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Hill thinks America’s core problem is poverty, because it is a major cause of the crises in health care, education, crime, violence and high rates of incarceration.

“What we see is a gap between what we have and what’s possible,” he said. “And the gap isn’t an intelligence gap, an effort gap, it’s an opportunity gap.”

One reason for rising economic inequality, Hill said, has been a lack of effective regulation of big business since the 1980s.

Hill said Americans can best honor King’s legacy by continuing to work toward the goals he pursued.

“I want to challenge us to go deeper,” he said. “To not just think about the man who wanted people holding hands and singing We Shall Overcome, but someone who really forced us to reimagine the relationship between the government and its citizens, between the rich and the vulnerable.”

That thought and work will be especially important during this election year, Hill said.

“Beyond the everyday political banter we hear on cable television and read in the newspapers, we have to pay attention to what’s going on in our communities,” he said. “One of the things Dr. King represented was mass action on a national level, but locally rooted. He said that when dogs bit us in Birmingham, we bled everywhere. That kind of mentality is what’s necessary.

“I want to challenge people to do something — to join organizations, to volunteer, to start organizations,” Hill said. “What can we do in our communities? What can we do in our schools? What can we do in our respective religious institutions? What can we do in our homes to bring about the world that is not yet?”

The theme of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Celebration was “His Courage Will Not Skip This Generation.” The celebration hosted by the Center for Multicultural Student Services was very touching and enlightening from the student performances to the speaker, Dr. Marc Lamont Hill. I was not affected by the celebration as much until a student presented a spoken word poem. She spoke...