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“In a sense we’ve come to our nation’s capital to cash a check. 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 every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be guaranteed the “unalienable Rights” of “Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note, insofar as her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check, a check which has come back marked “insufficient funds.”

But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation. And so, we’ve come to cash this check, a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice.”

Forty-eight years ago, Dr. King and a quarter-million people stood at the steps of the Lincoln Memorial to cash a check on the promise that all Americans have the right to partake in the “great vaults of opportunity of this nation.” Dr. King’s  is well remembered for its optimism of integration and its influence on rallying support to end racial discrimination. What’s fallen to the wayside in the public narrative of Dr. King’s activism is his belief that social justice requires the protection of both human and economic rights. In a , Dr. King’s son, Martin Luther King III, gave context to the famous speech by reminding us that “The title of the 1963 demonstration, “The Great March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom,” reflected [Martin Luther King, Jr.’s] belief that the right to sit at a lunch counter would be hollow if African Americans could not afford the meal.”

Dr. King’s passion for economic justice gives weight to the selected metaphor of a bad check in calling out the problem of inequality in America. With the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965, Dr. King shifted his work to focus on economic inequality and poverty for people of all races. According to the  at Stanford University, Dr. King believed that while desegregation and the right to vote were essential, African Americans and other minorities would never enter full citizenship until they had economic security. In the months leading up to his assassination, Dr. King pushed tirelessly on the Poor People’s Campaign which was to do for economic inequality what the March on Washington did for racial inequality.

While Dr. King did not expect that a year’s work on the Poor People’s Campaign would achieve “an ultimate goal of freedom, independence, self-determination, whatever we want to call it,” an  and an  in the New York Times point out that a half-century later, the country is still far from achieving Dr. King’s call to fight economic injustice in the US. This reality of the failing may be hurtful and controversial — an interesting article in the Washington Post’s  publication mentioned a prominent inscription of the check metaphor on the MLK memorial was deemed “too confrontational” and dropped from the project. However, with evidence of an  and , it is a reality we must face.

The growing chasm between the “haves” and “have nots” is driven, in part, by a dynamic where the foundational elements of inclusion such as education, healthcare and housing are increasingly “financialized” through privatization. At the same time, financial services and asset building opportunities for lower-income people fail to keep pace with the need. Initiatives such as the national Bank On efforts,  and the  can help to increase the availability of safe financial services and rebalance the flow of savings incentives across the income spectrum. By taking steps to level the economic playing field, we can once again reinvigorate Dr. King’s dream of equality and make good on the promise of opportunity committed to all Americans who seek it.