Singing “Trouble in My Way” and echoing the familiar refrain, “Jesus will fix it,” about 2,000 people marched to the State House on Monday to honor the memory of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.

A handful of protesters awaited, waving Confederate flags and holding signs that read, “The NAACP is racist.”

Such strong symbolism continues to mark Columbia’s King Day at the Dome march and rally, born five years ago from the successful effort to remove the Confederate flag from atop the State House.

John Hurst Adams, an African Methodist Episcopal bishop, preached what he said was the Confederate flag’s eulogy, representing justice.

“It stands for slavery. Everything it stands for has been proven false. It’s sick. It’s gonna die. This is its eulogy,” Adams said.

Former U.S. Education Secretary Dick Riley implored marchers to till the soils of education and equality until the state provides all residents a quality education.

“Pray for a good harvest, but keep on hoeing,” instructed Riley, the former S.C. governor appointed education secretary under President Clinton in 1992. “We have not placed a high enough value on a good education.”

Organizers billed the day as a march for education equity and equal justice, as the NAACP united with the grass-roots Education First movement.

That movement grew out of a pending lawsuit against the state brought by seven counties challenging equal education funding in counties with smaller property tax bases to support schools.

Rhett Jackson, Education First co-chairman, said the last four legislatures have underfunded equal education for the state’s children by $500 million.

Some marchers held signs encouraging the Legislature to raise their taxes in order to properly fund kindergarten through high school. However, neither Gov. Mark Sanford nor the GOP-controlled Legislature supports outright tax increases.

Sanford is pushing a private-school tuition tax credit proposal, which would allow parents to divert public funds to private schools or to different public schools than their children currently attend, and allow corporations to create private scholarships.

S.C. Education Superintendent Inez Tenenbaum blasted Sanford’s proposal, getting one of the two largest ovations of the day. “Let’s pull together to defeat any voucher program,” Tenenbaum, a Democrat, urged. “Support public education. We’re all in this together.”

The day’s other standing ovation went to former state Chief Justice Ernest Finney, who was not a speaker. But his court in 1999 ruled in the state education equity case, Abbeville v. State, that the constitution obligates the Legislature to provide at least a minimally adequate education.

Lonnie Randolph, NAACP state president, said King Day was one in which to discuss inequities across the board.

The Rev. Reggie White, NAACP regional director, called the State House and its grounds one of the “rough and crooked places of America.” He berated the Legislature for its willingness to spend more money locking black men in jail rather than educating young black boys.

In another symbolic reference to King’s legacy, White brought up the war in Iraq. “Do not ask us to do for citizens of a foreign state what you will not do for us,” he said.

King, who was assassinated in 1968, vocally opposed the war in Vietnam, which caused a number of black issue-oriented organizations, such as the NAACP and Urban League, to withdraw support for King’s overall civil rights agenda in the 1960s.

Acting national NAACP president and CEO Dennis Hayes said he has asked the General Assembly to submit an education equity plan by June 24. He said the NAACP wants a plan before it holds its national convention in July.

NAACP officials have said for months they intend to bring more economic pressure on South Carolina to get the Legislature’s attention.

Rep. Gilda Cobb-Hunter, D-Orangeburg, said the Legislature “stupidly” has done nothing to plan for implementing a remedy if the court rules against the state in the Clarendon County school equity case.

“The General Assembly should be ready to do something,” said Cobb-Hunter, who has offered a bill creating a study committee to look at options.