King triumphantly declared, “Our God Is Marching On!,” Amsterdam News editors wrote:
We fully intended to publish the Montgomery speech in our very next edition, but communications lines broke down between Alabama and the Amsterdam News, and through no fault of our own we were not able to get the complete text of the speech until many days later.
But we have it now!
And we think it so good, and that Dr. King’s following is so loyal, and our readers’ expectations are so high, that we are happy to publish it now with the feeling “better late than never.”8
Selma magnified glaring deficiencies in the black press that had been tolerable when there was no alternative. Unable to compete as television news came into its own and as mainstream media companies lured talented black journalists, the Amsterdam News and other papers increasingly found themselves offering, but without apologies to their diminishing readership – news that was no longer theirs exclusively but was perhaps “better late than never. “
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7 "President Johnson's Message." New Journal and Guide (1916-2003): 1. Mar 20 1965. ProQuest. Web. See also: "We are Overcoming." New York Amsterdam News (1962-1993): 1. Mar 20 1965; and "LBJ—All the Way." Call and Post (1962-1982), City edition ed.: 2. Mar 20 1965. ProQuest. Web.
8"Our God is Marching On!" New York Amsterdam News (1962-1993): 50. Apr 17 1965. ProQuest. Web.