Rhetorical Analysis Of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Dr. King uses ethos, logos, and pathos effectively throughout his letter to address a large audience. He intertwines the three rhetorical strategies seamlessly to support his argument. Although Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. has his critics in the clergy who argue against his civil rights demonstrations in Birmingham, he effectively uses all three types of rhetorical strategies to effective persuade his critics by explaining why his actions are just and timely in his “Letter from Birmingham Jail.”
Dr. King has to establish credibility early in his letter since his audience has already been critical of his actions, and he accomplishes this immediately. He establishes a connection with part of his intended audience, the clergymen, by stating his

King continues with his letter, he is able to continuously use pathos to appeal to the emotions of his audience. In another example, Dr. King explains “You warmly commended the Birmingham police force for keeping ‘order’ and ‘preventing violence.’ I doubt that you would have so warmly commended the police force if you had seen its dogs sinking their teeth into unarmed, nonviolent Negroes. I doubt that you would so quickly commend the policeman if you were to observe their ugly and inhumane treatment of Negroes here in the city jail” (608). This is another effective way to persuade his audience since his audience has commended the Birmingham Police Department for the way they handled the peaceful protests in a non-violent manner, but they were not made aware of the violent and hostile tactics the police department used when they had the opportunity. On a human level alone, one can not advocate for the use of force when it comes to the treatment of peaceful protestors. Not to mention that these clergymen are commending an organization that they believed handled the manner appropriately, just to realize that they were wrong about that belief. This is an effective way to evoke emotion from his audience yet again. Dr. King’s continuous use of pathos effectively appealed to the emotion of the clergymen, and he continued his argument by using logos to further cement his

King strengthens his argument by continuing to use logos when making comparisons to history. Dr. King goes on to say “We should never forget that everything Adolf Hitler did in Germany was ‘legal’ and everything the Hungarian freedom fighters did in Hungary was ‘illegal.’ It was ‘illegal’ to aid and comfort a Jew in Hitler’s Germany. Even so, I am sure that, had I lived In Germany at the time, I would have aided and comforted my Jewish brothers” (605). Adolf Hitler is perhaps the greatest evil figure in history, and Dr. King points out the similarities between Nazi Germany, and the United States of the 1960’s. This is a powerful use of logos by Dr. King since we are now more than 70 years removed from World War two and the death of Adolf Hitler, but being mentioned in the same sentence as Hitler still creates a negative reaction to this day. In 1963 the ramifications of Nazi Germany and World War Two still weighed heavily on society, especially in the United States due to our involvement in ending the reign of the Nazi regime. The last thing anyone wanted at the time was to be compared to Nazi