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The cartoon, published in the Greenfield Recorder just days after the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, captures the feelings of many Americans at the time. A sharp contrast is drawn between King's nonviolent message and the events surrounding his death. In a style typical of the great cartoonist Herblock, King holds a book containing his ideals and confronts the tools of violence; a white hand with a gun and a black hand holding a torch. The contrast is heightened by the title, a reference to King's famous "I Have a Dream" Speech.