Martin Luther King Jr. faced problems problems of social justice different from those America faces today, but America must pursue them with King's commitment and philosophy, A. Leon Higginbotham, Jr. told about 300 people at the second annual Martin Luther King Lecture at Science Center C yesterday.

Higginbotham emphasized the special responsibility of Harvard's "privileged community" in carrying out King's work.

Students. quick to challenge injustice in college, fail to use their analytic talents later, and "having donned their 'Brooks Brothers' and 'Brooks Sisters' three-piece suits don't give a second thought to the still persistent injustices," he said.

King fought these injustices as a moral obligation, Higginbotham said, adding that this obligation went above his respect for the legal process to appeal to higher laws of humanity.

Remember

Higginbotham stressed the danger of becoming complacent about King's achievements of desegregation. The achievements are of no use "if all that we have is desegregated, inferior education for blacks," he said.

He added job equality has no value if blacks cannot get jobs in the first place.

Higginbotham is a judge on the Third U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia. He is author of "In the Matter of Color," published in 1978, a book that explores how the legal process contributed to black economic and social exploitation in the colonial period.