For Southern Progressive United PAC, Southern progressivism is more than a political label. It belongs to a tradition of organizing, justice, opportunity and democratic participation deeply rooted in the South. Few Americans represent that tradition more powerfully than Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

When Americans hear the word progressive, they may think about a collection of policy positions, a faction of the Democratic Party or a political identity associated with the national left.

We see something more.

Southern progressivism has a history, a culture and a tradition of its own.

And perhaps no figure better helps us understand that tradition than Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Calling King a “progressive” requires some historical care. We should not simply impose the political labels of today on a leader who was assassinated in 1968. King was a minister, civil-rights leader and movement builder whose leadership developed within the particular racial, religious, economic and political conditions of the American South.

But measured by the principles we believe should define Southern progressivism—justice, equality, economic opportunity, democratic participation, human dignity and accountable government—King stands as one of the most consequential leaders our region has ever produced.

He also demonstrates something important about our identity.

A Southern progressive is not simply a progressive who happens to live in the South.

Southern Progressivism Was Built Here

King was born in Atlanta. He became a national figure through the Montgomery bus boycott in Alabama. His leadership became intertwined with Birmingham, Selma and communities throughout the South.

That geography matters.

The movement King helped lead confronted some of America’s most deeply entrenched systems of racial inequality, disenfranchisement and political exclusion.

Its leaders could not simply announce the country they wanted.

They had to organize the people necessary to change the country they had.

They organized through churches and community meetings. They developed local leaders whose names would never become nationally famous. Students, ministers, domestic workers, laborers, teachers, lawyers and ordinary citizens became participants in something larger than themselves.

They registered voters.

They challenged laws.

They organized demonstrations and boycotts.

They built coalitions.

They applied political, legal, economic and moral pressure.

And they continued organizing in communities where those already holding political power were often determined to stop them.

That is part of the inheritance of Southern progressivism.

We Are Not Simply National Progressives Living in the South

Southern Progressive United PAC believes there is an important distinction between being progressive nationally and being a Southern progressive.

The difference is not that Southern progressives should have fewer principles or smaller ambitions.

The difference begins with understanding place.

The South has been shaped by a distinctive history of race, religion, labor, agriculture, poverty, segregation, migration, voting restrictions and struggles over political representation.

It is also not one place politically or culturally.

The South contains some of America’s largest metropolitan areas and thousands of rural communities. It contains rapidly growing suburbs and struggling small towns, historically Black communities and increasingly diverse populations, major universities, military communities, union households, evangelical churches and millions of voters who cannot be neatly placed into political categories.

A Southern progressive has to understand those differences.

We also have to understand something King understood exceptionally well:

Political language does not always travel as easily as political values.

Someone may believe in better wages, affordable health care, strong public schools, equal opportunity and voting rights without ever calling themselves progressive.

Our responsibility is not to demand that people adopt our political vocabulary before we listen to them.

Our responsibility is to organize around values and policies capable of improving their lives.

King Spoke the Language of Values

One of King’s extraordinary strengths was his ability to connect demands for fundamental change with values people already understood.

He spoke from the Black church tradition. He spoke about democracy. He appealed to America’s stated promises of liberty and equality while forcing the country to confront how often it had failed to honor those promises.

That was not an abandonment of principle.

It was a way of communicating principle.

There is a lesson in that for Southern progressives today.

We cannot assume that terminology developed in Washington, national political organizations, universities, advocacy institutions or social media will automatically resonate in Birmingham, Jackson, rural Kentucky, eastern North Carolina, small-town Texas or communities across the South.

Progressive values can travel even when progressive terminology does not.

We should be capable of talking with people where they are while remaining clear about what we believe.

Justice Has Always Included Economic Justice

King’s legacy is sometimes reduced to desegregation and racial reconciliation.

That is an incomplete picture.

His work centered on racial equality and voting rights, but his later public life increasingly addressed poverty, economic inequality and the circumstances facing working people.

That broader vision matters enormously to our understanding of Southern progressivism.

Civil rights cannot be completely separated from economic opportunity.

Voting rights matter because people deserve a meaningful voice in the decisions affecting their communities.

Education matters because opportunity is difficult without it.

Health care matters because families cannot build economic security when illness can become financial catastrophe.

Wages matter because people who work should have a realistic opportunity to support themselves and their families.

Housing matters because stable communities require people to be able to afford to live in them.

These are not disconnected political issues.

They are parts of a larger question:

Who has the opportunity to participate fully in the economic, civic and political life of the South?

Southern Progressivism Is About Building Power

Perhaps the most important lesson of the movement King helped lead is that progress requires more than holding the right beliefs.

It requires building power.

That means registering voters.

It means developing candidates and community leaders.

It means organizing workers.

It means building institutions that remain active between elections.

It means investing in rural communities and small towns as well as major cities.

It means creating relationships with people who may agree with us on some issues and disagree with us on others.

It means listening.

It means persuading.

And ultimately, it means governing.

Southern progressives cannot measure success only by whether a particular candidate wins the next election. Elections matter enormously. A political movement that wants to change public policy eventually has to win enough power to govern.

But we should also ask what remains after Election Day.

Did we develop new leaders?

Did we register new voters?

Did we bring previously disengaged people into civic life?

Did we strengthen local organizations?

Did a first-time candidate become a stronger future leader?

Did volunteers become organizers?

Did communities develop a stronger voice?

Did we leave behind more political capacity than we had before?

That is how movements become durable.

Not Every Southern Democrat Is a Southern Progressive

Southern Progressive United PAC does not use “Southern progressive” as another name for “Southern Democrat.”

The distinction matters.

Political parties are coalitions. People within them have different philosophies, priorities and records.

We believe the word progressive should describe something substantive.

For us, a Southern progressive is committed to advancing justice, opportunity, equality, democratic participation and accountable government throughout the South.

But there is another part of that definition that matters just as much.

Southern progressives build.

They organize.

They participate.

They develop leaders.

They enter communities that national politics too often overlooks.

They understand that political change rarely arrives because someone somewhere issued the perfect statement. Change occurs when enough people become organized, informed and empowered to demand it.

King never held elected office.

Yet few Americans have had a greater impact on American law, public policy and democratic life.

That should remind us that political power exists far beyond the walls of a legislature.

We Call This Tradition “King Progressivism”

Southern Progressive United PAC models our understanding of Southern progressivism on the tradition represented by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

We call it King Progressivism.

That does not mean claiming King for every modern political position, candidate or organization. No contemporary political organization should pretend to speak for a historical figure who cannot speak for himself.

It means something more demanding.

It means measuring ourselves against principles that defined the movement King helped lead: justice joined with opportunity, civil rights joined with economic dignity, moral conviction joined with practical organizing, and political change rooted in the participation of ordinary people.

When we say we are following in King’s footsteps, we mean we are trying to continue that Southern tradition of building movements capable of expanding opportunity and democratic power.

We believe Southern progressives should organize rather than simply criticize.

We should persuade rather than merely label.

We should build coalitions rather than demand complete agreement before working together.

We should develop local leaders rather than wait for national political figures to rescue us.

We should recognize the political importance of Black communities while also building the broad coalitions necessary to govern.

We should take rural communities seriously.

We should understand faith as an important part of Southern civic life.

We should connect civil rights with economic opportunity.

And we should judge ourselves not merely by what we say, but by what we build.

That is what King Progressivism means to us.

A Southern Progressive Identity

Southern Progressive United PAC believes the South should not be treated as a political problem to be solved from somewhere else.

This is our home.

Its history belongs to us—the painful parts and the inspiring ones.

Its communities deserve political organizations willing to understand them rather than stereotype them.

Its next generation of leaders should be discovered, developed and supported here.

And its progressive movement should draw strength from one of the richest traditions of democratic organizing anywhere in America.

Martin Luther King Jr. is central to that tradition, but he did not build it alone.

The movement included people whose names fill history books and thousands whose names most Americans will never know. It depended on organizations, churches, students, workers, lawyers, local leaders and ordinary citizens willing to participate.

That may be the most important lesson for Southern progressives today.

We do not need to wait for another King.

We need to build the conditions in which thousands of new Southern leaders can emerge.

We need candidates willing to run where conventional wisdom says they cannot win.

We need organizers willing to work between elections.

We need citizens willing to become participants rather than spectators.

We need institutions capable of turning individual moments of enthusiasm into lasting political capacity.

And we need a progressive politics confident enough in its principles to speak to people who do not already agree with us.

That is the Southern progressive tradition we claim.

That is the tradition Southern Progressive United PAC intends to help build.

And when we describe ourselves as King Progressives, we are making a commitment—not to imitate one man, but to continue the unfinished work of building a South where justice, opportunity, equality and democratic participation belong to everyone.