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First it was Harry Belafonte who had a major and very public falling out with the children of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Now, another close friend and former disciple of Dr. King has met the ire of at least 2 of the King children.
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Former Atlanta Mayor and U.N. Ambassador Andrew Young, who was present and on the front lines with Dr. King throughout his civil rights struggles in the 1960’s, is being sued by King’s sons, Martin III and Dexter King.
King’s sons are in a fight with Young regarding who has the rights to the iconic civil rights leaders words and image, as well as how far those rights extend. Young used some footage of Dr. King in a series produced by Young’s foundation that the sons have taken exception with, even though Young also appears in the same footage.
“The question is whose legacy is it? And I agree that it’s their legacy, and that the copyright images of their father need to be protected by them, but I also feel that I’m doing the same thing for nothing and I will not give up my right to the legacy for their right to the legacy,” Young said in a recent interview.
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Martin Luther King III and Dexter King serve as chairman and president/CEO of their father’s estate including his image and his papers. King’s daughter, Rev. Bernice King, heads The Martin Luther King Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change, where Young is a member of the board of directors. The 2 sides are at odds and have dragged a private dispute between family members and an old friend into the public court system.
According to Stephen Ryan, a lawyer for Bernice King, the King brothers have been exercising their majority control over the estate “to take actions that directly harm the King Center,” with the goal of hindering or ending the center’s current name and operations. The King brothers have disregarded their obligations to the nonprofit center in favor of their own financial interests, and their actions risk tarnishing and reducing their father’s legacy. Their actions are an effort to force the center’s board to give them control, and are “totally inconsistent with their duties to the King Center, and the spirit of their father and mother, the founder of the King Center,” Ryan said.
The estate filed a lawsuit demanding that the MLK Center stop using King’s image and likeness unless certain conditions are met. One of the very first conditions was the immediate removal of Andrew Young from the center’s board of directors. Ironically, the lawsuit was filed August 28th, which was the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington where King made his famous “I Have a Dream” speech. It is also similar to a very recent court feud between the King sons and Harry Belafonte, a very close family friend who financially supported and even housed Dr. King during the civil rights era.
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Young, a longtime King confidante who helped coordinate civil rights efforts throughout the south, is saddened by the lawsuit and disagrees with King’s sons over his use of the footage in which he and Dr. King both appear. “They said I infringed on their copyright. Well, I don’t think so, because I think it was my right — (the legacy) it’s mine also.”
These King children have gotten out of hand. First it was Harry Belefonte now it's Andrew Young. These men were at Dr. Kings right hand side all those years and now the kids are fighting with them?? The children, at least the sons aren't maintaining their fathers legacy right at all. Too bad there's nobody around who can pull their coattail and show them how wrong this is. They are ruining there fathers memory. Just sad.