By George P. Hassett

The celebration of Dr. Martin Luther King at the Somerville High School auditorium Monday was almost post-race. Issues of racial equality were raised but more often speakers at the event encouraged the audience to keep King’s legacy alive through ending poverty, supporting worker and immigrant rights, offering help to recovering heroin addicts and honoring local measures such as the mediation program at Somerville High.

Keynote speaker Byron Rushing, a Democratic state representative from Boston, spoke of King’s work to unionize trash collectors in Memphis and maintained King’s legacy was one of radical change and revolution.

He related the story of FBI agent William Sullivan who watched a King speech and promptly informed FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover that King was “the most dangerous negro leader in America.”

He may have been motivated by bad intentions, but Rushing said Sullivan was speaking truth: King was dangerous, he said.

“Martin Luther King was dangerous for everyone who wanted to solve problems through violence. He was dangerous for everyone who wanted to be-come richer by keeping others poorer. Danger Рthat is the legacy of Martin Luther King,” Rushing said.

And for citizens to carry out King’s legacy they must also pursue freedom and justice with the same sense of dangerousness, he said.

‚ÄúI ask you, good people of Somerville, to carry out Martin Luther King’s legacy and become dangerous. Work to end poverty in your communities, support workers rights and demand that the war in Iraq end today,‚Äù he said to applause. ‚ÄúYou are absolutely on the right track already. You can all be dangerous. You can all be dangerous negroes.‚Äù

The celebration, in its sixth year, featured an address from Somerville High School student Jessica Dias, performances from an Indo-Pak dance group and the True Light Choir of the Mission Church and awards for the Community Action Agency of Somerville (CAAS) and Danny McLaughlin, a lifelong Somerville resident, activist and teen counselor.

CAAS Executive Director Jack Hamilton accepted the award on behalf of the 25-year-old anti-poverty agency. CAAS provides early childhood care for over 200 Cambridge and Somerville children ages 3 to 5. They also do advocacy work for tenants, immigrants and at-risk youth.

In accepting the award, Hamilton spoke of a decades old anti-immigrant campaign CAAS helped defeat.

‚ÄúSome not so clear thinking Somerville residents were trying to get a vague anti-immigrant question on the ballot. It didn’t say much more than ‘we don’t like immigrants.’ We hired a lawyer and a handwriting expert and proved the signatures they were gathering had been fraudulent. On some streets everyone on the street had signed. And in some homes the entire family had apparently come to the door alphabetically to sign,‚Äù he said.

Observing CAAS’ head start program, he said, is a window to a better world.

‚ÄúTo walk into head start and see 20 children of all different backgrounds working together and learning together is amazing. I think to myself, ‘This room has it right. What the hell is the matter with the rest of the world, why don’t we get it?‚Äù he said.

To spread that atmosphere of inclusion Hamilton said Somerville citizens need to keep working.

‚ÄúWe’re doing a good job but we have got to do better,‚Äù he said. ‚ÄúThere is still a lot of work to be done particularly around immigration, which is an issue that is just driving me bananas these days.‚Äù 

McLaughlin was chosen this year as the individual in Somerville who most embodied King’s dream and legacy. He is the program coordinator for Somerville Teen Empowerment and co-founder, along with his brothers Matt, Mark and Steve, of Save Our Somerville, a community group working to strengthen ties between old and new residents.

McLaughlin said his work in the city is inspired by its unlikely heroes – struggling teens looking to improve their lives and recovering heroin addicts trying to stay clean.

‚ÄúSomerville is my home and my heart – it’s who I am. Growing up here I’ve seen a lot and been through a lot,‚Äù he said. ‚ÄúWe are all Somervillens. It’s time to stop fighting each other and start working together.‚Äù