I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. This is why right temporarily defeated is stronger than evil triumphant.

Martin Luther King Jr. voiced this conviction in the mid-1960s as he defended nonviolent resistance amid arrests, bombings, and political backlash against the civil rights movement. The phrasing reflects King’s Christian theology (agape love, redemptive suffering) and his Gandhian belief that moral force can outlast coercion. It was a period when civil rights victories were real but fragile, and when King was increasingly pressed to answer critics who argued that nonviolence was naïve in the face of violent white supremacy. The line functions as reassurance to supporters that apparent setbacks do not determine the ultimate moral outcome.

The quote asserts a moral structure to history: truth and love may be “unarmed” (lacking physical coercion), yet they possess a deeper durability than violence. King contrasts temporary outcomes (“right temporarily defeated”) with ultimate ones (“final word in reality”), arguing that evil’s visible triumphs are unstable because they depend on force and fear. The statement also reframes suffering in nonviolent struggle: defeat is not proof of failure but part of a longer arc in which conscience, solidarity, and justice can prevail. It is both theological (faith in providence) and strategic (a rationale for disciplined nonviolence).