonviolent protest.

Involvement with Nuclear Weapons

Coretta Scott King used her platform to advocate for nuclear disarmament. She was at the creation of the National Committee for a Sane Nuclear Policy (SANE) in 1957 and represented Women’s Strike for Peace at a nuclear-disarmament conference in Geneva in 1962.

Scott King inspired Dr. King to be actively against nuclear weapons as well. Her “principled pacifism” influenced Dr. King’s work with the peace movement, which she had supported for years. When asked whether he had educated his wife about anti-war issues, Dr. King said, “She educated me.” Scott King often represented him at peace demonstrations.

After Dr. King’s assassination, Scott King continued her antinuclear work. In 1988, Coretta Scott King headed the American delegation of Women for a Meaningful Summit to advocate for disarmament before the Reagan-Gorbachev talks. She also testified before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to push Congress to approve the SALT II treaty, a bilateral agreement to reduce nuclear weapons between the US and USSR.

Scott King argued that peace does not come from nuclear arsenals and military spending, but that it instead breeds more insecurity. To the Chicago Defender, she said, “It is of vital importance that we solve world tensions and bring about understanding between nations … We are on the brink of destroying ourselves through nuclear warfare.” She criticized American prioritization of nuclear weapons over social welfare, calling it a moral failing of the United States. During the Senate hearing, she asked, “Shall we in the name of national security, commit ourselves to a course of confrontation, a potential nuclear annihilation by rejecting this treaty, or shall we as a nation seek a more lasting security through the peaceful resolution of conflict in a way that allows us to free our spirits and our resources for the development of human potential in our society?”

At a SANE Vietnam War Protest rally, Scott King insisted that, “…ultimately there can be no peace without justice, and no justice without peace. The two great moral issues of our time– peace and human rights– are so closely related that we can say they are one and the same. For what dothest a nation do to gain civil rights for all of its citizens if there is no world in which to exercise these rights.” She believed that nuclear weapons would be the end of the world, unless we acted to remove the danger.