"The ends do not justify the means"

Not sure I agree with everything in Mr. Abdul-Jabar's article about MLK, but this part is spot-on:

He [MLK] would have also been disturbed by the violence and rioting that has occurred during these protests. We must remember that Dr. King’s cause was not just equality for all people, but achieving that equality through nonviolence. The ends do not justify the means; the means and the ends are the same. Violence insults his legacy. To him, anything won through force is not won at all — it is loss. He wanted equality achieved through love because he wanted to win over his enemies, not defeat them. As he said: “Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into a friend.” His goal was to cleanse the community, not to cleave it.

Amen to that.