Khalil Gibran Muhammad, educator and author, delivered the keynote address titled "No Reparations Without Racial Education: Martin Luther King on the Tyranny of Ignorance." Muhammad is Professor of History, Race, and Public Policy at Harvard's Kennedy School and Suzanne Young Murray Professor at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Studies.

Deploring "the tyranny of ignorance," Muhammad reminded his Bates audience that understanding America's history of racial injustice is the first step toward redressing that injustice.

"Since it is not OK to teach our children to deny the Jewish Holocaust, then why is it OK in far too many schools and homes to deny the centrality of slavery to the American story?" he wondered. Later, Muhammad said:

"Dr. King's vision of transforming America did not just turn on moral appeals for justice, advocacy for civil rights legislation, and a massive push for economic equity. What we've long overlooked was that before Dr. King had achieved the civil rights bills of 1964 and '65 . . . he envisioned our shared history and collective memory at the cornerstone of transforming America."

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