ATLANTA (AP) – When Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated in 1968, Georgia’s few black legislators asked then-Gov. Lester Maddox, a fiery segregationist, if his body could lie in honor in the state Capitol.

Maddox not only swore he would never authorize a public tribute of King in the Capitol Rotunda, he was outraged to see state flags, then dominated by the Confederate Cross, flying at half-staff in tribute to a black man.

But in a sign of civil rights gains in the nearly 40 years since, the state plans to honor Martin Luther King Jr.’s widow, Coretta Scott King, with a public viewing at the Capitol.

King died Monday at an alternative medicine clinic in Mexico. She was 78.

“This is not just a salute to Mrs. King. It’s a tribute to her and her husband, and to all they stood for and did,” said U.S. Rep. John Lewis.

On Saturday, King will become the first woman and first black person to lie in honor at the Georgia Capitol. The state flag she helped to change – now bearing a much smaller Confederate battle emblem – was immediately lowered by Gov. Sonny Perdue and will wave at half-staff until her funeral Tuesday.

King’s casket will lie in Ebenezer Baptist Church for most of Monday. Her funeral will be held at New Birth Missionary Baptist Church in Lithonia, where the Kings’ youngest child, Bernice, is a minister.

Few details have been released about the funeral, including who will deliver the eulogy. However, the American Jewish Committee said the King family had invited the executive director of its Atlanta chapter to deliver remarks.

In 1968, Maddox refused to participate in Martin Luther King Jr.’s funeral ceremonies. But for his widow, the governor and his wife will escort her casket into the Capitol along with the Kings’ four children.

Ignoring King’s death as Maddox ignored her husband’s is not an option, said Akinyele Umoja, Georgia State University African-American studies professor.

“It would be considered an insult to the black community nationally not to do this,” Umoja said. “They have to do it.”

The King legacy is a major draw to Atlanta. The King Center, which is the site of Martin Luther King Jr.’s tomb, attracts thousands, along with his nearby birth home and Ebenezer Baptist Church, where he preached in the years before his death.

Also, when Martin Luther King Jr. died, segregation was openly accepted in the South, even though it was on its last legs, Umoja said.

“Lester Maddox had a strong base. Now, you don’t have that constituency,” he said.

State Rep. Tyrone Brooks, who was a young activist in King’s Southern Christian Leadership Conference, said Maddox was the epitome of Jim Crow, racist segregation.

“It became a national insult to Dr. King and the King legacy and the whole civil rights movement that was sweeping across the South, bringing about significant change.”

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