In our special broadcast from Memphis, we speak with former sanitation worker and union leader Taylor Rogers and community organizers in Memphis who led a local black power group called the Invaders. Charles Cabbage and Coby Smith were working with Dr. King to organize the march in Memphis in support of the sanitation workers. [includes rush transcript]

Today is Martin Luther King Jr. day. Dr. King was born January 15, 1929. He was murdered on April 4th 1968. This year - had he lived - he would have been 78 years old.

In the early 1960s, King focused his challenge on legalized racial discrimination in the South where police dogs and bullwhips and cattle prods were used against Southern blacks seeking the right to vote or to eat at a public lunch counter. After passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965, King began challenging the nation's fundamental priorities. By 1967 he had come out against the war and for the poor giving major addresses opposing the Vietnam war and organizing a major Poor People's march to take place in Washington D.C.

In March of 1968, King came to Memphis to support striking African-American sanitation workers who were demanding better working conditions and facing massive resistance from white city officials. Days before he died he was to lead a march in Memphis - he was assassinated.

• Taylor Rogers, former sanitation worker in Memphis. He and 1,300 of his fellow workers went on strike in 1968. He later served as president of the local Memphis branch of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees or AFSCME union for 20 years.
• Charles Cabbage, long time activist and community organizer in Memphis. He helped lead The Invaders, a black power group active at the time of Dr. King's assassination. He met with King hours before he died.
• Coby Smith, long time activist and community organizer in Memphis. He helped lead The Invaders, a black power group active at the time of Dr. King's assassination.