Yearly, we rejoice and commemorate Martin Luther King, Jr.’s life and legacy on the third Monday of January. The vacation at all times falls between Jan. 15 and Jan. 21, aligning it with the date of King’s birthday, Jan. 15.
However it hasn’t at all times been this fashion. MLK Day formally turned a federal vacation with the passage of a 1983 regulation, and it was first noticed in 1986.
Some individuals have questioned if Stevie Marvel’s track “Pleased Birthday,” which incorporates King’s identify within the lyrics, is linked to the vacation. One social media publish from 2022’s MLK Day claimed that the track was written to advertise the motion to make MLK Day a federal vacation.
THE QUESTION
Did Stevie Marvel produce the track “Pleased Birthday” to assist making Martin Luther King, Jr.’s birthday a nationwide vacation?
THE SOURCES
“Pleased Birthday” track lyrics, and album vinyl sleeve for “Hotter than July”
Nationwide Museum of African American Historical past and Tradition
THE ANSWER
Sure, Stevie Marvel did produce the track “Pleased Birthday” to assist making Martin Luther King, Jr.’s birthday a nationwide vacation.
WHAT WE FOUND
Stevie Marvel was closely concerned within the motion to make Martin Luther King, Jr. Day a nationwide vacation. His track “Pleased Birthday” is express in its lyrics that King’s birthday needs to be celebrated as a nationwide vacation.
The second verse of the track begins, “I simply by no means understood / How a person who died for good / Couldn't have a day that might / Be put aside for his recognition.” That verse then ends by naming the person in query: “For in peace our hearts will sing / Because of Martin Luther King.”
The track was a part of Marvel’s 1980 album “Hotter than July,” and was launched because the album’s fourth single in 1981. The unique vinyl sleeve for the album, the Atlanta Historical past Middle says, straight advocated for King’s birthday to develop into a nationwide vacation.
“I and a rising variety of individuals consider that it's time for our nation to undertake laws that can make January 15, Martin Luther King's birthday, a nationwide vacation, each in recognition of what he achieved and as a reminder of the space which nonetheless needs to be traveled,” Marvel wrote on the sleeve. “Be part of me within the observance of January 15, 1981, as a nationwide vacation. Stevland Morris a/okay/a Stevie Marvel”
Based on Motown Information, the document label which launched the track, “Pleased Birthday” turned the signature track of the marketing campaign.
However Marvel didn’t wait till 1981 to become involved.
“He had already been engaged on it for a few years together with Coretta King,” mentioned Kevin Fellezs, Ph.D., an assistant professor of music and African American research at Columbia College.
After a invoice to look at the day didn't go the Home of Representatives by 5 votes in 1979, public assist for the invoice continued to develop “in no small half attributable to musician Stevie Marvel,” says the Nationwide Museum of African American Historical past and Tradition.
The musician appeared alongside Coretta Scott King in rallies many instances over the subsequent few years. Motown Information says he led a march of 100,000 in Washington, D.C., in 1981, and he took half in one other rally on the Washington Monument in 1983.
By the point a invoice that might designate King’s birthday a nationwide vacation returned to the Home flooring in 1983, Coretta Scott King, the Congressional Black Caucus and Stevie Marvel had labored collectively to current the chamber with a petition of 6 million signatures in assist of the invoice.
The invoice simply handed the Home, however was briefly held up within the Senate. When Marvel took half within the Aug. 27, 1983, rally for the twentieth anniversary of the March on Washington, the invoice had nonetheless not but handed the Senate. He informed the group to hitch him in urging their senators to vote sure on the invoice earlier than main the group in a rendition of “Pleased Birthday.”
The invoice ultimately handed the Senate, and President Ronald Reagan signed it into regulation in November 1983. The vacation was first noticed in 1986.