How Black leaders Improved America: Martin Luther King & Jackie Robinson helped changed our country using peaceful means. Martin L. King lead our country through peaceful demonstrations changing our country's civil rights laws, he was admired as a great leader. Jackie Robinson the first black major league baseball player, held his peace in spite of harsh criticism and physical threats. Eventually people accepted him a great player, honoring him with the Nobel Prize for Human Rights. Malcolm X was a civil rights activist, who beleived in physical force to provide black respect. Ben chose these lessons and found them very interesting. Good Job, Ben