In his “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” Martin Luther King Jr. delivered an important statement on civil rights and civil disobedience. The 1963 racial crisis in Birmingham, Alabama, was a critical turning point in the struggle for African American civil rights. Nonviolent protestors led by King faced determined opposition from hard-core segregationists. King and his organization, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), needed a victory to sustain the momentum of their movement. The integration of downtown stores and lunch counters was the primary focus of SCLC’s “Project C”—the “C” stood for confrontation. Demonstrations began one day after a new city government was elected. Many observers criticized King for protesting at a time when Birmingham’s race relations appeared to be moving in a more positive direction. These critics included eight prominent white clergymen who published a statement characterizing these protests as “unwise and untimely” and asking African Americans to withdraw their support from King’s efforts.