Question

This will be the day when all of God's children will be able to sing with new meaning:

My country, 'tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing.

Land where my fathers died, land of the pilgrim's pride,

From every mountainside, let freedom ring!

And if America is to be a great nation, this must become true.

And so let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire.

Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York.

Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania.

Let freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado.

Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California.

–"I Have a Dream,"
Martin Luther King Jr.

Read the passage, and then complete the statements.

In this passage, King alludes to
.

King includes this allusion to help convey
.

This allusion supports King’s purpose of

Answer 1

In this passage, King alludes to the patriotic hymn “My Country, ’Tis of Thee” (also called “America”).

King includes this allusion to invoke familiar American ideals of liberty and freedom and to highlight the gap between those ideals and the reality of racial injustice.

This allusion supports King’s purpose of persuading the nation to live up to its founding principles by extending true freedom and equality to all citizens — i.e., to advance civil rights and national unity.