Read the following excerpt from Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s "Letter from Birmingham,"
then answer the question.
"We must use time creatively, and forever realize that the time is always ripe to do right.
Now is the time to make real the promise of democracy, and transform our pending national
elegy into a creative psalm of brotherhood. Now is the time to lift our national policy from
the quicksand of racial injustice to the solid rock of human dignity.
I have travelled the length and breadth of Alabama, Mississippi and all the other southern
states. On sweltering summer days and crisp autumn mornings I have looked at her
beautiful churches with their spires pointing heavenward. I have beheld the impressive
outlay of her massive religious education buildings. Over and over again I have found myself
asking: 'Who worships here? Who is their God? Where were their voices when the lips of
Governor Barnett dripped with words of interposition and nullification? Where were their
voices of support when tired, bruised, and weary Negro men and women decided to rise
from the dark dungeons of complacency to the bright hills of creative protest?'"

Which statement best describes the tone of these paragraphs? (5 points)
a. his tone shifts from neutral to negative
b. calm to lively
c. urgent to reflective
d. ironic to sarcastic