This means that the money never reaches its destination. Martin Luther King defines the bad check as justice for African Americans. Justice has never reached the hands of African Americans, just as money does not reach the hands of a person after insufficient control. He compared the check to the treatment of black people, because people would be able to relate to the money, if nothing else. If America then knew what it felt like to receive a bad check, it would know what it felt like to walk in the shoes of an African American. He used his metaphors as tools, to make the message clear and