Most beautiful line in any 60s song "Didn't you love the things that they stood for?" That says it all. I loved and will always love the things that they stood for.

Still gives me chills. This is a powerful song for all us Freedom loving Americans👍👍🇺🇸🙏❤️

I remember watching this on TV when it first aired in 1968. My sister, my parents and I loved the Smothers Brothers and would gather every Sunday to watch their show. I had a lump in my throat at the mention of Abraham, John and Martin throughout the song, and by the time "Some day soon, it's gonna be one day Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?" came the tears flowed freely among all of us. We were absolutely stunned at the sadness and beauty of this song, and in the case of Martin and Bobby, our grief was fresh.

if this song doesn't bring tears, I don't know what would.

My dad just introduced me to this song yesterday and I've probably replayed this twenty times since then..

“ Didn’t you love the things that they stood for. Didn’t they try to find the good..in you and me.” What has happened to our country? I was 16 when this song came out. Its heartbreaking to see our country today. We need to get back to finding the good in everyone.

I am very impressed by Dion's guitar playing

All I can tell you as a musician, Aside from the message and beauty of this piece is: It looks like ridiculously hard fingerpicking to play - while singing a different melody Hats off to Dion 🙂

what a beautiful song. it kills me. this is an amazing live performance. Go Dion!!

What an incredibly powerful performance and song.Tough times we saw growing up.The emotion from Dion says it all.

And he is still making great new music today. His recent album is totally killer.

Dions performance was very good, I didn't know he played guitar so well

This episode is one of the best episodes of The Smothers Brothers. I was watching it for Donovan. When this song came on, I instantly loved it. It's so beautiful.

The Smothers Brothers featured a lot of great talent, but this performance by Dion Francis DiMucci was tops.

From an interview with Dion just watched he explained he was living in Miami in mid 1968 when a song-writing friend of his, Dick Holler knocked on his door and asked if he would record this song he had just written which was "Abraham, Martin and John", At first Dion didn't like it and wasn't keen to record it, but with the insistence of his wife he went ahead and changed the melody of it, and took it to his former label Laurie to record it with a big orchestra production under the direction of John Ablott and Gene Schwartz featuring horns, violas, harps, sitar, organ recorded in just one take and became a No.4 hit in September 1968.

My grandfather used to randomly blurt out singing this tune.. made me google to find the original and it’s beautiful.. may he rest peacefully.

I still get chills and tear up everytime I hear this song.... especially the verses about Dr. King and Bobby Kennedy

I've always loved Marvin Gaye singing this song, but after hearing Dion sing it for the first time today, I'm blown away. Awesome!

This song makes me tear up; every time 🥺

Beautiful song. Dion was first to record it. A huge hit here in Canada.

yes awesome agree with all the praise of Dion & the song, and let's hear it for the radical Smothers Bros too

This song is so beautiful, and so sad .It always makes me cry.

This is my favorite version. Love the backing operatic voices in the background. Sich feeling, and sheer beauty.

"R.I.P. abraham-lincoln john f. kennedy robert f. kennedy & dr.martin luther king jr. you all will be missed".

It's something else to hear the audience gasping and murmuring as Dick announced the song.

Very unusual in those days for a performance to actually be live on TV. Usually was lip sinked,. This song always chokes me up 😢

And, yes, that is Dion from Dion and the Belmonts. Wonderful song that found the right guy to sing it.

Moving. Perfect vocals by Dion. Love the "Amen" bridge. It’s not in the recorded version. It should have been, it adds soul.

This song was written by Dick Holler, the day after Bobby Kennedy was assassinated and he specifically wanted Dion who was living in Florida at the time to record it, this is only months after Dion had freed himself from heroin addiction.

My Dad would play this for us early70s.. It feels like yesterday🤧🙏🙏🙏

I have been listening to this song since I was a young child and I have always loved it…

I remember this episode of the Smothers Brothers. And more importantly, I remember when this song first was released. We would do well to live now the lesson we learned backed then. Thank you for uploading this.

This song always brings tears to my eyes.

Dion also wrote probably one of the best teen age love angst ballads ever " why must I be a teenager in love", Dion & the Belmonts about 1958 or so. Very underrated song writer, I think.

The same. Man who sang Run Around Sue. I loved the fifties du was he did but this is the classic everyone will remember him by

This song was a hit when I was seven years old (1968). Now more then fifty years later it still means a lot to me and all people who have listened to it! One can only dream of what our country would have been if Abraham Martin John and Bobby would not have died so young! Unbelievable compared to the leaders of our country today! Bruce s . Jackson!

I suppose if listening to this incredible song doesn't bring chills up and down your spine then you weren't around then.

They did nothing short of saving the world from ourselves in their own times for us!

NEVER GETS OLD

I've only heard the radio version before, this was such a great performance. Love this song.

This is a amazing true classic that should go down in history of life in the US!!

This would bring a tear to a glass eye xx

Love this forever, three very brave men will stay in our hearts forever. Thank you.!!🇺🇸♥️🇺🇸♥️🇺🇸♥️🇺🇸♥️🇺🇸♥️🇺🇸♥️🇺🇸

This song is hard to listen to. First listening to this song the summer before my freshman year in college, hearing it now brings back some very strong memories. Stronger still are the emotions it elicits.

I remember seeing this in 1968..i was 17 years old

Dion still rules

What a great tune:) I love it so endlessely...Thanks Dion...

Along with Lou Reed (May he rest in peace!), no one epitomized New York with the way they sang better than Dion!

Wow! I never had heard that version before. Superb!!!

I loved this song!! what we all went thru,

Gene Schwartz, the president of New York-based Laurie Records (the Royal Guardsmen's label) convinced the producer and the songwriter of AM&J, Dick Holler and Phil Gernhard, to see Dion DiMucci, who had been the label's top act in the early 60's; lately he'd fallen on hard times. A recovering heroin addict, Dion (as he was known) was living in South Florida, and attempting to re-invent himself as an acoustic guitar-strumming folk act. At Schwartz's insistence, they brought "Abraham" to the fallen star.

This song brings back a lot of painful moments 💔 from my youth, in the end life went on and we all have gotten older

He Smashed this. His voice is outstanding. I've heard of Dion all my life "Run Around Sue"! But I had no idea he did this. I've heard it by other people, like "Smokey & The Miracles" & "Marvin Gaye", which were great. But blown away by this version. 🎶🎤❤😥🇺🇸🇬🇧 (the English flag is for me)

Great song Sharon, I sang this. song in church the weekend after John Jr., Caroline, and her sister died in the plane crash going to Martha's Vineyard

And this was from a time when, even when times were so terribly bad, things were relatively better than today. I ouught to know. I lived through both times, then and now.

Tabernacle Choir in the background love this song love Dion 1950s were fabulous back then. Today Bizarro world. Hello from Bay Ridge Brooklyn

I get chills and sometimes tear up, they murdered our heroes, Stan😢TFS

I love this song too but went my grandma was a live she used to watch the smothers brothers comedy hour too and i really miss shows like this they were better then American idol another shows

It's a shame they can't clean up the audio on this. Dion really nailed this performance, vocal and guitar. Just remarkable.

And now RIP Tom Smothers. Half of the Smothers Brothers.

Gosh I remember The Smothers Brothers Show. And I remember this song too. In 1968 I was in the first grade and my daddy was gone. He was fighting in the jungles of Vietnam. It was his second tour. Many years later I’m still here. I’m 59 years old and my parents have been married for 61 years.

Jim I couldn't agree anymore, that one line said it all, God bless to all the people who loved this as much as me❤❤❤.

Listening my heart out to this saaaaad and beautiful song.

I love this song!

What a great song remember it will I was in the second grade in 1968

Muito linda melodia a letra me toca mesmo nao entendendo seu idioma isto e a prova de que a musica une os povos

Though not mentioned in the lyrics, I think this brief eulogy Ted Kennedy made about Bobby Kennedy is timeless: On behalf of Mrs. Robert Kennedy, her children and the parents and sisters of Robert Kennedy, I want to express what we feel to those who mourn with us today in this cathedral and around the world. We loved him as a brother and father and son. From his parents, and from his older brothers and sisters--Joe, Kathleen and Jack--he received inspiration which he passed on to all of us He gave us strength in time of trouble, wisdom in time of uncertainty, and sharing in time of happiness. He was always by our side. Love is not an easy feeling to put into words. Nor is loyalty, or trust or joy. But he was all of these. He loved life completely and lived it intensely. A few years back, Robert Kennedy wrote some words about his own father and they expressed the way we in his family feel about him. He said of what his father meant to him: "What it really all adds up to is love--not love as it is described with such facility in popular magazines, but the kind of love that is affection and respect, order, encouragement, and support. Our awareness of this was an incalculable source of strength, and because real love is something unselfish and involves sacrifice and giving, we could not help but profit from it. "Beneath it all, he has tried to engender a social conscience. There were wrongs which needed attention. There were people who were poor and who needed help. And we have a responsibility to them and to this country. Through no virtues and accomplishments of our own, we have been fortunate enough to be born in the United States under the most comfortable conditions. We, therefore, have a responsibility to others who are less well off." This is what Robert Kennedy was given. What he leaves us is what he said, what he did and what he stood for. A speech he made to the young people of South Africa on their Day of Affirmation in 1966 sums it up best, and I would read it now: "There is discrimination in this world, and slavery and slaughter and starvation. Governments repress their people; and millions are trapped in poverty while the nation grows rich; and wealth is lavished on armaments everywhere. "These are differing evils, but they are common works of man. They reflect the imperfection of human justice, the inadequacy of human compassion, our lack of sensibility toward the sufferings of our fellows. "But we can perhaps remember--even if only for a time--that those who live with us are our brothers; that they share with us the same short moment of life; that they seek--as we do--nothing but the chance to live out their lives in purpose and happiness, winning what satisfaction and fulfillment they can. "Surely this bond of common faith, this bond of common goal, can begin to teach us something. Surely, we can learn, at least, to look at those around us as fellow men. And surely we can begin to work a little harder to bind up the wounds among us and to become in our own hearts brothers and countrymen once again. "Our answer is to rely on youth--not a time of life but a state of mind, a temper of the will, a quality of imagination, a predominance of courage over timidity, of the appetite for adventure over the love of ease. The cruelties and obstacles of this swiftly changing planet will not yield to obsolete dogmas and outworn slogans. They cannot be moved by those who cling to a present that is already dying, who prefer the illusion of security to the excitement and danger that come with even the most peaceful progress. It is a revolutionary world we live in; and this generation, at home and around the world, has had thrust upon it a greater burden of responsibility than any generation that has ever lived.

This beautiful song was made great and momentous by the individual not mentioned in the title, namely Bobby Kennedy. Kennedy 024!

I feel like crying. God bless these great men.

Hear the audience gasp when Dickie announces the song title? Had my HS choir sing this in 2016; kids loved it, and parents, too.

Have listened to this version so many times and it still instills pride , love , power of music!!

This song and "Soul Coaxing" by Raymone FeFevre fit together in my life. They are still important to me all these years later.

This is the best version of this song !!!!

Great song.

Its increíble inspiration...is imposible to forgot great men

Wow, now that's HEAVY!!!!!!!!! 🤎✝ RIP in Heaven Tommy!!! Loved ya! 💘💘 Elvis heard this and he wanted a song to dedicate to the slain MLK and RFK. written by: "Earl Brown" This was the song that concluded the television special, perhaps as apocalyptic a single recording as Elvis would ever attempt, not so much for its words (which represent a somewhat generalized message of peace and understanding) as for the raw, unmodulated emotion that he puts into them. The song was written at the last minute to provide a finale that would allow Elvis to articulate his anguish over the assassinations of Bobby Kennedy and Martin Luther King, Jr., and in essence that is just what its idealistic lyrics do (“There must be peace and understanding sometime”). But it is what comes over Elvis in the studio, the pain and conviction in his voice as he sings of “a better land where all my brothers walk hand in hand,” then practically screams out the last line, “Please let my dream come true - right…now!” that puts the song quite literally over the top. The single not only whetted the public’s appetite for the special, it changed both the climate and perception surrounding Elvis, charting higher than anything Elvis had had out in three years.

Remembering...

One of the all time 👍 GREATS

I just came home for seeing THE WANDERER...the live stage show based on Dion's life and career. It was staged at the Paper Mill Playhouse in NJ...about 30 miles from Broadway. I have no doubt this show will be on Broadway very soon. It was fantastic.

Dion is so talented in so many different ways...Boy he sure did walk a hard road from 50s Doo Wop through his Heroin addiction and getting clean to this absolute amazing Masterpiece of Musicianship....

The reason for the acoustic guiter & the background vocals is because there was a musicians strike. Check out the complete episode of the Smothers Brothers. Donovan & Jennifer Warnes were also on it. Great

Am happy to listen to my idol dion here

The theme of the song is so epic I just assumed it was 6 minutes long --- can't believe it's only 3.

thank you dion

It gives me shivers...

Chokes me up

I have all those albums songs, and the latest one. But more than that I love his hair.

Gorgeous version.

Thank you for posting this. I got a friend to buy me the CD when she went to USA. Here there is even more passion in Dion's voice and I had no idea that he could play guitar at all.

Stunning!❤

Virtuoso performance by a living legend. Happy Thanksgiving to all.

Brilliant performance, beautiful song.

A song about what we could have been. Instead of being led by the Kennedys and King, we got Reagan and the Bush Family; we now approach the cliff.

Always makes me cry

1968 was one of the most difficult year in our nation's history assassinations of Martin Luther king and Robert Kennedy I was in 10th grade learning about u.s. history

At first I thought this was Ducky from NCIS, then I started sobbing from the music and realized, no it’s not Ducky from NCIS.

CLIFF RICHARD also makes a cover of the song on his ''Tracks an' Grooves'' album in 1970.

This song made this man a legend

So nostalgic and moving. Thank you for this.

i did not know DION sang this song, I did in the past, I have been looking for this song!