In closing the letter, King criticized the clergy’s praise of the Birmingham police for maintaining order nonviolently. Recent public displays of nonviolence by the police were in stark contrast to their typical treatment of black people, and, as public relations, helped “to preserve the evil system of segregation.”[19] Not only is it wrong to use immoral means to achieve moral ends, but also “to use moral means to preserve immoral ends.”[20] Instead of the police, King praised the nonviolent demonstrators in Birmingham, “for their sublime courage, their willingness to suffer and their amazing discipline in the midst of great provocation. One day the South will recognize its real heroes.”[21]