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[music]

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Who taught you to hate the color of your skin?

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Who taught you to hate the texture of your hair?

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Who taught you to hate the shape of your nose, and the shape of your lips?

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Who taught you to hate yourself, from the top of your head to the soles of your feet?

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Who taught you to hate your own kind?

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Who taught you to hate the race that you belong to

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So much so that you don't want to be around each other?

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You know. Before you come asking Mr. Muhammad does he teach hate, you should ask yourself

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who taught you to hate being what God made you.

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Most of us, blacks, or negroes as he called us,

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really thought we were free,

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without being aware that in our subconscious, all those chains we thought had been struck off were still there

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And there were many ways, where what really motivated us

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was our desire to be loved by the white man.

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Malcolm meant to lance that sense of inferiority.

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He knew it would be painful.

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He knew that people could kill you because of it,

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but he dared to take that risk.

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He was saying something, over and above that of any other leader of that day.

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While the other leaders were begging for entry into the house of their oppressor,

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he was telling you to build your own house.

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He expelled fear for African Americans.

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He said "I will speak out loud what you've been thinking"

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and he said "You'll see, people will hear, and it will not do anything to us, necessarily, ok?

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But I will not speak it for the masses of people."

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When he said it in a very strong fashion, in this very manly fashion, in this fashion that says,

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"I am not afraid to say what you've been thinking all these years,"

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that's why we loved him.

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He said it out loud, not behind closed doors,

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He took on America for us.

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And I, for one, as a Muslim believe that the white man is intelligent enough.

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If he were made to realize how Black people really feel

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and how fed up we are without that old compromising sweet talk

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Why, you're the one who make it hard for yourself.

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The white man believes you when you go through with that old sweet talk

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'cause you've been sweet talking him ever since he brought you here

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Stop sweet talking him!

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Tell him how you feel!

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Tell him how, what kind of hell you've been catching, and let him know that if he's not ready to clean his house up, if he's not ready to clean his house up,

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he shouldn't have a house. [crowd: That's right!] It should catch on fire, and burn down...

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[applause]

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[drums and music]

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On these Harlem street corners, for most of this century, Black people have celebrated their culture,

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and argued the question of race in America.

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It was here that Malcolm first joined the street orators who gave voice to Harlem's hope, and its anger.

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I've taught nationalism, and that means that I want to go out of this white man's country, because integration will never happen

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You will never, as long as you live,

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integrate into the white men's system

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A hundred and twenty-fifth street and Seventh Avenue was

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the center of activity among the black street orators.

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When Malcolm arrived, technically he had no corner.

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So he established his base, you might say, in front of Elder Michaux's bookstore.

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When Malcolm would ascent the little platform, he didn't, he couldn't talk for the first four, five minutes.

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The people would be making such a praise-shout to him

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and he would stand there, taking his due.

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and then he would open his mouth.

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They call Mr. Muhammad a hate-teacher

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because he makes you hate dope and alcohol.

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They call Mr. Muhammad a black supremacist

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because he teaches you and me not only that we are as good as the white man,

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but better than the white man.

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Yes, better than the white man.

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You are better than the white man

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and that's not saying anything.

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That's not saying, you know we're just as equal with him.

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Who is he to be equal with?

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You look at his skin

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You can't compare your skin with his skin,

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Why your skin look like gold beside his skin.

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There was a time when we used to drool in the mouth over white people.

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We thought they were pretty 'cause we were blind, we were dumb.

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We couldn't see them as they are.

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But since the honorable Elijah Muhammad has come and taught us the religion of Islam,

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which have cleaned us up, and made us so we can see for ourselves

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now we can see that old pale thing to look exactly as he look

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nothing but an old, pale thing.

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I came away from that rally feeling that with him

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once you heard him speak,

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you never went back to where you were before.

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You had to, even if you kept your position you had to rethink it.

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We weren't accustomed to being told that we were devils

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and that we were oppressors up here in our wonderful northern cities.

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He was speaking for a silent mass of black people

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and sang it out front on the devil's own airwaves, and that was an act of war.

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When he came off the stage, I jumped off the island,

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walked up to him, and of course when I got to him the bodyguards,

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you know, moved in front, and he just pushed them away.

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And I went in front of him and extended my hand,

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and said "I liked some of what you said. I didn't agree with what, all that you said, but I liked some of what you said"

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And he looked at me, held my hand in a very gentle fashion and says

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"One day you will, Sister. One day you will, Sister", and he smiled.

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To make his message clear, Malcolm used his own life as a lesson for all black Americans.

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He preached it in fables and parables

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and later, in writing his autobiography with Alex Haley,

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he sought some control over how his life would be interpreted in the future.

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I would be rather taken by a statement he would make of himself

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He would say "I am a part of all I have met"

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and by that he meant that all the things he had done in his earlier life had exposed him to things

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and taught him skills of one or another sort,

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all of which had synthesized into the Malcolm who became the spokesman for the Nation of Islam.

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You were born in Omaha, is that right?

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Yes sir

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And you left, your familiy left Omaha when you were about one year old?

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I imagine about a year old.

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Why did they leave Omaha?

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Well, to my understanding, the Ku Klux Klan burned down one of their homes in Omaha

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There's a lot of Ku Klux Klan

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They made your family feel very unhappy, I'm sure.

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Well, insecure, if not unhappy.

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So you must have a somewhat prejudiced point of view,

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a personally prejudiced point of view

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In other words, you cannot look at this in a broad, academic sort of way, really, can you?

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I think that's incorrect, because despite the fact that that happened in Omaha

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and then when we moved to Lansing, Michigan,our home was burned down again

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in fact my father was killed by the Ku Klux Klan,

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and despite all of that, no one was more thoroughly integrated with whites than I

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No one has lived more so in the society of whites than I.

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We were the only black children in the neighborhood

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but on the back of our property we had a wooded area,

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so the white kids would all come over to our house and they'd go back and play in the woods.

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So Malcolm would say "Well let's go play Robin Hood"

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Well, so we'd go back there to play Robin Wood

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Robin Hood was Malcolm.

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and these white kids would go along with it.

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Malcolm said he was the lightest skinned of the seven children born to Earl and Louise Little,

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a reminder, he said, of the white man who had raped his mother's mother.

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In 1929, when Malcolm was four years old, his father, a carpenter and preacher,

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moved the family to Lansing, Michigan.

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Lansing was a small town and the west side was the side of town that blacks lived on.

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Malcolm and his family lived outside of the city

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and they had a four-acre parcel with a small house on it,

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so they were sort of considered as farmers.

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Three months after the Littles moved in, white neighbors took legal action to evict them.

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A county judge ruled that the farm property was restricted to whites only.

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But Earl Little refused to move.

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Here in Michigan, Ku Klux Klan membership was at least 70,000, five times more than in Mississippi.

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For Malcolm's family, white hostility was a fact of life.

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Everybody was asleep in our house and all of a sudden, we heard a big boom.

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And when we woke up, fire was everywhere and everybody was running into the walls and into each other, you know.

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Well, what I recall about that was my mother telling us to,

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"Get up, get up, get up, the house is on fire," and to get out. That's what I actually recall.

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I could hear my mother yelling, I hear my father yelling.

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And so they made sure they got us all rounded up and got us out.

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The house burned down to the ground. No firewagon came, nothing, and we were burned out.

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Malcolm's father, Earl Little, accused local whites of setting the fire.

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The police accused Earl and arrested him on suspicion of arson. The charges were later dropped.

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In the city where we grew up, whites could refer to us as "those uppity niggers," or,

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"those smart niggers that live out south of town."

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In those days, whenever a white person referred to you as a "smart nigger," that was their way of saying, "This is a nigger you have to watch because he's not dumb."

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My father was independent. He didn't want anybody to feed him.

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He wanted to raise his own food. He didn't want anybody to exercise authority over his children.

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He wanted to exercise the authority, and he did.

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He was always speaking in terms of Marcus Garvey's way of thinking and trying to get black people to organize themselves,

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not to cause any trouble, but just to do, to work in unity with each other

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toward improving their conditions.

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But in those days if you did that, you were still considered a troublemaker.

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In the 1920's Marcus Garvey,

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a black nationalist, preached that black Americans should build a nation independent of white society.

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With membership in the hundreds of thousands, Garvey's Universal Negro Improvement Association sought closer ties with African countries.

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The UNIA had its own flag, its own national anthem and an African legion pledged to defend black people at home and abroad.

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The U.S. Bureau of Investigation labeled Garvey, "one of the prominent Negro agitators."

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The federal government deported him in 1927, but Malcolm's parents remained Garveyites.

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Earl recruited new members.

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Louise wrote for the Garvey newspaper.

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My mother is the one who would read to us the Garvey paper, which was called The Negro World.

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and she also would talk to us about ourselves as being independent.

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We shouldn't be calling ourself "Negroes," or "niggers" and that we were black people

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and that we should be proud to call ourself black people.

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What is your real name?

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Malcolm. Malcolm X.

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Is that your legal name?

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As far as I'm concerned, it's my legal name.

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Would you mind telling me what your father's last name was?

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My father didn't know his last name.

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My father got his last name from his grandfather and his grandfather got it from his grandfather who got it from the slavemaster.

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The real names of our people were destroyed

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Well, was there any

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during slavery.

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Was there any line, any point in the genealogy of your family when you did have to use a last name and if so, what was it?

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The last name of my forefathers

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Yes?

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was taken from them when they were brought to America and made slaves,

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and then the name of the slavemaster was given, which we refuse, we reject that name today and refuse to

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You mean, you won't even tell me what your father's supposed last name was or gifted last name was?

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I never acknowledge it whatsoever.

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September 1931

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Malcolm was six years old when his mother had a premonition.

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We were all at the house and we had dinner, supper together.

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And my mother was holding Wesley, who was my youngest brother.

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And she may have been nursing him, 'cause she was at the table, and she fell asleep,

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nursing, holding the baby.

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And my father had gotten up and went in the bedroom to clean up and to go down and collect money.

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And she woke up and she said, "Earl, Earl, don't go downtown."

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She says, "If you go, you won't come back."

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That night around 11 o'clock, Earl Little was found in an isolated area outside Lansing,

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his body almost cut in two by the wheels of a streetcar.

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The police reported Earl Little's death an accident.

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There was a cloud over that whole issue because, at the time,

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it was perceived that rather than an accident with a streetcar that Earl Little had really been pushed under the wheels of the streetcar.

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As a matter of fact,

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I remember hearing just that language,

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that he was probably pushed under the wheels of that streetcar.

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And my father's death caused a great

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great shock in the family,

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because he was the power.

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He was the strength.

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We were organized,

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we were a structured family.

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When I'd get out of school,

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when we got out of school, me and my brothers and sisters,

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we'd come right home and go to work

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in the garden, clean up the chicken shed and get ready for the night,

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and get up in the morning and all this.

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We'd pump the water and bring it in the house and all this.

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This was while Dad was alive,

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because to not do this brought the consequences of a whipping.

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So we were disciplined.

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And then after my father got killed

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and my mother's inability to run as fast as I could run or Malcolm

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enabled us to get away with a lot of things

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we wouldn't have tried to get away with.

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So we got looser and looser.

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Louise Little struggled to raise her seven children through the years of the Great Depression.

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She's reduced to where she has no income.

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She'd try to get -- she got jobs.

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She was a proud lady.

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She had a lot of pride.

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She sold. She crocheted gloves for people.

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She did a lot of things not to be dependent solely on welfare.

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She didn't like them telling her what she could do and what she couldn't do.

232
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And this is one of the main things that devastated her more than anything else.

233
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As time went by, you could see she was wearing down.

234
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[music]

235
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For seven years, as Malcolm grew into adolescence,

236
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his mother slowly withdrew from her family.

237
00:18:35,109 --> 00:18:38,619
Two days before Christmas, 1938,

238
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Louise Little was diagnosed as paranoid and was sent to Kalamazoo State Hospital.

239
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And when I came home from school one day and she wasn't there,

240
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I can remember being empty 'cause my mother had never left us.

241
00:18:58,304 --> 00:19:01,472
And I felt, you know, the pain of her being gone every day,

242
00:19:01,472 --> 00:19:04,208
and it was only going to be a couple of weeks,

243
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you know.

244
00:19:05,187 --> 00:19:08,393
She was going to get better and come right back home.

245
00:19:08,393 --> 00:19:12,848
And it turned into years.

246
00:19:12,848 --> 00:19:20,830
Louise Little would remain at Kalamazoo for the next 26 years.

247
00:19:20,830 --> 00:19:25,620
The 13-year-old Malcolm watched as the court split up his family,

248
00:19:25,620 --> 00:19:29,888
assigning the younger children to foster homes in Lansing

249
00:19:29,888 --> 00:19:38,257
and sending him to a white community 10 miles away.

250
00:19:38,257 --> 00:19:39,838
In the past,

251
00:19:39,838 --> 00:19:45,140
the greatest weapon the white man has had has been his ability to divide and conquer.

252
00:19:45,140 --> 00:19:49,617
If I take my hand and slap you,

253
00:19:49,617 --> 00:19:51,068
you don't even feel it.

254
00:19:51,068 --> 00:19:55,991
It might sting you because these digits are separated.

255
00:19:55,991 --> 00:20:03,662
But all I have to do to put you back in your place is bring those digits together.

256
00:20:03,662 --> 00:20:08,128
He was a man who, in the eighth grade in Michigan

257
00:20:08,128 --> 00:20:12,892
a school where I think he was the only black in his class and one of the very few in the school

258
00:20:12,892 --> 00:20:16,625
had been an outstanding straight-A student,

259
00:20:16,625 --> 00:20:17,181
you know,

260
00:20:17,181 --> 00:20:19,599
who had been in fact the president of his class,

261
00:20:19,599 --> 00:20:22,405
and all the others were white in the eighth grade.

262
00:20:22,405 --> 00:20:26,194
Obviously, he had to be exceptional to be those things.

263
00:20:26,194 --> 00:20:33,159
And then you had the Malcolm who had left school and who had gone to Roxbury, Massachusetts

264
00:20:33,159 --> 00:20:39,480
where he had gotten his first exposure to what might loosely be called "hustling."

265
00:20:39,480 --> 00:21:04,562
[music]

266
00:21:04,562 --> 00:21:09,466
I called myself little hustler up in Roxbury in those days.

267
00:21:09,466 --> 00:21:11,685
And this particular day, you know,

268
00:21:11,685 --> 00:21:17,202
Malcolm X had come into Boston and he had on his zoot suit with the wide-brim hat

269
00:21:17,202 --> 00:21:21,983
with the long, three-quarter-length coat with the chain that went down to your ankles.

270
00:21:21,983 --> 00:21:31,864
I don't know, the last time I recall, Cab Callowy used that outfit for his stage uniform.

271
00:21:31,864 --> 00:21:33,676
Now, when Malcolm left Lansing,

272
00:21:33,676 --> 00:21:36,186
he had nothing but a old square suit on

273
00:21:36,186 --> 00:21:37,069
"white man's suit,"

274
00:21:37,069 --> 00:21:38,865
as I call it.

275
00:21:38,865 --> 00:21:41,168
When he came back from Boston, oh Lord,

276
00:21:41,168 --> 00:21:44,567
Malcolm had a zoot suit on and a wide-brim hat

277
00:21:44,567 --> 00:21:47,065
and a chain from his hat down onto his lapel

278
00:21:47,065 --> 00:21:49,666
and he was the talk of the town.

279
00:21:49,666 --> 00:21:53,402
Everybody was talking about Malcolm.

280
00:21:53,402 --> 00:21:57,647
[music]

281
00:21:57,647 --> 00:22:01,226
And then when he was dancing on the floor and he was floating around,

282
00:22:01,226 --> 00:22:04,094
those pants were like he was a floating balloon,

283
00:22:04,094 --> 00:22:07,006
with -- that coat was like a wing.

284
00:22:07,006 --> 00:22:11,762
The way he'd be dancing and flying around with the big, 10-gallon hat on and the chain flinging.

285
00:22:11,762 --> 00:22:11,763
And this used to really shake up the girls.

286
00:22:11,763 --> 00:22:11,763
[music and singing]

287
00:22:28,634 --> 00:22:29,815
In Boston, they called him "New York Red.

288
00:22:29,815 --> 00:22:31,856
In New York, they called him "Detroit Red."

289
00:22:31,856 --> 00:22:34,512
He had his hair crockonoed, "conked," you know.

290
00:22:34,512 --> 00:22:38,334
It was red and he had pictures of him and Billie Holiday

291
00:22:38,334 --> 00:22:46,367
and all these people at the time out there who were just being made known to the rest of the black world.

292
00:22:46,367 --> 00:22:54,704
Malcolm worked the kitchen crew on the New Haven Railroad between Boston, New York, and Washington, D.C.

293
00:22:54,704 --> 00:23:06,228
In 1942, he moved to Harlem and at age 17 began traveling in a world of after-hour clubs and small-time hustlers.

294
00:23:06,228 --> 00:23:08,522
He reached a point where he said,

295
00:23:08,522 --> 00:23:15,815
"You'll never make it on these janitor jobs and selling sandwiches on these trains and shining shoes and stuff like that."

296
00:23:15,815 --> 00:23:18,176
He says, "You never will get anywhere."

297
00:23:18,176 --> 00:23:22,878
Well, he had the reputation as being a hustler and he was a street person,

298
00:23:22,878 --> 00:23:25,012
but he wasn't a hustler.

299
00:23:25,012 --> 00:23:28,070
He was a con man, yeah, a con artist.

300
00:23:28,070 --> 00:23:30,741
They called him an artist.

301
00:23:30,741 --> 00:23:34,109
When the white folks came out at night and they wanted black women,

302
00:23:34,109 --> 00:23:35,463
he could arrange for them to get them.

303
00:23:35,463 --> 00:23:38,087
If they wanted bootleg whiskey, he knew where to get it.

304
00:23:38,087 --> 00:23:41,089
If they wanted drugs, he knew where to get it.

305
00:23:41,089 --> 00:23:45,954
He made it possible that he knew what they wanted and he knew where to get it

306
00:23:45,954 --> 00:23:49,423
and he would be in the middle where he could make a profit off of it.

307
00:23:49,423 --> 00:23:53,124
And this is the way he started doing.

308
00:23:53,124 --> 00:23:54,621
Looking back at that time,

309
00:23:54,621 --> 00:23:57,794
Malcolm said only three things worried him

310
00:23:57,794 --> 00:24:02,863
jail, a job and the Army.

311
00:24:02,863 --> 00:24:04,724
To avoid serving in World War II,

312
00:24:04,724 --> 00:24:10,840
he told his draft board that he wanted to organize black soldiers to kill whites.

313
00:24:10,840 --> 00:24:17,939
He was judged unfit for the military.

314
00:24:17,939 --> 00:24:22,117
Malcolm's gambling and drugs and Harlem nightlife were expensive.

315
00:24:22,117 --> 00:24:26,560
He had already been arrested twice for petty crimes.

316
00:24:26,560 --> 00:24:29,589
When he moved back to Boston in 1945,

317
00:24:29,589 --> 00:24:34,368
he organized a gang to burglarize homes of prominent families.

318
00:24:34,368 --> 00:24:37,969
The other gang members included his friend Malcolm Jarvis,

319
00:24:37,969 --> 00:24:42,848
his white girlfriend, Bea, and two other white women.

320
00:24:42,848 --> 00:24:47,204
This girl knew that these people were down in Florida at that time of the year,

321
00:24:47,204 --> 00:24:48,086
there was nobody home,

322
00:24:48,086 --> 00:24:52,649
so we broke into the house and we'd get some of their valuables and Malcolm would

323
00:24:52,649 --> 00:24:54,929
take most of the stuff and pawn it and get money

324
00:24:54,929 --> 00:24:56,589
for his gambling habit.

325
00:24:56,589 --> 00:25:00,000
After two weeks of doing this,

326
00:25:00,000 --> 00:25:02,443
that's when the ??? when he made the mistake

327
00:25:02,443 --> 00:25:07,112
of going to the pawn shop to retrieve a watch worth over a thousand dollars that came out of

328
00:25:07,112 --> 00:25:13,170
one of the houses and that's when he was arrested by three policemen.

329
00:25:13,170 --> 00:25:19,034
Malcolm Little, Malcolm Jarvis and the three women were charged with breaking and entering.

330
00:25:19,034 --> 00:25:22,189
The fact that two black men were with white women became

331
00:25:22,189 --> 00:25:25,107
an issue in the court.

332
00:25:25,107 --> 00:25:32,351
Malcolm was definitely involved with two white women and this is what made the case so powerful.

333
00:25:32,351 --> 00:25:36,007
So outrageous.

334
00:25:36,007 --> 00:25:42,396
The women testified that Malcolm had forced them to participate in the burglaries.

335
00:25:42,396 --> 00:25:49,519
The two men received a maximum sentence: eight to ten years in state prison.

336
00:25:49,519 --> 00:25:53,694
When they sentenced us, I went out of my mind.

337
00:25:53,694 --> 00:25:58,140
I reached up and grabbed the bars of the cage and I shook them, almost shook them right up off the floor

338
00:25:58,140 --> 00:26:00,161
and I hollered at the judge and I said to him,

339
00:26:00,161 --> 00:26:03,675
"you might as well kill me as to give me ten years in jail."

340
00:26:03,675 --> 00:26:09,100
Well, I was what you call a mad negro, I was one.

341
00:26:09,100 --> 00:26:11,307
And I knew what I saw was real.

342
00:26:11,307 --> 00:26:12,895
???

343
00:26:12,895 --> 00:26:22,947
I knew that when they laughed all together, they were laughing, look what we did, we doing it to the negro.

344
00:26:22,947 --> 00:26:30,138
Then they had the unintimidated gall to ask the girls before they took them out of there to press charges

345
00:26:30,138 --> 00:26:36,421
against us for rape. The girls wouldn't do it.

346
00:26:36,421 --> 00:26:41,654
Malcolm Little was twenty years old, facing eight to ten years in state prison.

347
00:26:41,654 --> 00:26:47,324
He had wandered far from the Garvey pride and independence his parents had preached.

348
00:26:47,324 --> 00:26:56,346
He was now prisoner number 22843.

349
00:26:56,346 --> 00:27:01,696
To have once been a criminal is no disgrace.

350
00:27:01,696 --> 00:27:05,816
To remain a criminal is the disgrace.

351
00:27:05,816 --> 00:27:10,333
I formerly was a criminal. I formerly was in prison.

352
00:27:10,333 --> 00:27:15,243
I'm not ashamed of that. You never can use that over my head,

353
00:27:15,243 --> 00:27:19,423
and he's using the wrong stick. I don't feel that stick.

354
00:27:19,423 --> 00:27:26,560
[cheering and applause]

355
00:27:26,560 --> 00:27:32,129
They charged Jesus with sedition. Didn't they do that?

356
00:27:32,129 --> 00:27:40,864
They said he was against Caesar. They said he was discriminating because he told his disciples

357
00:27:40,864 --> 00:27:49,453
"go not the way of the gentiles, but rather go to the lost sheep. Go to the people who don't know who they are,

358
00:27:49,453 --> 00:27:55,220
who are lost from the knowledge of themselves and who are strangers in a land that is not theirs. Go to those people. Go

359
00:27:55,220 --> 00:28:04,843
to the slaves. Go to the second-class citizens. Go to the ones who are suffering the brunt of Caesar's brutality."

360
00:28:04,843 --> 00:28:11,725
And if Jesus were here in America today, he wouldn't be going to the white man. The white man is the oppressor.

361
00:28:11,725 --> 00:28:17,449
He would be going to the oppressed. He would be going to the humble. He would be going to the lowly.

362
00:28:17,449 --> 00:28:20,473
He would be going to the rejected and the despised.

363
00:28:20,473 --> 00:28:35,042
He would be going to the so-called American negro.

364
00:28:35,042 --> 00:28:43,170
Behind prison walls, Malcolm hustled bets, fed his drug habit and argued against the existence of God.

365
00:28:43,170 --> 00:28:47,138
The men in the cellblock called him Satan.

366
00:28:47,138 --> 00:28:56,405
But at the same time, encouraged by an older black inmate, Malcolm began reading and taking English courses.

367
00:28:56,405 --> 00:29:06,945
Malcolm described vividly prison life that he was in effect lonely and limited, but had plans for

368
00:29:06,945 --> 00:29:12,654
he was going to do a lot of reading and he certainly

369
00:29:12,654 --> 00:29:14,426
did a lot of writing.

370
00:29:14,426 --> 00:29:20,799
Because I think there were times when he probably wrote to me every week.

371
00:29:20,799 --> 00:29:26,051
During the second year in prison, his brothers and sisters wrote to him about what they called

372
00:29:26,051 --> 00:29:29,330
the natural religion for the black man,

373
00:29:29,330 --> 00:29:35,808
a religion that taught that black people were the original people, that God was black and

374
00:29:35,808 --> 00:29:38,596
was called Allah.

375
00:29:38,596 --> 00:29:43,432
They told Malcolm they were now a part of the Nation of Islam, followers of the honorable

376
00:29:43,432 --> 00:29:49,172
Elijah Mohammad, the messenger of Allah.

377
00:29:49,172 --> 00:29:58,522
I think Islam is one of the greatest religions of all time for our people in America. The so-called American

378
00:29:58,522 --> 00:30:12,679
negro have to be completely reeducated and Islam gives them that qualification, that he can feel proud and

379
00:30:12,679 --> 00:30:18,749
does not feel ashamed to be called a black man.

380
00:30:18,749 --> 00:30:25,953
I came into the Muslim movement in 1947 and, um

381
00:30:25,953 --> 00:30:29,787
then started bringing my brothers and sisters in.

382
00:30:29,787 --> 00:30:34,974
When we already had been indoctrinated with Marcus Garvey's philosophy, so they didn't

383
00:30:34,974 --> 00:30:39,043
have anything to do with convincing us that we were black

384
00:30:39,043 --> 00:30:40,621
and should be proud.

385
00:30:40,621 --> 00:30:43,987
We were already that when we came in.

386
00:30:43,987 --> 00:30:47,373
So I wrote to Malcolm and told him about...

387
00:30:47,373 --> 00:30:54,109
I said to him if he would believe in Allah that he would get out of prison. And that's all I wrote because I know

388
00:30:54,109 --> 00:31:01,061
he had very low tolerance for religion and I didn't intend to lose that tolerance.

389
00:31:01,061 --> 00:31:05,752
Malcolm's brothers and sisters wrote the young prisoner that black people in America

390
00:31:05,752 --> 00:31:11,545
were part of a lost tribe, soon to be delivered out of bondage.

391
00:31:11,545 --> 00:31:17,888
And that whites, according to Elijah Mohammad, were a race of devils whose domination on Earth was

392
00:31:17,888 --> 00:31:21,371
about to end.

393
00:31:21,371 --> 00:31:27,778
At first, he liked every bit of it, except one thing he couldn't understand and that was the part they were teaching

394
00:31:27,778 --> 00:31:31,258
about the white man being the devil.

395
00:31:31,258 --> 00:31:33,874
Malcolm wrote to Elijah Mohammad. Elijah Mohammad

396
00:31:33,874 --> 00:31:38,692
answered and when he answered, he would cite a portion of scripture.

397
00:31:38,692 --> 00:31:46,984
And then he gave him the key. He said the key... the Bible is the book that everything that takes place in that Bible

398
00:31:46,984 --> 00:31:48,392
is on this Earth.

399
00:31:48,392 --> 00:31:53,875
So you don't have to die to go to hell, you can catch hell while you're living. And the white man is the one that's

400
00:31:53,875 --> 00:32:01,359
putting that hell on you. Well, that's a very convincing teaching, especially when you're using the white

401
00:32:01,359 --> 00:32:05,383
man's history to corroborate this.

402
00:32:05,383 --> 00:32:13,663
Malcolm began reading history, philosophy and religion. The writings of W.E.B Du Bois,

403
00:32:13,663 --> 00:32:21,889
Shakespeare, Socrates, the fables of Aesop, the lives of Gandhi and Nat Turner.

404
00:32:21,889 --> 00:32:29,609
And he finds all this history of how white Christians lynched black Christians, white Christians were the ones who were

405
00:32:29,609 --> 00:32:33,499
involved in the slave trade -- those were Christians.

406
00:32:33,499 --> 00:32:40,123
So Malcolm began to see this and then he began to study it himself and prove that if there is such a thing as a real devil

407
00:32:40,123 --> 00:32:50,200
on this earth, it has to be the white man.

408
00:32:50,200 --> 00:33:00,324
Elijah Mohammad told Malcolm to submit to Allah. But for Malcolm, submission would always be difficult.

409
00:33:00,324 --> 00:33:11,387
It took a week before he could force himself to bow in prayer.

410
00:33:11,387 --> 00:33:17,629
Later, to help spread the teachings of Elijah Mohammad, Malcolm joined the prison debate team, competing

411
00:33:17,629 --> 00:33:22,846
against visiting college teams from Harvard and MIT.

412
00:33:22,846 --> 00:33:25,910
That's when Malcolm's name and fame started spreading

413
00:33:25,910 --> 00:33:28,664
amongst the prison population. And that's when the

414
00:33:28,664 --> 00:33:31,905
population started to grow at the debating classes. Most of

415
00:33:31,905 --> 00:33:36,330
the fellows used to come over out of curiosity just to hear him speak.

416
00:33:36,330 --> 00:33:43,810
In 1950, Malcolm wrote to the governor demanding the right to practice the Muslim religion in prison.

417
00:33:43,810 --> 00:33:53,458
His letters would later end up in FBI files. The Bureau had been keeping a close watch on the nation of Islam since

418
00:33:53,458 --> 00:34:02,554
the late 1930s. Malcolm, considered a troublemaker, was denied an early parole.

419
00:34:02,554 --> 00:34:09,667
He was not eligible to be let out at that time because he'd be a threat to society.

420
00:34:09,667 --> 00:34:16,810
They considered him dangerous, knowledge-wise and otherwise, religious-wise. He would've been like a

421
00:34:16,810 --> 00:34:22,600
rotten apple in the barrel of a thousand. He was gonna spoil many.

422
00:34:22,600 --> 00:34:33,250
On August 7, 1952, after six and a half years in prison, Malcolm was released. Within a month, he was accepted into

423
00:34:33,250 --> 00:34:41,781
the Nation of Islam. Malcolm Little had become Malcolm X.

424
00:34:41,781 --> 00:34:45,265
How did you happen to join the Muslim movement?

425
00:34:45,265 --> 00:34:54,536
I was in prison. I was a very wayward criminal, backward, illiterate, uneducated, whatever other negative characteristics you can think of...

426
00:34:54,536 --> 00:35:01,121
type of person until I heard the teachings of the honorable Elijah Mohammad. And because of the impact that it had

427
00:35:01,121 --> 00:35:08,334
upon me in giving me a desire to reform myself and rehabilitate myself for the first time in my life. And also being

428
00:35:08,334 --> 00:35:15,440
able to see the effect that it had upon others, this is what made me accept it. And I noticed that after being exposed to

429
00:35:15,440 --> 00:35:21,363
the religious teachings of the honorable Elijah Mohammad, immediately, it instilled within me such a high degree of racial

430
00:35:21,363 --> 00:35:28,250
pride and racial dignity that I wanted to be somebody and I realized that I couldn't be anybody by begging the white man

431
00:35:28,250 --> 00:35:35,328
for what he had, but that I had to get out here and try and do something for myself or make something out of myself.

432
00:35:35,328 --> 00:35:47,570
The first time I recall seeing Malcolm was at the home of my father, Elijah Mohammad. I saw a thin man, tall man, young

433
00:35:47,570 --> 00:35:54,574
man, reddish face. If he was just meeting you, the first thing you would get from him is a smile.

434
00:35:54,574 --> 00:35:58,000
He said "this is Wallace" and I smiled

435
00:35:58,000 --> 00:36:05,262
at him, I was happy to see him because I had heard about him too and he said the messenger's son, the messenger's son.

436
00:36:05,262 --> 00:36:12,009
And he was just so excited about the messenger, really, it wasn't just seeing Wallace. It was seeing the

437
00:36:12,009 --> 00:36:14,584
messenger's son.

438
00:36:14,584 --> 00:36:20,067
When Malcolm came out, he was full of fire. He had gotten so full of fire that he got out at the right time and the right

439
00:36:20,067 --> 00:36:28,442
place so he could expound. He came to Detroit, he was surprised to find there were such few people in this powerful teaching in his mind.

440
00:36:28,442 --> 00:36:34,742
And he says, "I'm surprised that you are sitting here and so many empty seats." He said "every time you come out here,"

441
00:36:34,742 --> 00:36:37,152
he said "this place should be full."

442
00:36:37,152 --> 00:36:40,706
And that excited the honorable Elijah Mohammad.

443
00:36:40,706 --> 00:36:48,490
In the early 1950s, the Nation of Islam was unknown in most black communities. Total membership was believed to be

444
00:36:48,490 --> 00:36:51,373
no more than four hundred people.

445
00:36:51,373 --> 00:36:56,144
Malcolm was sent on the road to spread the message.

446
00:36:56,144 --> 00:37:04,685
Within two years, he helped organize temples in Boston, Hartford and Philadelphia.

447
00:37:04,685 --> 00:37:11,223
Elijah Mohammad then named Malcolm minister of the most important temple on the East Coast,

448
00:37:11,223 --> 00:37:15,430
Harlem's temple number seven.

449
00:37:15,430 --> 00:37:18,805
Mr. Mohammad knew that Malcolm had the experience and

450
00:37:18,805 --> 00:37:23,742
he knew New York and he also knew that he was the kind

451
00:37:23,742 --> 00:37:33,103
of man, complexion, height, speech and carriage, all has to be taken into consideration when you select a man

452
00:37:33,103 --> 00:37:37,862
to send before the people. Plus, this is an international city.

453
00:37:37,862 --> 00:37:42,037
You got to have your best in New York and this is why

454
00:37:42,037 --> 00:37:46,872
Mr. Mohammad selected him.

455
00:37:46,872 --> 00:37:50,062
[soft applause]

456
00:37:50,062 --> 00:37:56,507
In 1955, when Elijah Mohammad visited the New York temple, it was to inspect the work of the

457
00:37:56,507 --> 00:38:09,033
ambitious and outspoken young minister who had transformed tiny storefronts along the East Coast into a congregation of thousands.

458
00:38:09,033 --> 00:38:19,131
Malcolm X and Elijah Mohammad's message made a whole lot of people feel whole again, human being again,

459
00:38:19,131 --> 00:38:24,005
some of them came out and found a new meaning to their

460
00:38:24,005 --> 00:38:28,174
manhood and their womanhood. Had Elijah Mohammad

461
00:38:28,174 --> 00:38:40,536
tried to introduce an orthodox form of Arab-oriented Islam, I doubt if he would have attracted five hundred people.

462
00:38:40,536 --> 00:38:52,090
But he introduced a form of Islam that could communicate with the people he had to deal with.

463
00:38:52,090 --> 00:39:01,330
He was the king to those who had no king and he was the messiah to those some people thought unworthy

464
00:39:01,330 --> 00:39:07,639
of a messiah.

465
00:39:07,639 --> 00:39:14,318
The teachings of ??? honorable Elijah Mohammad is like nothing I have ever taken, it's a medicine.

466
00:39:14,318 --> 00:39:15,301
Right, that's right.

467
00:39:15,301 --> 00:39:18,261
You're seeing the medicine that has cured me of all my ills.

468
00:39:18,261 --> 00:39:19,046
That's right.

469
00:39:19,046 --> 00:39:21,253
'Cause I was a sick man.

470
00:39:21,253 --> 00:39:25,649
And when I embraced the teachings of the honorable Elijah Mohammad, these teachings cured me of these ills.

471
00:39:25,649 --> 00:39:28,102
I'm a well man now. And I feel good.

472
00:39:28,102 --> 00:39:32,213
That's right, as long as you stay with the doctor, you'll continue to feel good.

473
00:39:32,213 --> 00:39:34,328
Yes sir.

474
00:39:34,328 --> 00:39:36,295
What about you, brother? How do you feel about the honorable Elijah Mohammad?

475
00:39:36,295 --> 00:39:44,496
Honorable Elijah Mohammad is trying to teach all our original people they are in bad shape. Honorable Elijah

476
00:39:44,496 --> 00:39:46,801
Mohammad trying to wake 'em up.

477
00:39:46,801 --> 00:39:50,123
[music]

478
00:39:50,123 --> 00:39:54,021
Inside Muslim temples, no white people were allowed.

479
00:39:54,021 --> 00:40:06,668
Members worked to build a self-sufficient community founded on strict rules and absolute obedience.

480
00:40:06,668 --> 00:40:14,412
The Nation set up Muslim schools for its children, teaching mathematics, science, history and Arabic.

481
00:40:14,412 --> 00:40:20,773
[all in chorus] We're the original man. The original man is the ??? black man.

482
00:40:20,773 --> 00:40:27,796
[indistinct] on the Planet Earth.

483
00:40:27,796 --> 00:40:34,872
Muslim women studied nutrition, child-rearing and guidelines on how to care for their husbands.

484
00:40:34,872 --> 00:40:46,309
Muslim men studied parental responsibility, history and religion.

485
00:40:46,309 --> 00:40:54,028
The elite corps, called the Fruit of Islam, was trained in hand-to-hand combat and was expected to protect

486
00:40:54,028 --> 00:41:01,893
the temples and to punish any members who spoke out against the messenger.

487
00:41:01,893 --> 00:41:08,072
I was surprised when I went into some... a couple of the Muslim families. The faith that they had

488
00:41:08,072 --> 00:41:17,591
in Elijah Mohammad and in Malcolm... I asked one father, I said, "suppose your son came home one day and told you

489
00:41:17,591 --> 00:41:20,612
that he was renouncing the Muslim religion?"

490
00:41:20,612 --> 00:41:25,823
And he said "I would turn him from my door. I would never allow him in again."

491
00:41:25,823 --> 00:41:30,982
So I asked Malcolm about that. He says, "he meant it. And he would do it."

492
00:41:30,982 --> 00:41:35,401
I says, "not worry about what happened to his son?"

493
00:41:35,401 --> 00:41:43,835
"No, he wouldn't worry about what happened to him. His allegiance is with Elijah Mohammad."

494
00:41:43,835 --> 00:41:51,191
To help expand the Nation of Islam, Malcolm created a newspaper, Muhammad Speaks,

495
00:41:51,191 --> 00:41:56,453
and persuaded other black newspapers to carry the messenger's weekly column.

496
00:41:56,453 --> 00:42:04,233
His strength was, once he believed in a thing, he would give everything he had to it, all of his energies.

497
00:42:04,233 --> 00:42:06,976
He'd work, he would become a workaholic.

498
00:42:06,976 --> 00:42:09,127
He worked day and night for it.

499
00:42:09,127 --> 00:42:16,147
He only required around four hours' sleep and many times wouldn't get that. And you just kind of wonder

500
00:42:16,147 --> 00:42:19,631
how can anybody keep up that kind of a pace? But he did it,

501
00:42:19,631 --> 00:42:27,343
day in and day out. Plus on top of that, he's reading. He's reading papers, keeping up what the news is,

502
00:42:27,343 --> 00:42:34,289
he's just a person that's tuned into life in such a way that

503
00:42:34,289 --> 00:42:38,988
he doesn't miss too much of it.

504
00:42:38,988 --> 00:42:46,478
At age 32, after devoting five years to building the Nation, he sought the approval of Elijah Mohammad to marry

505
00:42:46,478 --> 00:42:53,282
sister Betty X, a college-educated member of Harlem's temple number seven.

506
00:42:53,282 --> 00:43:02,889
In the years that followed, the demands of his ministry allowed little time for his growing family.

507
00:43:02,889 --> 00:43:14,438
He sometimes, if I could catch him, would have to read to the children. They would always want the story read again

508
00:43:14,438 --> 00:43:21,289
so that they would really just wait until he was on the last page and say "read it again."

509
00:43:21,289 --> 00:43:29,169
"Read it again, read it again," you know, and so that he started giving the books different endings.

510
00:43:29,169 --> 00:43:38,276
He had a beautiful sense of humor, especially when he was kidding me about pork and whacking me on the back

511
00:43:38,276 --> 00:43:48,586
and saying that "you're a decent human being, smart historian, I'm going to give you 99 as a human being and

512
00:43:48,586 --> 00:43:54,191
you stop eating pork I'm going to give you 100."

513
00:43:54,191 --> 00:44:02,371
Had a beautiful sense of humor, plus the fact that when you got to know him, he was kind of shy.

514
00:44:02,371 --> 00:44:07,135
[jazzy music]

515
00:44:07,135 --> 00:44:11,318
Malcolm was now in the Nation of Islam's inner circle,

516
00:44:11,318 --> 00:44:15,432
Elijah Muhammad's most visible representative.

517
00:44:15,432 --> 00:44:18,406
He had the Messenger's confidence, and the loyalty

518
00:44:18,406 --> 00:44:21,174
of thousands of Muslims.

519
00:44:21,174 --> 00:44:24,603
In a sense, Malcolm had found a father.

520
00:44:24,603 --> 00:44:30,485
Elijah Muhammad had found another son.

521
00:44:30,485 --> 00:44:33,752
[faint sirens]

522
00:44:33,752 --> 00:44:36,801
On an April night in 1957,

523
00:44:36,801 --> 00:44:40,761
a Muslim Brother was beaten by New York City police.

524
00:44:40,761 --> 00:44:45,099
His skull fractured, Johnson Hinton lay in a back room

525
00:44:45,099 --> 00:44:47,701
of a Harlem police station.

526
00:44:47,701 --> 00:44:50,436
When word spread that Hinton was dying,

527
00:44:50,436 --> 00:44:54,367
Malcolm ordered the Muslims into the streets.

528
00:44:54,367 --> 00:44:58,331
Other Harlem residents joined them.

529
00:44:58,331 --> 00:45:05,905
The community had endured a long history of police brutality;

530
00:45:05,905 --> 00:45:10,410
many considered the police an occupying force.

531
00:45:10,410 --> 00:45:16,480
28th Precinct was notorious for their prejudice.

532
00:45:16,480 --> 00:45:19,253
Naturally, when the people saw us come out there,

533
00:45:19,253 --> 00:45:23,689
that was the first time that anyone had marched

534
00:45:23,689 --> 00:45:26,255
on the 28th Precinct in protest of something

535
00:45:26,255 --> 00:45:28,724
that they felt that wasn't right.

536
00:45:28,724 --> 00:45:32,367
I don't know what would have happened in Harlem

537
00:45:32,367 --> 00:45:36,118
that night, because the atmosphere was not . . .

538
00:45:36,118 --> 00:45:39,788
It was, I think the word they use is "charged"?

539
00:45:39,788 --> 00:45:43,206
Well, this atmosphere was explosive.

540
00:45:43,206 --> 00:45:46,089
Malcolm demanded medical treatment for Hinton.

541
00:45:46,089 --> 00:45:49,167
After a long negotiation, police agreed

542
00:45:49,167 --> 00:45:52,786
to send the prisoner to Harlem Hospital.

543
00:45:52,786 --> 00:45:56,867
But even then, the Muslims refused to disperse.

544
00:45:56,867 --> 00:46:02,845
There's a sergeant - he came out and tried to chase the Muslims

545
00:46:02,845 --> 00:46:05,053
who were standing across the street.

546
00:46:05,053 --> 00:46:07,389
And Malcolm came out and told him, "You can't do that."

547
00:46:07,389 --> 00:46:09,874
He said, "They're not gonna move for you."

548
00:46:09,874 --> 00:46:12,768
Malcolm said: "I'll get rid of...I'll send them away".

549
00:46:12,768 --> 00:46:17,153
He went out to the front of the station on the first step and he just waived his hand

550
00:46:17,153 --> 00:46:21,492
and the people walked away.

551
00:46:21,492 --> 00:46:25,418
A police commissioner on the scene, remarked

552
00:46:25,418 --> 00:46:29,657
"That's too much power for one man to have!"

553
00:46:29,657 --> 00:46:38,514
Malcolm will later take New york City to court and win the largest police brutality settlement in the city's history.

554
00:46:38,514 --> 00:46:48,622
They realized that anytime a person could wave his hand and have a large number of people automatically move away

555
00:46:48,622 --> 00:46:53,662
without any conversation, that by the same token that the same man

556
00:46:53,662 --> 00:46:59,687
could wave his hand and those people to create some kind of disturbance if he wanted to.

557
00:46:59,687 --> 00:47:02,446
I believe from that point on the police department and

558
00:47:02,446 --> 00:47:06,828
and the political people in New York City began to realize

559
00:47:06,828 --> 00:47:11,735
they had a significant force in the city to deal with.

560
00:47:11,735 --> 00:47:19,774
Good evening, I'm Mike Wallace. Last week on Newsbeat,

561
00:47:19,774 --> 00:47:25,153
our 6:30 news program here on Channel 13, we presented a five-part series which we called

562
00:47:25,153 --> 00:47:30,298
"The Hate That Hate Produced," a study of the rise of black racism,

563
00:47:30,298 --> 00:47:36,166
of a call for black supremacy among a small but growing segment of the American Negro population.

564
00:47:36,166 --> 00:47:43,507
MALCOLM X: "We have come to hear and to see the greatest and the wisest and most..."

565
00:47:43,507 --> 00:47:50,580
This 1959 documentary was the first television portrayal of the internal activities of the Nation of Islam.

566
00:47:50,580 --> 00:47:53,986
Malcolm saw the television program as an opportunity.

567
00:47:53,986 --> 00:47:57,513
Elijah Muhammad was against it.

568
00:47:57,513 --> 00:48:01,563
Mr. Muhammad told Malcolm no, it wasn't going to do any good.

569
00:48:01,563 --> 00:48:04,215
All it would do is hurt us, in our work, in what we were trying to do.

570
00:48:04,215 --> 00:48:08,426
Malcolm wasn't satisfied.

571
00:48:08,426 --> 00:48:15,053
He didn't insist, but he continued to ask Mr. Muhammad

572
00:48:15,053 --> 00:48:20,963
could he do it. Mr. Muhammad reluctantly agreed.

573
00:48:20,963 --> 00:48:26,458
MALCOLM X: "I charge the white man with being the greatest liar on earth.

574
00:48:26,458 --> 00:48:30,271
I charge the white man, ladies and gentleman of the jury,

575
00:48:30,271 --> 00:48:32,931
with being the greatest murderer on the earth.

576
00:48:32,931 --> 00:48:37,116
I have charged the white man with being the greatest adulterer on earth."

577
00:48:37,116 --> 00:48:39,817
Here was the auditorium overflowing -

578
00:48:39,817 --> 00:48:42,999
thousands of people -- about an organization

579
00:48:42,999 --> 00:48:46,503
I knew nothing about?

580
00:48:46,503 --> 00:48:50,032
I found it difficult to credit when I saw it.

581
00:48:50,032 --> 00:48:52,225
And of course, when we put it on the air,

582
00:48:52,225 --> 00:48:58,297
New Yorkers -- 'cause that's all who saw it -we’re stunned that this...

583
00:48:58,297 --> 00:49:01,211
-- there was this organization, the Black Muslims, about which

584
00:49:01,211 --> 00:49:05,002
white New Yorkers simply knew nothing!

585
00:49:05,002 --> 00:49:08,966
Minister Malcolm X as he addressed a non-Muslim audience.

586
00:49:08,966 --> 00:49:18,923
MALCOLM X: "How could so few white people rule so many black people?

587
00:49:18,923 --> 00:49:21,436
This is the thing you should want to know.

588
00:49:21,436 --> 00:49:27,821
How could so few -- the white man today will tell you that thousands of years ago

589
00:49:27,821 --> 00:49:31,309
the black man in Africa was living in palaces,

590
00:49:31,309 --> 00:49:34,441
the black man was wearing silk,

591
00:49:34,441 --> 00:49:38,598
the black man in Africa was cooking and seasoning his food.

592
00:49:38,598 --> 00:49:42,500
The black man in Africa had mastered the arts and sciences.

593
00:49:42,500 --> 00:49:45,497
He knew the course of the stars in the universe

594
00:49:45,497 --> 00:49:49,515
before the man up in Europe knew that the earth wasn't flat.

595
00:49:49,515 --> 00:49:51,462
Is that right or wrong?"

596
00:49:51,462 --> 00:49:56,654
I was amazed at his capacity to communicate

597
00:49:56,654 --> 00:49:59,566
and at the naked honesty with which

598
00:49:59,566 --> 00:50:02,301
he expressed his feelings about black people, about white people.

599
00:50:02,301 --> 00:50:05,993
He scared me - I'm sure he intended to -

600
00:50:05,993 --> 00:50:10,203
but certainly after I saw him in "The Hate That Hate Produced",

601
00:50:10,203 --> 00:50:14,080
I know that- I knew that I would never forget this man.

602
00:50:14,080 --> 00:50:20,558
When I first saw Malcolm on a television, he scared me also.

603
00:50:20,558 --> 00:50:23,323
Immediately the family said, "Turn off that television.

604
00:50:23,323 --> 00:50:26,848
That man is saying stuff you ain't supposed to hear,"

605
00:50:26,848 --> 00:50:29,426
so of course we did!

606
00:50:29,426 --> 00:50:33,264
But always-- you know when the sun comes in the window

607
00:50:33,264 --> 00:50:37,924
and you kind of jump up to get it, to close the blinds or pull down the shade,

608
00:50:37,924 --> 00:50:41,003
but before you do that, the sun comes in?

609
00:50:41,003 --> 00:50:45,895
Well, before each time we'd turn the television off, a little sun came in.

610
00:50:45,895 --> 00:50:51,031
While the documentary helped bring in new converts,

611
00:50:51,031 --> 00:50:55,429
the racial views of the Nation of Islam shocked white America

612
00:50:55,429 --> 00:50:58,659
and many in the black community.

613
00:50:58,659 --> 00:51:09,725
Preaching of racial hatred and racial advantage and the bigotry involved is a bad thing whether it's colored or white.

614
00:51:09,725 --> 00:51:13,219
For years, the NAACP has been opposed

615
00:51:13,219 --> 00:51:17,707
to white extremists preaching hatred of Negro people

616
00:51:17,707 --> 00:51:21,584
and we are equally opposed to Negro extremists

617
00:51:21,584 --> 00:51:26,721
preaching against white people simply for the sake of whiteness.

618
00:51:26,721 --> 00:51:29,553
Most in the civil rights movement believed that

619
00:51:29,553 --> 00:51:34,972
integration was the way to solve America's racial problems,

620
00:51:34,972 --> 00:51:37,181
but Malcolm preached that black people

621
00:51:37,181 --> 00:51:42,626
were able to solve their own problems without the help of whites.

622
00:51:42,626 --> 00:51:49,448
At a time when black Americans began identifying with freedom movements in Africa and Latin America,

623
00:51:49,448 --> 00:51:55,675
Malcolm developed alliances with revolutionary leaders from around the world.

624
00:51:55,675 --> 00:52:03,821
He encouraged black Americans to see themselves not as a minority but as a part of a world majority.

625
00:52:03,821 --> 00:52:08,785
The rise of African nations

626
00:52:08,785 --> 00:52:18,316
concurrent with the spread of the Nation of Islam and the civil rights movement

627
00:52:18,316 --> 00:52:24,772
gave black America a burst of pride over and above

628
00:52:24,772 --> 00:52:32,293
anything they had had since the decline of the movement of Marcus Garvey.

629
00:53:03,628 --> 00:53:06,063
MALCOLM X: "They're passing the basket through the crowd

630
00:53:06,063 --> 00:53:09,878
and I think everybody standing here should put one dollar in that basket.

631
00:53:09,878 --> 00:53:12,041
Don't you think you should? Sure!

632
00:53:12,041 --> 00:53:14,374
These are freedom dollars, Brother!

633
00:53:14,374 --> 00:53:16,575
We're not asking you to give us some money to make us rich.

634
00:53:16,575 --> 00:53:24,032
We put our businesses-- the Honorable Elijah Muhammad has set up more businesses than any black man in America".

635
00:53:24,032 --> 00:53:27,290
The Nation of Islam, with its interlocking corporations

636
00:53:27,290 --> 00:53:32,444
was now reputed to be the largest black-owned business empire in the United States.

637
00:53:32,444 --> 00:53:38,537
The Nation of Islam, during the early '60s,

638
00:53:38,537 --> 00:53:42,731
was perhaps enjoying its best days.

639
00:53:42,731 --> 00:53:46,160
We were opening restaurants and grocery stores

640
00:53:46,160 --> 00:53:49,999
and seeing Muhammad SPEAKS paper compete with other black papers.

641
00:53:49,999 --> 00:53:54,314
We were seeing Malcolm on television kind of frequently.

642
00:53:54,314 --> 00:54:00,246
We were proud of him. In our opinion, he was doing an excellent job of representing

643
00:54:00,246 --> 00:54:04,066
the Honorable Elijah Muhammad and the Nation of Islam.

644
00:54:04,066 --> 00:54:06,802
We were seeing the Fruit of Islam now

645
00:54:06,802 --> 00:54:11,563
not just going through exercises in some small facilities,

646
00:54:11,563 --> 00:54:14,162
but we were seeing them in great numbers,

647
00:54:14,162 --> 00:54:21,815
hundreds of them on the streets of big cities like Chicago and New York and Los Angeles.

648
00:54:21,815 --> 00:54:29,774
My view of the Fruit of Islam was that these were the absolute baddest, cleanest brothers I had ever seen in my life.

649
00:54:29,774 --> 00:54:32,376
There was some bad blood, you know what I'm saying?

650
00:54:32,376 --> 00:54:38,383
I mean, you did not mess with the FOI! When they came out on the street, people would say, "Uh, er, yes, sir, uh-huh."

651
00:54:38,383 --> 00:54:43,365
The growing presence of the Fruit of Islam attracted police attention.

652
00:54:43,365 --> 00:54:48,348
There were increasing numbers of confrontations and arrests.

653
00:54:48,348 --> 00:54:53,831
Malcolm warned that members of the FOI would always obey the law,

654
00:54:53,831 --> 00:54:58,044
but would also defend themselves if attacked.

655
00:54:58,044 --> 00:55:05,695
In cities across America, police agencies were determined to contain the Black Muslims.

656
00:55:05,695 --> 00:55:13,564
It was only a matter of time before the two forces would again collide.

657
00:55:13,564 --> 00:55:19,766
Los Angeles, California

658
00:55:19,766 --> 00:55:31,077
On a spring night in 1962, another confrontation.

659
00:55:31,077 --> 00:55:37,292
It began as a stop-and-search of Muslim men delivering dry cleaning.

660
00:55:37,292 --> 00:55:42,937
It ended with a full police assault on the Muslim temple.

661
00:55:42,937 --> 00:55:49,839
This time eight men were shot, one police officer and seven Muslims.

662
00:55:49,839 --> 00:55:54,802
Temple secretary Ronald Stokes was dead at the scene.

663
00:55:54,802 --> 00:56:03,014
I arrived at the mosque in Los Angeles after the shooting took place,

664
00:56:03,014 --> 00:56:07,303
and there was great sadness amongst the people, you know...

665
00:56:07,303 --> 00:56:11,095
Malcolm was walking back and forth, shaking his head saying

666
00:56:11,095 --> 00:56:12,976
"They're going to pay for it, they're going to pay for it,

667
00:56:12,976 --> 00:56:16,584
they're going to pay for it, they're going to pay for it!"

668
00:56:16,584 --> 00:56:21,959
If anyone breaks into our temples, we were to defend the temple with our life.

669
00:56:21,959 --> 00:56:26,629
The temple is sacred and those brothers, they acted on what they were taught.

670
00:56:26,629 --> 00:56:33,606
And I'm sure that anyone seeing police break into a church would be outraged.

671
00:56:33,606 --> 00:56:35,102
Mayor SAM YORTY, Los Angeles:

672
00:56:35,102 --> 00:56:37,891
"This didn't come as a great surprise to us, the fact that

673
00:56:37,891 --> 00:56:45,027
they would resist our police officers and cause trouble because we have been watching this group for a long time

674
00:56:45,027 --> 00:56:50,940
and I think Chief Parker warned some time ago that we might have trouble with them."

675
00:56:50,940 --> 00:56:56,800
The Los Angeles Times reported the incident as a Muslim riot and "a wild gunfight",

676
00:56:56,800 --> 00:57:05,144
but it was never proven that any of the guns fired belonged to the Muslims.

677
00:57:05,144 --> 00:57:11,188
Malcolm called for churches and civil rights organizations to form a united front

678
00:57:11,188 --> 00:57:17,430
with the Muslims against police brutality.

679
00:57:17,430 --> 00:57:22,718
MALCOLM X: Let us remember that we are not brutalized because we are Baptists.

680
00:57:22,718 --> 00:57:25,733
We're not brutalized because we are Methodists.

681
00:57:25,733 --> 00:57:28,524
We're not brutalized because we're Muslims.

682
00:57:28,524 --> 00:57:31,963
We're not brutalized because we are Catholics.

683
00:57:31,963 --> 00:57:40,522
We're brutalized because we are black people in America."

684
00:57:40,522 --> 00:57:43,823
I'm telling you they came out of those cars

685
00:57:43,823 --> 00:57:47,383
and we have enough witnesses to hang them

686
00:57:47,383 --> 00:57:49,669
with their guns smoking.

687
00:57:49,669 --> 00:57:52,466
Chief Parker knows this, Mayor Yorty knows this

688
00:57:52,466 --> 00:57:56,336
and every police official in the city knows that!

689
00:57:56,336 --> 00:57:59,329
They didn't fire now warning shots in the air.

690
00:57:59,329 --> 00:58:10,522
They fired warning shots point-blank at innocent, unarmed defenseless Negroes.

691
00:58:10,522 --> 00:58:16,257
As I say two of the brothers were shot in the back.

692
00:58:16,257 --> 00:58:22,361
Another was shot in the shoulder.

693
00:58:22,361 --> 00:58:25,850
Another was shot- two of them were shot -

694
00:58:25,850 --> 00:58:32,334
excuse the expression -- through the penis.

695
00:58:32,334 --> 00:58:37,138
Let me tell you something and I'll tell you why you say

696
00:58:37,138 --> 00:58:40,153
we hate white people. We don't hate anybody.

697
00:58:40,153 --> 00:58:48,237
We love our people so much they think we hate the ones who are inflicting injustice against them."

698
00:58:48,237 --> 00:59:03,191
Patrolman Donald Weese, the officer who killed Ronald Stokes, testified

699
00:59:03,191 --> 00:59:10,602
that he knew Stokes was unarmed, but that Stokes had raised his hands in a menacing way.

700
00:59:10,602 --> 00:59:19,687
The all-white coroner's jury deliberated 23 minutes and found the death a justifiable homicide.

701
00:59:19,687 --> 00:59:24,918
Fourteen Muslims were then ordered to stand trial on assault charges.

702
00:59:24,918 --> 00:59:30,889
Eleven would be found guilty and sentenced to prison.

703
00:59:30,889 --> 00:59:33,782
We were people that said, "Never be the aggressor,

704
00:59:33,782 --> 00:59:38,691
but if someone attack you, we do not teach you to turn the other cheek."

705
00:59:38,691 --> 00:59:42,293
There were Muslims who were not from the East Coast,

706
00:59:42,293 --> 00:59:47,942
but from other parts of the country that was actually ready to go out there

707
00:59:47,942 --> 00:59:53,127
and kill those police officers,

708
00:59:53,127 --> 00:59:58,344
even though they may have been killed in the process of doing it.

709
00:59:58,344 --> 01:00:13,467
But that's how strong the attitude of Muslims was against those brothers just being shot like that.

710
01:00:13,467 --> 01:00:19,303
The conflict at the Los Angeles mosque brought to the surface

711
01:00:19,303 --> 01:00:24,405
the growing differences between Malcolm X and Elijah Muhammad.

712
01:00:24,405 --> 01:00:29,009
The Messenger insisted Allah would avenge Stokes' death,

713
01:00:29,009 --> 01:00:33,490
but Malcolm demanded justice in the courts.

714
01:00:33,490 --> 01:00:35,722
MALCOLM X: If it were possible for them to get a fair trial,

715
01:00:35,722 --> 01:00:38,250
there would be no necessity for trial at all.

716
01:00:38,250 --> 01:00:40,304
These are the victims of police bullets,

717
01:00:40,304 --> 01:00:43,196
and you don't take the victim in court as a criminal.

718
01:00:43,196 --> 01:00:45,624
You take the one shot the victim in court.

719
01:00:45,624 --> 01:00:49,986
And it is the police who should be on trial here in Los Angeles."

720
01:00:49,986 --> 01:00:54,859
Malcolm began to talk less and less about God was going to get rid of the Caucasians

721
01:00:54,859 --> 01:00:57,412
and he began to talk about how we was going to be able to

722
01:00:57,412 --> 01:01:01,039
bring them to justice and make them guilty and that,

723
01:01:01,039 --> 01:01:05,458
"They are guilty according to the law of the land," which was not our argument at all.

724
01:01:05,458 --> 01:01:08,963
Our argument was that we were a divine people and that we would be protected

725
01:01:08,963 --> 01:01:12,443
and finally delivered, put in the seat of authority by Allah.

726
01:01:12,443 --> 01:01:15,505
That was our teaching at that time!

727
01:01:15,505 --> 01:01:19,021
To avoid further confrontations with city authorities,

728
01:01:19,021 --> 01:01:24,129
Elijah Muhammad summoned Malcolm to a meeting at the Messenger's home.

729
01:01:24,129 --> 01:01:27,381
And Elijah Muhammad told him very definitely,

730
01:01:27,381 --> 01:01:33,287
"If you had reacted the way you should have reacted,

731
01:01:33,287 --> 01:01:39,937
if you had more faith in Allah, Ronald Stokes would be alive."

732
01:01:39,937 --> 01:01:41,378
And that was it.

733
01:01:41,378 --> 01:01:44,504
He really gave him enough upbraiding.

734
01:01:44,504 --> 01:01:48,082
And Malcolm said nothing about it, "Well, there was nothing we could do,"

735
01:01:48,082 --> 01:01:52,633
or anything of that sort. He just listened.

736
01:01:52,633 --> 01:01:55,417
Mr. Muhammad told him-- he said,

737
01:01:55,417 --> 01:01:57,557
"That's one man that we lost.

738
01:01:57,557 --> 01:02:00,808
I never did tell you that we weren't going to lose anyone,

739
01:02:00,808 --> 01:02:04,124
but that's the way it is when you're building a nation."

740
01:02:04,124 --> 01:02:10,785
He said, "They were wrong, but if I send my followers out there

741
01:02:10,785 --> 01:02:14,365
to do battle with those people in L.A.,

742
01:02:14,365 --> 01:02:17,393
either undercover or on top of the cover,

743
01:02:17,393 --> 01:02:21,656
they will get slaughtered, and I'm not going to do that."

744
01:02:21,656 --> 01:02:25,211
And Malcolm didn't like that.

745
01:02:25,211 --> 01:02:30,120
Malcolm had always said, "Muslims don't back down."

746
01:02:30,120 --> 01:02:35,677
In Harlem, he now had to explain what happened in Los Angeles.

747
01:02:35,677 --> 01:02:38,354
MALCOLM X: Ronald Stokes was not the least

748
01:02:38,354 --> 01:02:41,363
among the followers of the Honorable Elijah Muhammad,

749
01:02:41,363 --> 01:02:45,147
he was one of the highest. He was the secretary of our Los Angeles mosque,

750
01:02:45,147 --> 01:02:49,284
and as we explained in that rally on May, many of you thought

751
01:02:49,284 --> 01:02:54,501
we should go right on out then and make war on the white man.

752
01:02:54,501 --> 01:02:57,649
You wanted to do it yourself, didn't you?"

753
01:02:57,649 --> 01:02:58,801
AUDIENCE: Yes!

754
01:02:58,801 --> 01:02:59,998
MALCOLM X: Didn't you?

755
01:02:59,998 --> 01:03:00,923
AUDIENCE: Yes!

756
01:03:00,923 --> 01:03:02,122
MALCOLM X: You wanted some action then, didn't you?

757
01:03:02,122 --> 01:03:03,750
AUDIENCE: Yes!

758
01:03:03,750 --> 01:03:05,952
MALCOLM X: 'Cause you don't like the idea of white people shooting black people down, do you?

759
01:03:05,952 --> 01:03:07,121
AUDIENCE: No!

760
01:03:07,121 --> 01:03:08,898
MALCOLM X: And you're ready to do something about it, aren't you?

761
01:03:08,898 --> 01:03:09,871
AUDIENCE: Yes!

762
01:03:09,871 --> 01:03:14,331
MALCOLM X: We know you are, and the white man should be thankful that

763
01:03:14,331 --> 01:03:17,866
God has given the Honorable Elijah Muhammad the control over his followers

764
01:03:17,866 --> 01:03:20,867
that he has so that they can play it cool,

765
01:03:20,867 --> 01:03:26,638
calm and collected and leave it in the hands of God."

766
01:03:26,638 --> 01:03:30,970
In the months following the Los Angeles incident,

767
01:03:30,970 --> 01:03:34,071
Malcolm's faith in the Messenger was further tested

768
01:03:34,071 --> 01:03:40,199
by rumors about Elijah Muhammad's private life.

769
01:03:40,199 --> 01:03:44,763
Once a month, he would go to Chicago to take money to Elijah Muhammad,

770
01:03:44,763 --> 01:03:51,205
and he would always go to the side door.

771
01:03:51,205 --> 01:03:55,835
And this particular day,when he got to the side door,

772
01:03:55,835 --> 01:04:00,550
there were three young ladies where they were knocking and bamming on the door

773
01:04:00,550 --> 01:04:07,789
"Open the door, open the door. We need money for food. Our children don't have have this or that or the other."

774
01:04:07,789 --> 01:04:14,446
He immediately felt that, number one, he didn't belong there.

775
01:04:14,446 --> 01:04:17,604
Malcolm had long dismissed stories that Elijah Muhammad

776
01:04:17,604 --> 01:04:21,843
had fathered eight children with six of his secretaries.

777
01:04:21,843 --> 01:04:27,927
Now he approached the Messenger's son Wallace to confirm what he had seen.

778
01:04:27,927 --> 01:04:29,711
So I told him yes. I say,

779
01:04:29,711 --> 01:04:31,562
"I know of-- I know about that."

780
01:04:31,562 --> 01:04:35,032
I say, "You can see things, but you don't want to see it,

781
01:04:35,032 --> 01:04:37,436
so you just blot it out in your mind."

782
01:04:37,436 --> 01:04:42,833
I say, "I'm aware of secretaries having that kind of relationship with my father,

783
01:04:42,833 --> 01:04:44,369
being there with their children."

784
01:04:44,369 --> 01:04:47,915
I say, "I've seen him take their children and somewhere in my conscience

785
01:04:47,915 --> 01:04:51,342
I'm sure it was registering that that was his family,

786
01:04:51,342 --> 01:04:54,403
but I never accepted it to deal with it in my mind.

787
01:04:54,403 --> 01:04:58,647
Never did I accept to deal with it in my mind."

788
01:04:58,647 --> 01:05:06,840
Officials in the nation accused Wallace Muhammad of starting rumors and conspiring against his father.

789
01:05:06,840 --> 01:05:13,702
The charge that I gave Malcolm information on my father's domestic situation is true,

790
01:05:13,702 --> 01:05:19,568
but only after Malcolm had already told me that he witnessed that situation."

791
01:05:19,568 --> 01:05:25,589
MALCOLM X: It gives me great pleasure and an honor and a privilege at this time to introduce to you

792
01:05:25,589 --> 01:05:30,283
and present to you the Messenger of Allah, your and my beloved leader and teacher,

793
01:05:30,283 --> 01:05:33,104
the Most Honorable and Humble Elijah Muhammad."

794
01:05:33,104 --> 01:05:35,204
Malcolm had submitted himself to Elijah Muhammad

795
01:05:35,204 --> 01:05:43,294
as his spiritual leader and never tried to see anything else.

796
01:05:43,294 --> 01:05:46,905
And the things that he tried to put into practice himself

797
01:05:46,905 --> 01:05:52,309
he thought were being also being practiced by his leader.

798
01:05:52,309 --> 01:05:54,966
And when he found it differently,

799
01:05:54,966 --> 01:05:58,373
it just took all the wind out his sails."

800
01:05:58,373 --> 01:06:03,678
In public, the two men continued to embrace.

801
01:06:03,678 --> 01:06:07,543
In private, suspicion had replaced faith.

802
01:06:07,543 --> 01:06:13,772
Their relationship was further complicated by Elijah Muhammad's failing health.

803
01:06:13,772 --> 01:06:17,556
Malcolm's popularity naturally grew.

804
01:06:17,556 --> 01:06:21,129
Number one, Mr. Muhammad was sick, he had bronchitis,

805
01:06:21,129 --> 01:06:30,487
so Mr. Muhammad, he only went to large public meetings maybe once a year, twice a year.

806
01:06:30,487 --> 01:06:36,722
That was it. All the rest of the time, Malcolm was going everywhere.

807
01:06:36,722 --> 01:06:40,641
It was Malcolm who sparked the growth of the Nation all over the country.

808
01:06:40,641 --> 01:06:41,717
He was in demand.

809
01:06:41,717 --> 01:06:46,592
Nobody was asking for Elijah Muhammad to speak, they were asking for Malcolm to speak.

810
01:06:46,592 --> 01:06:51,574
And naturally, Malcolm got more involved with the civil rights struggle

811
01:06:51,574 --> 01:06:56,517
and his argument became more an argument that you would expect from someone

812
01:06:56,517 --> 01:07:05,195
who was in the civil rights struggle than you would for someone who was following the Honorable Elijah Muhammad.

813
01:07:05,195 --> 01:07:24,519
The '60s showed us the white man in the image that the Nation of Islam had cast him in,

814
01:07:24,519 --> 01:07:29,485
in the image of brutal person, you know, turning the dogs out on demonstrators,

815
01:07:29,485 --> 01:07:31,970
using the fire hoses.

816
01:07:31,970 --> 01:07:41,298
So all this helped the Nation of Islam's charge against the white race

817
01:07:41,298 --> 01:07:48,330
and made it possible for the Nation of Islam's spokesman, for the E.Muhammed's spokesman, Malcolm X,

818
01:07:48,330 --> 01:07:54,490
to get the press, to get the camera on him

819
01:07:54,490 --> 01:08:03,623
and to state what he had confidence in that was an alternative, and that was seperation.

820
01:08:03,623 --> 01:08:10,850
As Muslims, we believe that separation is the best way and the only sensible way,

821
01:08:10,850 --> 01:08:12,787
not integration,

822
01:08:12,787 --> 01:08:19,572
but on the other hand, when we see our people being brutalized by white bigots, white racists,

823
01:08:19,572 --> 01:08:24,137
we think that they are foolish

824
01:08:24,137 --> 01:08:27,657
to allow themselves to be beaten and brutalized

825
01:08:27,657 --> 01:08:31,758
and do nothing whatsoever to protect themselves.

826
01:08:31,758 --> 01:08:36,090
If a dog is biting a black man, the black man should kill the dog,

827
01:08:36,090 --> 01:08:40,796
whether the dog is a police dog or a hound dog or any kind of dog.

828
01:08:40,796 --> 01:08:45,481
If a dog is fixed on a black man when that black man is doing nothing but

829
01:08:45,481 --> 01:08:50,755
trying to take advantage of what the government says is supposed to be his,

830
01:08:50,755 --> 01:08:52,749
then that black man should kill that dog or

831
01:08:52,749 --> 01:08:57,715
any two-legged dog who sets the dog on him.

832
01:08:57,715 --> 01:09:02,030
When Malcolm talks all the Muslim ministers talk,

833
01:09:02,030 --> 01:09:06,567
they articulate for all the Negro people who hear them,

834
01:09:06,567 --> 01:09:11,063
who listen to them, they articulate their suffering,

835
01:09:11,063 --> 01:09:15,215
the suffering which has been in this country so long denied.

836
01:09:15,215 --> 01:09:18,300
That's Malcolm's great authority over any of his audiences.

837
01:09:18,300 --> 01:09:21,402
He corroborates their reality.

838
01:09:21,402 --> 01:09:25,491
I was probably about 14 years old

839
01:09:25,491 --> 01:09:33,058
and I was involved in demonstrations at this construction site.

840
01:09:33,058 --> 01:09:39,593
The community was demanding integration of the workforce.

841
01:09:39,593 --> 01:09:45,401
We realized that Malcolm had come to watch the demonstration.

842
01:09:45,401 --> 01:09:50,005
When my shift changed, I went across the street to talk to Malcolm.

843
01:09:50,005 --> 01:09:53,744
We had quite an argument that morning,

844
01:09:53,744 --> 01:09:59,054
and he tried to explain to me what was wrong with my

845
01:09:59,054 --> 01:10:03,372
laying down on the ground in front of a cement truck.

846
01:10:03,372 --> 01:10:09,547
And Malcolm said if these are people who could lynch black people,

847
01:10:09,547 --> 01:10:15,457
murder black children, enslave people, why couldn't they run over somebody

848
01:10:15,457 --> 01:10:18,027
with a truck? And he said,

849
01:10:18,027 --> 01:10:20,847
"Oh, they'd say it was an accident!"

850
01:10:20,847 --> 01:10:26,659
He'd say, 'Oops, my foot slipped,' but you'd be just as dead."

851
01:10:26,659 --> 01:10:32,027
And when he left and I turned around to go back across the street,

852
01:10:32,027 --> 01:10:34,448
I went back and I got on the picket line,

853
01:10:34,448 --> 01:10:39,755
but I never laid down in the street in front of a truck again.

854
01:10:39,755 --> 01:10:44,612
We were sitting across the street at the Shabazz Frosti Kreem and

855
01:10:44,612 --> 01:10:47,959
talking about race relations in America,

856
01:10:47,959 --> 01:10:51,991
and Malcolm at one point said, "OK, what's your solution?"

857
01:10:51,991 --> 01:10:54,284
And I don't-- he was not asking me for advice,

858
01:10:54,284 --> 01:10:59,346
he was-- he just wanted to sort of put me on the spot for a moment, I think.

859
01:10:59,346 --> 01:11:03,880
And I was, at the time, under the spell of Dr. King

860
01:11:03,880 --> 01:11:07,701
and his notion of the beloved society which would be colorblind,

861
01:11:07,701 --> 01:11:11,779
in which color would not be a disability for anybody

862
01:11:11,779 --> 01:11:16,142
it would disappear, but it wouldn't be a disability.

863
01:11:16,142 --> 01:11:19,593
and Malcolm just kind of looked back at me and said

864
01:11:19,593 --> 01:11:23,189
"You're dreaming. I haven't got time for dreams."

865
01:11:23,189 --> 01:11:28,288
KENNETH CLARKE: The goal of Dr. King is full equality

866
01:11:28,288 --> 01:11:29,265
MALCOLM X: No!

867
01:11:29,265 --> 01:11:31,476
KENNETH CLARK: -- and full rights of citizenship for Negroes.

868
01:11:31,476 --> 01:11:34,507
MALCOLM X: The goal of Dr. Martin Luther King is to give Negroes a chance

869
01:11:34,507 --> 01:11:39,738
to sit in a segregated restaurant beside the same white man who had brutalized them for 400 years.

870
01:11:39,738 --> 01:11:42,664
The goal of Dr. Martin Luther King is to get Negroes

871
01:11:42,664 --> 01:11:46,516
to forgive the people who have brutalized them for 400 years

872
01:11:46,516 --> 01:11:50,997
by lulling them to sleep and making them forgetting what those whites have done to them.

873
01:11:50,997 --> 01:11:56,009
But the masses of black people in America today don't go for what Martin Luther King is putting down.

874
01:11:56,009 --> 01:11:58,799
As you said in one of your articles, it's psychologically insecure

875
01:11:58,799 --> 01:12:01,125
or something of that sort, I forget how you put it.

876
01:12:01,125 --> 01:12:03,615
But you didn't endorse what Martin Luther King was doing yourself.

877
01:12:03,615 --> 01:12:09,029
KENNETH CLARKE: I do not reject his goals of full integration and full equality rights for American citizens.

878
01:12:09,029 --> 01:12:11,449
Do you reject these goals?

879
01:12:11,449 --> 01:12:13,735
MALCOLM X: If you don't think that he's walking on the right road,

880
01:12:13,735 --> 01:12:16,414
I'm quite sure you don't agree that he'll get to the right place!"

881
01:12:16,414 --> 01:12:22,059
We were aware or felt that it was somewhat dangerous to be too closely associated to Malcolm.

882
01:12:22,059 --> 01:12:25,890
He was saying some pretty rough things, particularly about whites,

883
01:12:25,890 --> 01:12:30,939
and those of us who wanted to keep peace with the white world - some of us,

884
01:12:30,939 --> 01:12:37,168
had our jobs out in the white community - we didn't really want to get too close to Malcolm.

885
01:12:37,168 --> 01:12:42,549
KENNETH CLARKE: It has been suggested also that this movement preaches a gospel of violence, that...

886
01:12:42,549 --> 01:12:46,582
MALCOLM X: No, the black people in this country have been the victims of violence

887
01:12:46,582 --> 01:12:49,804
at the hands of the white man for 400 years,

888
01:12:49,804 --> 01:12:52,623
and following the ignorant Negro preachers,

889
01:12:52,623 --> 01:12:57,947
we have thought that it was godlike to turn the other cheek to the brute that was brutalizing us.

890
01:12:57,947 --> 01:13:01,254
And today, the Honorable Elijah Muhammad is showing black people in this country

891
01:13:01,254 --> 01:13:05,453
that just as the white man and every other person on this earth has god-given rights -

892
01:13:05,453 --> 01:13:10,851
natural rights, civil rights, any kind of rights that you can think of when it comes to defending himself -

893
01:13:10,851 --> 01:13:17,819
black people should have -- we should have the right to defend ourselves also.

894
01:13:17,819 --> 01:13:31,656
In August 1963, 250,000 Americans gathered for the march on Washington.

895
01:13:31,671 --> 01:13:38,350
Malcolm came to us. He told us the story about the march on Washington.

896
01:13:38,350 --> 01:13:43,637
And one thing I can say about Malcolm, anytime he told us something, he could back it up.

897
01:13:43,637 --> 01:13:46,357
He had a article and he brought the

898
01:13:46,357 --> 01:13:49,098
he said, "I'm going to tell you. I know what I'm talking about."

899
01:13:49,098 --> 01:13:52,378
He says, "Who pays the bills for civil rights?"

900
01:13:52,378 --> 01:13:55,748
And he said, "The angels are white."

901
01:13:55,748 --> 01:13:59,816
And what he went on to say was, "You have to fight your battles,

902
01:13:59,816 --> 01:14:02,469
and it started in the street.

903
01:14:02,469 --> 01:14:08,038
But once you let them become integrated, it gets cool."

904
01:14:08,038 --> 01:14:11,853
And then he relates it to a cup of coffee that is hot and as soon as...your water...

905
01:14:11,853 --> 01:14:14,898
put the milk in it, it cools down.

906
01:14:14,898 --> 01:14:18,475
And these analogies Malcolm used sometimes were funny,

907
01:14:18,475 --> 01:14:23,684
but they got home, they hit home.

908
01:14:37,680 --> 01:14:38,562
GLORIA RICHARDSON, Southern Civil Rights Leader

909
01:14:38,562 --> 01:14:44,460
Most of the people that we were organizing had heard also of Malcolm X and that-

910
01:14:44,460 --> 01:14:48,055
and respected him and listened to him.

911
01:14:48,208 --> 01:14:51,773
And, you know, any time that he was going to be on,

912
01:14:51,881 --> 01:14:55,565
they made a effort to hear those speeches

913
01:14:55,657 --> 01:15:04,328
and felt that he indeed understood what their problems were and that they needed to be fought against and,

914
01:15:06,991 --> 01:15:08,340
I suppose, not always nonviolently.

915
01:15:08,418 --> 01:15:10,518
Nineteen days after the march on Washington,

916
01:15:10,594 --> 01:15:13,047
a bomb blew apart the Sunday school of the 16th Street Baptist Church

917
01:15:13,109 --> 01:15:15,063
in Birmingham, Alabama.

918
01:15:18,294 --> 01:15:22,759
Twenty people were injured. Four little girls were killed.

919
01:15:29,080 --> 01:15:33,215
Here you're talking about bombing a church and killing four little girls,

920
01:15:33,215 --> 01:15:40,782
and the feeling of anger and not being able to do something or not doing something was

921
01:15:40,782 --> 01:15:43,601
I remember was tremendous.

922
01:15:43,601 --> 01:15:46,478
A lot of us sort of became dissatisfied,

923
01:15:46,478 --> 01:15:49,672
because - and Malcolm really became somewhat dissatisfied -

924
01:15:49,672 --> 01:15:50,942
-he never spoke of it

925
01:15:50,942 --> 01:15:56,572
that we weren't doing anything to help the...

926
01:15:56,572 --> 01:16:03,192
-our people who were being brutalized by the whites

927
01:16:03,192 --> 01:16:07,704
and the police during the civil rights movement.

928
01:16:07,704 --> 01:16:16,085
We felt that we should have gotten involved.

929
01:16:29,452 --> 01:16:33,192
MALCOLM X: One white man named Lincoln supposedly fought the civil war to

930
01:16:33,192 --> 01:16:36,012
solve the race problem and the problem is still here.

931
01:16:36,012 --> 01:16:38,055
And then another white man named Kennedy came along,

932
01:16:38,055 --> 01:16:40,989
running for president, and told Negroes what all he was going to do for them

933
01:16:40,989 --> 01:16:43,462
if they voted for him, and they voted for him 80 percent,

934
01:16:43,462 --> 01:16:46,667
and he's been in office now for three years and the problem is still here.

935
01:16:46,667 --> 01:16:49,688
When police dogs were biting black women and black children and black babies

936
01:16:49,688 --> 01:16:51,277
in Birmingham, Alabama,

937
01:16:51,277 --> 01:16:56,950
that Kennedy talked about what he couldn't do because no federal law had been violated,

938
01:16:56,950 --> 01:17:00,264
and as soon as the Negroes exploded and began to protect themselves

939
01:17:00,264 --> 01:17:02,566
got the best of the crackers in Birmingham,

940
01:17:02,566 --> 01:17:04,134
then Kennedy sent for troops.

941
01:17:04,134 --> 01:17:05,707
And there was no... he used...

942
01:17:05,707 --> 01:17:08,793
he didn't have any new law when he sent for the troops

943
01:17:08,793 --> 01:17:12,365
when the Negroes erupted than he had at the time when whites were erupting.

944
01:17:12,365 --> 01:17:16,196
So we are within our rights and with justice

945
01:17:16,196 --> 01:17:22,312
with justification, when we express doubt concerning the ability of the white man

946
01:17:22,312 --> 01:17:27,565
to solve our problem and also when we express doubt concerning his integrity,

947
01:17:27,565 --> 01:17:30,662
concerning his sincerity, because you will have to confess

948
01:17:30,662 --> 01:17:33,074
that the problem has been around here for a long time

949
01:17:33,074 --> 01:17:35,880
and whites have been saying the same thing about it for the past 100 years

950
01:17:35,880 --> 01:17:40,047
and it's no nearer a solution today than it was a hundred years ago.

951
01:17:40,047 --> 01:17:42,325
Well, he was changed,

952
01:17:42,325 --> 01:17:50,724
changed from religious talks to nationalistic talk to the point where I told him

953
01:17:50,724 --> 01:17:55,603
(meaning Malcolm) that I listened to him when he first started

954
01:17:55,603 --> 01:18:01,869
and I listened to him now and that I hear a change.

955
01:18:01,869 --> 01:18:04,447
He say, "What kind of change you mean?"

956
01:18:04,447 --> 01:18:09,342
I say, "Well, your talks when you first started out, you know,

957
01:18:09,342 --> 01:18:14,773
caused me to have chills when you speak because of the truth that you were saying.

958
01:18:14,773 --> 01:18:17,755
But now I don't feel that anymore."

959
01:18:17,755 --> 01:18:20,326
He told his answer to me, he said, "Well," he said,

960
01:18:20,326 --> 01:18:23,875
"maybe you have lost your religious or your spirit."

961
01:18:23,875 --> 01:18:30,038
I say, "Well, maybe I have, but I'm just letting you know what I feel."

962
01:18:30,038 --> 01:18:36,617
After a while, we began to notice that there were some rumblings from the family,

963
01:18:36,617 --> 01:18:38,756
from Elijah Muhammad's family.

964
01:18:38,756 --> 01:18:41,960
Every now and then there'd be little things they would say

965
01:18:41,960 --> 01:18:48,405
that let you know that they got a problem with Malcolm rising up before the public like he's doing,

966
01:18:48,405 --> 01:18:53,491
because everybody's beginning to recognize him now as the spokesman.

967
01:18:53,491 --> 01:18:57,674
All right, the spokesman might be all right, but at the same time

968
01:18:57,674 --> 01:19:02,353
he's getting the publicity this and the media's got him.

969
01:19:02,353 --> 01:19:06,524
Everybody is Malcolm, Malcolm, Malcolm X, Malcolm X,

970
01:19:06,524 --> 01:19:12,289
and you only hear-- you starting to hear Elijah Muhammed's name less and less.

971
01:19:12,289 --> 01:19:18,476
Malcolm believed he could handle the jealousies within the Nation of Islam,

972
01:19:18,476 --> 01:19:28,710
but tensions between him and the Messenger would come to a head in late November 1963.

973
01:19:28,710 --> 01:19:31,621
So we were sitting in the restaurant drinking coffee,

974
01:19:31,621 --> 01:19:35,891
having this meeting and the captain of the mosque, Joseph,

975
01:19:35,891 --> 01:19:39,094
got a telephone call from his wife.

976
01:19:39,094 --> 01:19:47,709
And Joseph got up and went to a phone booth, took the call, and he came back to the table looking visibly shocked.

977
01:19:47,709 --> 01:19:56,340
And he said that his wife has just told him that Kennedy had been shot.

978
01:19:56,340 --> 01:20:01,236
Malcolm sent somebody to get a radio out of the back and we plugged in the radio and

979
01:20:01,236 --> 01:20:07,574
listened and the announcer was saying,

980
01:20:07,574 --> 01:20:13,849
"To repeat, we're confirming that the President has been shot in Dallas, Texas

981
01:20:13,849 --> 01:20:18,119
and at this point, we don't know how serious it is."

982
01:20:18,119 --> 01:20:24,902
And Malcolm said-- immediately, he said, "That devil is dead."

983
01:20:24,902 --> 01:20:31,039
John F. Kennedy had been assassinated.

984
01:20:31,039 --> 01:20:34,803
Mr. Muhammad had his son call Malcolm.

985
01:20:34,803 --> 01:20:40,718
He said, "Brother Minister Malcolm, my father told me to tell you -

986
01:20:40,718 --> 01:20:43,849
and we're calling all over the country -

987
01:20:43,849 --> 01:20:50,413
that John F. Kennedy was assassinated and that we should not say anything

988
01:20:50,413 --> 01:20:52,968
in a derogatory way whatsoever

989
01:20:52,968 --> 01:21:00,167
because the man is the President of the United States and that people love him."

990
01:21:00,167 --> 01:21:05,380
The Muslims had scheduled a rally at the Manhattan Center in New York City.

991
01:21:05,380 --> 01:21:11,444
The day of the rally, the Messenger called Malcolm to remind him to teach the spiritual side

992
01:21:11,444 --> 01:21:15,996
and avoid saying anything about the President's death.


993
01:21:15,996 --> 01:21:18,934
But he was clearly nervous about what he might say!

994
01:21:18,934 --> 01:21:22,806
He spoke from a prepared speech,

995
01:21:22,806 --> 01:21:26,202
never specifically mentioned Kennedy

996
01:21:26,202 --> 01:21:33,020
but then, as if quoting desaster

997
01:21:33,020 --> 01:21:37,129
he opened the floor up to questions.

998
01:21:37,129 --> 01:21:42,911
Normally he would speak but won't ask for questions and answers. But this day, he asked for questions and answers!

999
01:21:42,911 --> 01:21:54,159
And he went in this litany, comparing other leaders around the world

1000
01:21:54,159 --> 01:22:01,421
who had somehow suffered at the hands of the United States government or its agents

1001
01:22:01,421 --> 01:22:06,884
and how that compared to what had just happened to Kennedy.

1002
01:22:06,884 --> 01:22:16,038
And he said, "Patrice Lumumba died and his wife became a widow.

1003
01:22:16,038 --> 01:22:20,858
His people had their leader cut down,"

1004
01:22:20,858 --> 01:22:25,827
and the U.S. government had been involved in doing that.

1005
01:22:27,034 --> 01:22:27,401
And he went through a string of these,

1006
01:22:27,401 --> 01:22:33,901
always winding up with the involvement of the United States government.

1007
01:22:34,255 --> 01:22:47,534
So that the final point that when you do those kinds of things all around the world, you set up a situation, an atmosphere, an environment in the world

1008
01:22:47,534 --> 01:22:52,395
and sooner or later those chickens come home to roost.

1009
01:22:52,648 --> 01:22:59,540
When he answered, I was really- I was really took back! I didn't understand that!

1010
01:22:59,924 --> 01:23:01,366
And he answered the question. He just said,

1011
01:23:01,366 --> 01:23:04,421
"Well," he said, "I know I'm going to get in trouble for this,

1012
01:23:04,421 --> 01:23:09,655
but as far as I'm concerned, it's a case of the chickens coming home to roost."

1013
01:23:09,655 --> 01:23:14,323
And actually, John Ali, the National Secretary, was there

1014
01:23:14,323 --> 01:23:18,096
and that's how Mr. Muhammad got the news so fast.

1015
01:23:18,096 --> 01:23:19,601
JOHN ALI, National Secretary, Nation of Islam

1016
01:23:19,601 --> 01:23:22,937
This statement is from Messenger Elijah Muhammad the leader of the Muslims in America.

1017
01:23:22,937 --> 01:23:28,493
Minister Malcolm Shabazz, addressing a public meeting at Manhattan Center in New York on Sunday, December 1st,

1018
01:23:28,493 --> 01:23:32,563
did not speak for the Muslims when he made comments on the death of the President

1019
01:23:32,563 --> 01:23:34,023
John F. Kennedy.

1020
01:23:34,023 --> 01:23:37,988
He was speaking for himself and not Muslims in general.

1021
01:23:37,988 --> 01:23:45,059
And Minister Malcolm has been suspended from public speaking for the time being.

1022
01:23:45,059 --> 01:23:49,690
While the Nation of Islam publicly grieved for the slain president,

1023
01:23:49,690 --> 01:23:55,836
the leadership announced the silencing of Malcolm X for 90 days.

1024
01:23:55,836 --> 01:24:01,157
He was to give no speeches and to have no contact with the press.

1025
01:24:01,157 --> 01:24:04,587
Well, we were doing a lot of Kennedy stories and there was going to be a little one

1026
01:24:04,587 --> 01:24:08,017
talking about Malcolm having been suspended.

1027
01:24:08,017 --> 01:24:09,990
And I was expecting to pick up the phone,

1028
01:24:09,990 --> 01:24:12,637
I'd get a quote and that would be it.

1029
01:24:12,637 --> 01:24:16,320
In this case, he held me on the phone for longer than I had expected,

1030
01:24:16,320 --> 01:24:21,521
and he sounded upset, he sounded worried,

1031
01:24:21,521 --> 01:24:24,582
and it was the first time I had ever sensed vulnerability in this guy

1032
01:24:24,582 --> 01:24:31,220
who I had always been accustomed to thinking of as an extremely strong man.

1033
01:24:31,220 --> 01:24:36,411
Newspapers predicted a power struggle within the Nation of Islam.

1034
01:24:36,411 --> 01:24:39,772
It was later learned the FBI fed stories to local reporters

1035
01:24:39,772 --> 01:24:44,996
in an attempt to deepen the rift between Malcolm and Elijah Muhammad.

1036
01:24:44,996 --> 01:24:51,231
Malcolm, isolated and exhausted, accepted an invitation to Miami

1037
01:24:51,231 --> 01:24:58,493
where young heavyweight contender Cassius Clay was training for his championship bout against Sonny Liston.

1038
01:25:06,014 --> 01:25:08,493
Though not a member of the nation,

1039
01:25:08,493 --> 01:25:12,438
Clay had been visiting Muslim temples for two years

1040
01:25:12,438 --> 01:25:18,273
and had asked Malcolm to help him mentally prepare for the fight against Liston.

1041
01:25:18,273 --> 01:25:19,738
ATTALLA SHABAZZ, Daughter

1042
01:25:19,738 --> 01:25:23,018
Well, going to Florida for my family was a honeymoon,

1043
01:25:23,018 --> 01:25:25,470
my parents referred to it as a honeymoon.

1044
01:25:25,470 --> 01:25:32,989
Of course, its significance of us going as a family was much stronger and meaningful for them.

1045
01:25:32,989 --> 01:25:39,053
For us, it was just an opportunity to be with each other,

1046
01:25:39,053 --> 01:25:42,437
but as my mother talked about it, as my father talked about it,

1047
01:25:42,437 --> 01:25:50,398
it was the first time in their real life as a marital union that they had time for themselves.

1048
01:25:50,398 --> 01:25:59,129
Malcolm offered to bring Cassius Clay into the Nation of Islam in exchange for his own reinstatement,

1049
01:25:59,129 --> 01:26:04,721
but the Nation's hierarchy ignored Malcolm's offer.

1050
01:26:04,721 --> 01:26:11,372
Like most of America, they saw the young boxer as a loudmouth with little chance of beating Liston.

1051
01:26:11,372 --> 01:26:23,473
As Malcolm watched from the ringside, the young Clay wore down the older champion.

1052
01:26:23,473 --> 01:26:30,538
At the beginning of the seventh round, a battered Liston could not come out of his corner.

1053
01:26:30,538 --> 01:26:36,844
Clay had become the new heavyweight champion of the world.

1054
01:26:36,844 --> 01:26:39,335
OK, give us the poetry on number seven.

1055
01:26:39,335 --> 01:26:41,769
He wanted to go to heaven/ So I took him in seven.

1056
01:26:41,769 --> 01:26:42,944
You took him in seven.

1057
01:26:42,944 --> 01:26:44,386
CASSIUS CLAY: I am the king of the world!

1058
01:26:44,386 --> 01:26:45,548
Hold it, hold it, hold it.

1059
01:26:45,548 --> 01:26:48,731
CASSIUS CLAY: I'm prettier.
REPORTER: Hold it, you're not that pretty.
CASSIUS CLAY: I'm a bad man.
REPORTER: Wait, wait-


1060
01:26:48,731 --> 01:26:52,103
I shook up the world! I shook up the world!

1061
01:26:52,103 --> 01:26:54,876
What do you think of Cassius's victory in Miami?

1062
01:26:54,876 --> 01:26:58,086
I think it was a great victory. He proved he was the best man!

1063
01:26:58,086 --> 01:27:00,107
And where were you during the fight?

1064
01:27:00,107 --> 01:27:01,791
I was in the auditorium, watching the fight.

1065
01:27:01,791 --> 01:27:02,937
Right at ringside?

1066
01:27:02,937 --> 01:27:05,896
Right at ringside. I was in seat seven.

1067
01:27:05,896 --> 01:27:10,588
The Nation's leadership bypassed Malcolm and called Clay directly.

1068
01:27:10,588 --> 01:27:15,187
They accepted the young champion into the Nation of Islam

1069
01:27:15,187 --> 01:27:22,069
and announced his new name, Muhammad Ali, at their annual convention on Savior's Day.

1070
01:27:22,069 --> 01:27:25,221
Malcolm was not invited.

1071
01:27:25,221 --> 01:27:28,111
In his place, introducing Elijah Muhammad,

1072
01:27:28,111 --> 01:27:34,375
was Malcolm's former protege, the minister from Boston, Louis X.

1073
01:27:34,375 --> 01:27:43,322
"And I would meet the man that I had lived for and fought for and longed for all the days of my life!"

1074
01:27:43,322 --> 01:27:45,187
Minister Malcolm was honest.

1075
01:27:45,187 --> 01:27:52,011
He was sincere. He was dedicated to the uplifting of African-American people.

1076
01:27:52,011 --> 01:27:59,444
Then you had another group of people who were officials there in Chicago who were-

1077
01:27:59,444 --> 01:28:03,241
who were dedicated to the uplifting of themselves.

1078
01:28:03,241 --> 01:28:10,768
He accused them of taking money, of buying expensive jewelry, of buying furs.

1079
01:28:10,768 --> 01:28:18,196
He accused them of converting the Nation of Islam into a criminal organization.

1080
01:28:18,196 --> 01:28:26,598
A lot of the well-placed people in Islam had been trained by Malcolm.

1081
01:28:26,598 --> 01:28:31,172
Some of them had been reformed by Malcolm.

1082
01:28:31,172 --> 01:28:39,336
They liked their little petty power positions,

1083
01:28:39,336 --> 01:28:48,338
and there were other people in the Nation with aspiration toward that number one slot.

1084
01:28:48,338 --> 01:28:53,818
And if Elijah Muhammad died and if Malcolm X took over the Nation,

1085
01:28:53,818 --> 01:28:58,853
the first thing he might do was some serious housecleaning.

1086
01:28:58,853 --> 01:29:02,723
He would move the money-changers out of the temple.

1087
01:29:02,723 --> 01:29:14,990
So the idea was to get rid of him BEFORE the event of the passing of the old man.

1088
01:29:14,990 --> 01:29:25,306
On March 8, 1964, Malcolm announced that he was leaving the Nation of Islam.

1089
01:29:25,306 --> 01:29:30,940
He formed the new religious organization called the Muslim Mosque Incorporated,

1090
01:29:30,940 --> 01:29:35,417
for those who followed him out of the Nation,

1091
01:29:35,417 --> 01:29:44,122
but Malcolm knew that a rival mosque would be seen as a direct challenge to Elijah Muhammad.

1092
01:29:48,198 --> 01:29:52,304
And he comes into this very room and he sits there and we talk to him.

1093
01:29:52,304 --> 01:29:58,871
He says, first of all, that he had arrived early, but because he was ahead of time,

1094
01:29:58,871 --> 01:30:02,557
he'd driven around the block a couple of times.

1095
01:30:02,557 --> 01:30:06,889
He wanted to be exactly on time and he was.

1096
01:30:06,889 --> 01:30:09,935
We sat and listened. We didn't have any questions.

1097
01:30:09,935 --> 01:30:12,137
We knew what the anguish was.

1098
01:30:12,137 --> 01:30:14,118
We knew what was happening.

1099
01:30:14,118 --> 01:30:19,634
And he just seemed to need a friendly ear, so we let him talk.

1100
01:30:19,634 --> 01:30:23,266
And he talked about his time in prison.

1101
01:30:23,266 --> 01:30:31,491
He talked about the times when he first heard of Elijah Muhammad and the change it made in his life.

1102
01:30:31,491 --> 01:30:41,400
He expressed that deep hurt within him that his father had rejected him.

1103
01:30:41,400 --> 01:30:48,347
And as he sat there, it was evident that if Elijah Muhammad had just done that at that moment,

1104
01:30:48,347 --> 01:30:54,558
whatever the differences were between them, Malcolm would have been off and running.

1105
01:30:54,558 --> 01:31:05,237
Malcolm was certainly a beloved son of the Harlem community and people were interested in his side of the story.

1106
01:31:05,237 --> 01:31:12,409
Elijah Muhammad was somebody in a picture on the wall, someone whose name was mentioned,

1107
01:31:12,409 --> 01:31:14,485
but Harlem didn't know him.

1108
01:31:14,485 --> 01:31:20,634
They knew Malcolm and loved Malcolm and remained loyal to Malcolm long after that split.

1109
01:31:20,634 --> 01:31:24,128
MALCOLM X: So what you and I have got to do is get involved!

1110
01:31:24,128 --> 01:31:26,838
You and I have to be right there, breathing down their throat!

1111
01:31:26,838 --> 01:31:30,371
Every time they look over their shoulder, we want them to see us.

1112
01:31:30,371 --> 01:31:38,799
We want to make them- we want to make them pass the strongest civil rights bill they've ever passed,

1113
01:31:38,799 --> 01:31:42,966
because we know even after they pass it they can't enforce it.

1114
01:31:42,966 --> 01:31:49,882
In order to do this, we're starting a voters registration drive,

1115
01:31:49,882 --> 01:31:57,581
we have to get everybody in Harlem register,

1116
01:31:57,581 --> 01:32:05,641
not as Democrats or Republicans, but registered as Independents.

1117
01:32:05,641 --> 01:32:17,194
If you don't have the sense of responsibility to get registered, we'll move you out of town.

1118
01:32:17,194 --> 01:32:19,553
Malcolm called for an aggressive plan

1119
01:32:19,553 --> 01:32:22,124
not only to gain political power

1120
01:32:22,124 --> 01:32:26,382
but to move black people towards total control of their community.

1121
01:32:26,382 --> 01:32:32,532
MALCOLM X: It's going to be the ballot or the bullet.

1122
01:32:32,532 --> 01:32:36,714
Other ethnic groups - other ethnic and racial groups came into our community and own the stores.

1123
01:32:36,714 --> 01:32:42,048
They run the schools. They run the supermarkets. They own the movie theaters.

1124
01:32:42,048 --> 01:32:50,546
They own the... you know, the... almost anything in the community that is generating income is owned by the outsiders.

1125
01:32:50,546 --> 01:32:54,315
MALCOLM X: My personal economic philosophy is also black nationalism,

1126
01:32:54,315 --> 01:32:59,732
which means that the black man should have a hand in controlling the economy of the so-called Negro community,

1127
01:32:59,732 --> 01:33:04,387
he should be developing the type of knowledge that will enable him to own and operate the businesses

1128
01:33:04,387 --> 01:33:09,500
and thereby be able to create employment for his own people, for his own kind.

1129
01:33:09,500 --> 01:33:13,433
And the social philosophy also is black nationalism,

1130
01:33:13,433 --> 01:33:17,853
which means that instead of the black man trying to force himself into the society of the white man,

1131
01:33:17,853 --> 01:33:20,884
we should be trying to eliminate from our own society

1132
01:33:20,884 --> 01:33:27,384
the ills and the defects and make ourselves likable and sociable among our own kind.

1133
01:33:27,384 --> 01:33:33,118
Malcolm's whole agenda was different. He was about total independence,

1134
01:33:33,118 --> 01:33:38,779
he was about self-determination, self-reliance, self-defense when necessary,

1135
01:33:38,779 --> 01:33:44,960
and of course, he was still fighting for the same thing that the others were; for justice.

1136
01:33:44,960 --> 01:33:50,074
And so I felt that Malcolm is the person I want to follow.

1137
01:33:50,074 --> 01:33:55,863
The growing popularity of Malcolm's new movement challenged those who remained loyal to Elijah Muhammad.

1138
01:33:55,863 --> 01:34:02,460
I didn't feel that I would have been a very good believer in Islam if I had just

1139
01:34:02,460 --> 01:34:07,661
because my own brother had left or whatever he had done, that I would leave.

1140
01:34:07,661 --> 01:34:10,710
I wasn't that kind of a follower.

1141
01:34:10,710 --> 01:34:11,718
Yeah.

1142
01:34:11,718 --> 01:34:15,204
I would never have tried to coax Malcolm back, but at the same time,

1143
01:34:15,204 --> 01:34:18,335
I would have gone on teaching because I was cleaning people up

1144
01:34:18,335 --> 01:34:23,420
and I was making people that were indecent decent, and I liked that.

1145
01:34:23,420 --> 01:34:26,963
[radio broadcast] Now, at this time, Minister PHILBERT...

1146
01:34:26,963 --> 01:34:33,276
Ordinarily, I would not suggest the airing of differences between brothers to outsiders

1147
01:34:33,276 --> 01:34:36,308
and especially over a loose media,

1148
01:34:36,308 --> 01:34:42,719
but because of the grave consequences of recent events, I submit to this medium.

1149
01:34:42,719 --> 01:34:49,567
Because I, Philbert X, a minister of Muhammad's Mosque of Lansing, Grand Rapids, Flint and Muskegon, Michigan,

1150
01:34:49,567 --> 01:34:54,855
love Islam, our teacher, the Honorable Elijah Muhammad and all of his followers,

1151
01:34:54,855 --> 01:35:00,355
I think someone should say something to speak out against the acts of my blood brother Malcolm.

1152
01:35:00,355 --> 01:35:07,641
The purpose of making that statement was to fortify the Muslims, so I wanted to talk to the Muslim for the point

1153
01:35:07,641 --> 01:35:09,485
and that's why I was brought to Chicago,

1154
01:35:09,485 --> 01:35:12,786
to make a statement that would strengthen the Muslims.

1155
01:35:12,786 --> 01:35:16,979
So I went forth to talk about Islam and how it is...my regular teaching.

1156
01:35:16,979 --> 01:35:18,850
But when I got ready to make my statement,

1157
01:35:18,850 --> 01:35:21,699
John Ali put a paper in front of me and told me I should read that,

1158
01:35:21,699 --> 01:35:24,000
that it had been prepared for me to make.

1159
01:35:24,000 --> 01:35:28,373
Because I have seen and bear witness as to how Malcolm was raised

1160
01:35:28,373 --> 01:35:31,953
from a level of nothing to a place of honor and respect throughout the world

1161
01:35:31,953 --> 01:35:35,409
as a result of Mr. Muhammad's direction;

1162
01:35:35,409 --> 01:35:38,352
and because now I see my brother pursue a dangerous course

1163
01:35:38,352 --> 01:35:45,162
which parallels that of the precedent set by Judas, Brutus and Benedict Arnold and others

1164
01:35:45,162 --> 01:35:49,494
who betrayed the honor and trust relationship between them and their leaders;

1165
01:35:49,494 --> 01:35:54,811
because I am aware of the great mental illness which besets,unfortunately, many in America

1166
01:35:54,811 --> 01:35:57,107
and which besetted [sic] my mother, whom I love,

1167
01:35:57,107 --> 01:35:58,476
and many of my other brothers

1168
01:35:58,476 --> 01:36:02,338
and which now may have taken another victim, my brother Malcolm...

1169
01:36:02,338 --> 01:36:05,738
And if I had read it, I wouldn't have read it over the air, you see

1170
01:36:05,738 --> 01:36:08,574
If I had looked at it, I wouldn't have read it over the air.

1171
01:36:08,574 --> 01:36:10,743
.And I asked John Ali about it.

1172
01:36:10,743 --> 01:36:15,096
And he says, "Oh," he says, "that's just a statement that was prepared for you to read."

1173
01:36:15,096 --> 01:36:18,315
He said, "I know the Messenger will be very pleased with the way you read it,"

1174
01:36:18,315 --> 01:36:20,078
and that was it.

1175
01:36:20,078 --> 01:36:27,042
I talked to Malcolm about what Philbert had said, and Malcolm said he wasn't surprised.

1176
01:36:27,042 --> 01:36:33,244
He said he knew that they were going to use everybody they could

1177
01:36:33,244 --> 01:36:39,636
and they could see that they could use Philbert and that they were going to do it.

1178
01:36:39,636 --> 01:36:45,293
He said he wasn't surprised at the things that Philbert had said in the paper and all,

1179
01:36:45,293 --> 01:36:56,750
and that he was angry that Philbert would do that, but he wasn't surprised at it.

1180
01:36:56,750 --> 01:37:05,580
See, in Islam, when you are considered a hypocrite,

1181
01:37:05,580 --> 01:37:14,158
it's quite different than saying a hypocrite in Christianity or just a hypocrite who posed as a friend.

1182
01:37:14,158 --> 01:37:20,023
In Islam, when you are accused of being a hypocrite,

1183
01:37:20,023 --> 01:37:25,116
there are times when your life can be put on the line.

1184
01:37:25,116 --> 01:37:29,865
I recall getting some of those papers

1185
01:37:29,865 --> 01:37:37,756
and one I remember that stays in my mind is a picture that had Malcolm with horns on his head

1186
01:37:37,756 --> 01:37:41,392
and his head had been severed

1187
01:37:41,392 --> 01:37:43,463
and they were calling him a Judas.

1188
01:37:43,463 --> 01:37:48,975
And I recall reading the language of ministers in the paper.

1189
01:37:48,975 --> 01:37:52,451
I won't say Farrakhan, but I know he was one of them,

1190
01:37:52,451 --> 01:37:54,141
but there were other ministers, too.

1191
01:37:54,141 --> 01:37:59,400
And I recall reading their language and I said to myself

1192
01:37:59,400 --> 01:38:02,687
"They're trying to get him killed. They want him dead."

1193
01:38:13,332 --> 01:38:17,967
In April 1964, Malcolm traveled to Saudi Arabia.

1194
01:38:17,967 --> 01:38:21,208
For some time, he had been studying orthodox Islam.

1195
01:38:21,208 --> 01:38:26,683
Now he arrived in Jeddah, on his way to perform the Haj,

1196
01:38:26,683 --> 01:38:31,715
a pilgrimage required of all Muslims.

1197
01:38:31,715 --> 01:38:38,911
Members of the Saudi royal family helped him gain entry to the holy city of Mecca.

1198
01:38:38,911 --> 01:38:40,464
MOHMAED AL-FAYSAL, Prince of Saudi Arabia:

1199
01:38:40,464 --> 01:38:44,082
My first impression of him was an eye-opener,

1200
01:38:44,082 --> 01:38:51,903
because I saw a different person totally. I didn't see the fiery... fire-breather...

1201
01:38:51,903 --> 01:38:59,600
I saw a very timid almost, shy man.

1202
01:38:59,600 --> 01:39:09,561
When a person performs a Haj, there are certain rituals through which he has to go.

1203
01:39:09,561 --> 01:39:17,817
All people have to dress in the same simple way and as such,

1204
01:39:17,817 --> 01:39:24,280
you cannot distinguish during the Haj any people on account of their status,

1205
01:39:24,280 --> 01:39:30,068
on account of their national origin.

1206
01:39:30,068 --> 01:39:36,529
It is a demonstration of human brotherhood.

1207
01:39:36,529 --> 01:39:41,481
Because everybody was in this white garb,

1208
01:39:41,481 --> 01:39:45,630
the rich, the poor, the powerful, the weak, the sick, everybody,

1209
01:39:45,630 --> 01:39:50,763
and they were all intermingled.

1210
01:39:50,763 --> 01:40:01,858
And I think that had such a profound impact on Malcolm.

1211
01:40:07,704 --> 01:40:11,384
[reading postcard]: "Greeting from the holiest and most sacred city on earth.

1212
01:40:11,384 --> 01:40:16,480
I often think of the warm friendliness of your wonderful family. Brother Malcolm."

1213
01:40:16,480 --> 01:40:19,525
"Greeting from the ancient land of Arabia.

1214
01:40:19,525 --> 01:40:24,624
Allah has blessed me to visit the holy city of Mecca where I witnessed pilgrims of all colors"

1215
01:40:24,624 --> 01:40:26,638
and "all colors" is underlined

1216
01:40:26,638 --> 01:40:30,430
"from all parts of this earth displaying a spirit of unity

1217
01:40:30,430 --> 01:40:35,419
and brotherhood like I've never seen before. It is truly a sight to behold.

1218
01:40:35,419 --> 01:40:37,454
El Haj Malik El Shabazz.

1219
01:40:37,454 --> 01:40:44,817
And I guess maybe he thought I wouldn't know who it was, so in parentheses, he has "Malcolm X."

1220
01:40:44,817 --> 01:40:51,356
Malcolm's letters to his followers made news back in America and raised the question:

1221
01:40:51,356 --> 01:40:56,024
Had he changed his position on race?

1222
01:40:56,024 --> 01:41:02,173
He does speak of brotherhood, the brotherhood of all races, colors and so on in the holy land.

1223
01:41:02,173 --> 01:41:06,134
He says, "There were tens of thousands of pilgrims from all over the world.

1224
01:41:06,134 --> 01:41:10,092
They were of all colors, from blue-eyed blonds to black skinned Africans,

1225
01:41:10,092 --> 01:41:15,740
but were all participating in the same ritual, displaying a spirit of unity and brotherhood

1226
01:41:15,740 --> 01:41:18,936
that my experiences in America had led me to believe

1227
01:41:18,936 --> 01:41:23,368
could never exist between the white and the non-white.

1228
01:41:23,368 --> 01:41:28,194
But he has back tracked a little from the position that all white men are devils if he's saying that!

1229
01:41:28,194 --> 01:41:29,361
I wouldn't say that he is...

1230
01:41:29,361 --> 01:41:30,623
...in respect that...

1231
01:41:30,623 --> 01:41:32,249
I wouldn't say that he has backtracked.

1232
01:41:32,249 --> 01:41:38,274
One can make an adjustment in one's direction without it being backwards.

1233
01:41:38,274 --> 01:41:42,018
When you say that he has backtracked

1234
01:41:42,018 --> 01:41:46,439
it seems as though that you imply you would prefer that he call white people devils

1235
01:41:46,439 --> 01:41:50,268
and not to call them devils, that he's going in the wrong direction!



1236
01:41:50,268 --> 01:41:51,593
Nobody likes to be called a devil.

1237
01:41:51,593 --> 01:41:54,597
So, well then I...then you wouldn't considered it a backtrack

1238
01:41:54,597 --> 01:41:56,910
if he stopped calling white people devils, then, would you?

1239
01:41:56,910 --> 01:41:58,567
No.

1240
01:41:58,567 --> 01:42:03,262
After his pilgrimage, Malcolm spent three weeks in Africa.

1241
01:42:03,262 --> 01:42:13,056
On May 21st, two day after his 39th birthday, he returned to New York.

1242
01:42:13,056 --> 01:42:19,994
Malcolm, have your experiences with white-skinned Muslims in Africa and the Middle East

1243
01:42:19,994 --> 01:42:27,182
made you feel that relations between Negroes and whites who are not Muslims is any more possible?

1244
01:42:27,182 --> 01:42:31,392
When I was on the pilgrimage,

1245
01:42:31,392 --> 01:42:38,631
I had close contact with Muslims whose skin would in America be classified as white

1246
01:42:38,631 --> 01:42:42,968
and with Muslims who would themselves be classified as white in America,

1247
01:42:42,968 --> 01:42:45,575
but these particular Muslims didn't call themselves white.

1248
01:42:45,575 --> 01:42:49,257
They looked upon themselves as human beings, as part of the human family

1249
01:42:49,257 --> 01:42:54,442
and therefore they looked upon all other segments of the human family as part of that same family.

1250
01:42:54,442 --> 01:42:55,758
Well, has this...

1251
01:42:55,758 --> 01:42:58,821
Now, they had a different look or a different air

1252
01:42:58,821 --> 01:43:01,986
or a different attitude than that which is reflected

1253
01:43:01,986 --> 01:43:06,575
in the attitude of the man in America who calls himself white.

1254
01:43:06,575 --> 01:43:11,087
So I said that if Islam had done this

1255
01:43:11,087 --> 01:43:12,597
done that for them,

1256
01:43:12,597 --> 01:43:15,765
perhaps if the white men in America would study Islam,

1257
01:43:15,765 --> 01:43:18,192
perhaps it could do the same thing for him.

1258
01:43:18,192 --> 01:43:21,888
Are you prepared to go into the United Nations at this point

1259
01:43:21,888 --> 01:43:26,048
and ask that charges be brought against the United States for its treatment of American Negroes?

1260
01:43:26,048 --> 01:43:29,690
Oh, yes. Oh, yes. [audience applause]

1261
01:43:29,690 --> 01:43:33,633
The audience will have to be quiet.

1262
01:43:33,633 --> 01:43:41,580
Yes, the... as I pointed out when I was in...during my traveling, that nations look

1263
01:43:41,580 --> 01:43:46,348
African nations and Asian nations and Latin American nations look very hypocritical

1264
01:43:46,348 --> 01:43:49,381
when they stand up in the United Nations,

1265
01:43:49,381 --> 01:43:52,828
condemning the racist practices of South Africa

1266
01:43:52,828 --> 01:43:55,687
and that which is practiced by Portugal and Angola,

1267
01:43:55,687 --> 01:43:59,076
and saying nothing in the U.N. about the racist practices

1268
01:43:59,076 --> 01:44:05,671
that are manifest every day against Negroes in this society.

1269
01:44:05,671 --> 01:44:09,955
As media attention increasingly focused on Malcolm,

1270
01:44:09,955 --> 01:44:12,643
the Nation of Islam stepped up its attacks

1271
01:44:12,643 --> 01:44:17,833
and filed eviction papers to force him from his home.


1272
01:44:17,833 --> 01:44:21,941
Well, Malcolm, in the spring and early summer of 1964,

1273
01:44:21,941 --> 01:44:25,872
was in a desperate situation with Nation of Islam

1274
01:44:25,872 --> 01:44:31,471
and the one weapon he had left was his knowledge of the Messenger's indiscretions

1275
01:44:31,471 --> 01:44:36,591
with various women who were working for him as secretaries.

1276
01:44:36,591 --> 01:44:41,570
He called one guy at The New York Herald Tribune and tried to interest him in the story.

1277
01:44:41,570 --> 01:44:45,231
It was considered libelous, so they wouldn't do it.


1278
01:44:45,231 --> 01:44:48,944
When Malcolm appeared in court to challenge the eviction proceedings,

1279
01:44:48,944 --> 01:44:54,472
he used the trial to reveal the private affairs of Elijah Muhammad.



1280
01:44:54,472 --> 01:44:56,218
Why are they threatening your life?

1281
01:44:56,218 --> 01:45:03,283
Well, primarily because they're afraid that I will tell the real reason that they've been...

1282
01:45:03,283 --> 01:45:07,016
that I'm our of the Black Muslim movement, which I never told, I kept to myself.

1283
01:45:07,016 --> 01:45:11,195
But the real reason is that Elijah Muhammad, the head of the movement,

1284
01:45:11,195 --> 01:45:18,143
is the father of eight children by six different teenaged girls, six different teenaged girls

1285
01:45:18,143 --> 01:45:21,557
who were his private personal secretaries.


1286
01:45:21,557 --> 01:45:25,475
That was a serious thing, the most serious thing,

1287
01:45:25,475 --> 01:45:27,547
and to charge the Honorable Elijah Muhammad

1288
01:45:27,547 --> 01:45:30,792
with such...would be really to take your own life

1289
01:45:30,792 --> 01:45:32,823
take your life in your own hands, you know.

1290
01:45:32,823 --> 01:45:34,628
You would be risking your life!

1291
01:45:34,628 --> 01:45:35,877
I'm just being plain.

1292
01:45:35,877 --> 01:45:38,761
I'm being open and plain with you. It would really mean that you...

1293
01:45:38,761 --> 01:45:41,476
somebody might kill you in the Nation of Islam.

1294
01:45:41,476 --> 01:45:44,866
Are you not perhaps afraid of what might happen to you

1295
01:45:44,866 --> 01:45:47,079
as a result of making these revelations?

1296
01:45:47,079 --> 01:45:49,796
Oh, yes. I probably am a dead man already!

1297
01:45:49,796 --> 01:45:51,384
What do you mean?

1298
01:45:51,384 --> 01:45:55,176
Well, when you understand the makeup of the Muslim movement

1299
01:45:55,176 --> 01:45:57,396
and the psychology of the Muslim movement,

1300
01:45:57,396 --> 01:45:59,253
as long as they...

1301
01:45:59,253 --> 01:46:03,691
I myself by having confidence in the leader of the Muslim movement,

1302
01:46:03,691 --> 01:46:08,535
if someone came to me and I had no knowledge whatsoever of what had taken place

1303
01:46:08,535 --> 01:46:13,284
and they told me what I'm saying, I would kill them! Myself.

1304
01:46:13,284 --> 01:46:16,908
The only thing that would prevent me from killing someone who made a statement like this,

1305
01:46:16,908 --> 01:46:19,975
they would have to be able to let me know that it's true.

1306
01:46:19,975 --> 01:46:23,320
Now, if anyone had come to me other than Mr. Muhammad's son,

1307
01:46:23,320 --> 01:46:26,361
I never would have believed it even enough to look into it,

1308
01:46:26,361 --> 01:46:28,859
but I had been around him so closely I had seen indications of it

1309
01:46:28,859 --> 01:46:34,098
of the reality of it, but my religious sincerity made me block it out of my mind.

1310
01:46:36,929 --> 01:46:39,794
At the Audubon Ballroom in Harlem,

1311
01:46:39,794 --> 01:46:42,647
Malcolm announced the formation of a political group

1312
01:46:42,647 --> 01:46:47,361
modeled after the Organization of African Unity overseas.

1313
01:46:47,361 --> 01:46:51,772
Brother Malcolm formed the Organization of Afro-American Unity

1314
01:46:51,772 --> 01:46:57,757
for those of us who were interested in his political, economic and cultural programs.

1315
01:46:57,757 --> 01:47:01,435
I think he was aware that there were people out there, you know,

1316
01:47:01,435 --> 01:47:06,660
from his travels around... that were people out there who wanted to work with him

1317
01:47:06,660 --> 01:47:10,633
but who were not prepared to become Muslims in order to do so.

1318
01:47:10,633 --> 01:47:14,518
One of the first things that the independent African nations did

1319
01:47:14,518 --> 01:47:18,776
was to form an organization called the Organization of African Unity.

1320
01:47:18,776 --> 01:47:24,200
This Organization of Afro-American Unity, which has the same aim and objectives...

1321
01:47:24,200 --> 01:47:26,986
to fight whoever gets in our way,

1322
01:47:26,986 --> 01:47:43,165
to bring about the complete independence of people of African decent here in the western hemisphere

1323
01:47:43,165 --> 01:47:54,522
and first here in the United States! And bring about the freedom of these people by any means necessary.

1324
01:47:54,522 --> 01:48:04,656
In July 1964, Malcolm was invited to join heads of state from Africa and the Middle East 


1325
01:48:04,656 --> 01:48:15,555
at the Organization of African Unity conference in Cairo, Egypt.

1326
01:48:15,555 --> 01:48:21,125
Malcolm X saw no contradiction between the African fight

1327
01:48:21,125 --> 01:48:25,852
and the black American fight in the United States.

1328
01:48:25,852 --> 01:48:29,087
He thought one was an extension of the other

1329
01:48:29,087 --> 01:48:36,182
that he can draw support from one to enhance the other.


1330
01:48:36,182 --> 01:48:45,808
In the 1960s, Africans had a lot of misgivings about American foreign policy in Africa,

1331
01:48:45,808 --> 01:48:50,298
because unfortunately at that time the American foreign policy

1332
01:48:50,298 --> 01:48:56,877
was supportive of the colonial policies of countries like Belgium.

1333
01:48:56,877 --> 01:49:04,312
And the only voice which was echoing the aspirations of Africans in the United States was that of Malcolm.

1334
01:49:04,312 --> 01:49:11,531
And there were many Americans who came, but none, NONE without exception

1335
01:49:11,531 --> 01:49:16,305
who had the impact that Malcolm had!

1336
01:49:16,305 --> 01:49:24,190
The man of a message and the message was not to America only.

1337
01:49:24,190 --> 01:49:27,078
Malcolm what is your purpose here?

1338
01:49:27,078 --> 01:49:30,777
Well, my purpose here is to remind the African heads of state

1339
01:49:30,777 --> 01:49:33,740
that there are 22 million of us in America

1340
01:49:33,740 --> 01:49:36,017
who are also of African descent

1341
01:49:36,017 --> 01:49:42,808
and to remind them also that we are the victims of America's colonialism or American imperialism,

1342
01:49:42,808 --> 01:49:45,347
and that our problem is not an American problem,

1343
01:49:45,347 --> 01:49:46,852
it's a human problem.

1344
01:49:46,852 --> 01:49:49,824
It's not a Negro problem, it's a problem of humanity.

1345
01:49:49,824 --> 01:49:53,038
It's not a problem of civil rights, but a problem of the human rights.

1346
01:49:53,038 --> 01:50:02,100
Malcolm traveled into 14 African nations and met with 11 heads of state.

1347
01:50:02,100 --> 01:50:05,564
U.S. intelligence agencies followed him from country to country.

1348
01:50:05,564 --> 01:50:15,713
In Nigeria, he was given the name Omowale, "the son returns."

1349
01:50:15,713 --> 01:50:22,026
When my father was abroad, we had a world map on the living room wall

1350
01:50:22,026 --> 01:50:27,549
and any time you got a little lonesome and wondered where Daddy was, we'd run over to that map,

1351
01:50:27,549 --> 01:50:29,546
and "Where is he now?"

1352
01:50:29,546 --> 01:50:33,134
And he's in Cairo, which is the capital of Egypt,

1353
01:50:33,134 --> 01:50:38,390
and he's over here with Nkrumah and he's over... so there was a different kind of passage

1354
01:50:38,390 --> 01:50:42,122
that we maintained when he was abroad.


1355
01:50:42,122 --> 01:50:48,848
Malcolm returned in late November 1964.

1356
01:50:48,848 --> 01:50:52,910
He resumed his weekly OAAU rallies at the Audubon Ballroom

1357
01:50:52,910 --> 01:51:00,280
and continued his collaboration with Alex Haley on his autobiography.

1358
01:51:00,280 --> 01:51:05,356
He said, "You know, I'm writing this book and I don't really know about doing this book."

1359
01:51:05,356 --> 01:51:08,749
He had some problems with the family having to be subjected to

1360
01:51:08,749 --> 01:51:11,263
what...the things that he would say!

1361
01:51:11,263 --> 01:51:13,750
I said, "Malcolm, you know what?

1362
01:51:13,750 --> 01:51:20,094
None of us are ever going to amount to anything until we get our mother out of Kalamazoo.

1363
01:51:20,094 --> 01:51:25,150
I had prayed on my mind for years, and I didn't talk about it, but it was eating away.

1364
01:51:25,150 --> 01:51:32,442
And he looked at me like, "I'm glad you said that 'cause it's been bothering me, too."

1365
01:51:32,442 --> 01:51:38,388
And he said, "Vonnie. Promise. I'll do something." And the next thing...

1366
01:51:38,388 --> 01:51:40,418
Malcolm never got back to me.

1367
01:51:40,418 --> 01:51:47,857
The next thing I knew, I got a call. My mother was in Lansing at my brother Philbert's.

1368
01:51:47,857 --> 01:51:52,708
Then he later told me that it had been pinned up in him all these years.

1369
01:51:52,708 --> 01:51:54,567
He didn't want to think about it.

1370
01:51:54,567 --> 01:51:59,412
He certainly didn't want to talk about it, because he did not feel good about it.

1371
01:51:59,412 --> 01:52:07,213
But he felt so great when he and his brother came together to have their mother released.

1372
01:52:09,366 --> 01:52:16,607
In December 1964, Malcolm debated at the Oxford Union in England.


1373
01:52:16,607 --> 01:52:23,272
I read once, passingly, about a man named Shakespeare.

1374
01:52:23,272 --> 01:52:25,192
I only read about him passingly,

1375
01:52:25,192 --> 01:52:29,267
but I remember one thing he wrote that kind of moved me.

1376
01:52:29,267 --> 01:52:32,314
He put it in the mouth of Hamlet, I think, it was,

1377
01:52:32,314 --> 01:52:38,226
who said, "To be or not to be." He was in doubt about something!

1378
01:52:38,226 --> 01:52:46,020
whether it was nobler in the mind of man to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune

1379
01:52:46,020 --> 01:52:48,502
moderation

1380
01:52:48,502 --> 01:52:55,071
or to take up arms against a sea of troubles and by opposing end them.

1381
01:52:55,071 --> 01:52:56,783
And I go for that.

1382
01:52:56,783 --> 01:52:58,861
If you take up arms, you'll end it,

1383
01:52:58,861 --> 01:53:01,530
but if you sit around and wait for the one who's in power

1384
01:53:01,530 --> 01:53:04,024
to make up his mind that he should end it,

1385
01:53:04,024 --> 01:53:05,726
you'll be waiting a long time.

1386
01:53:05,726 --> 01:53:09,760
And in my opinion, the young generation of whites, blacks, browns, whatever else there is,

1387
01:53:09,760 --> 01:53:14,083
you're living at a time of extremism, a time of revolution,

1388
01:53:14,083 --> 01:53:16,102
a time when there's got to be a change.

1389
01:53:16,102 --> 01:53:17,903
People in power have misused it

1390
01:53:17,903 --> 01:53:21,171
and now there has to be a change and a better world has to be built

1391
01:53:21,171 --> 01:53:26,050
and the only way it's going to be built with, is with extreme methods.

1392
01:53:26,050 --> 01:53:28,558
And I, for one, will join in with anyone

1393
01:53:28,558 --> 01:53:33,421
I don't care what color you are! ... as long as you want to change this miserable condition

1394
01:53:33,421 --> 01:53:35,342
that exists on this earth.

1395
01:53:35,342 --> 01:53:38,450
Thank you.

1396
01:53:38,450 --> 01:53:45,008
Malcolm was always involved somewhere in the struggle, and I remember,

1397
01:53:45,008 --> 01:53:53,489
in January of 1965, Juanita Poitier set up a meeting at her house

1398
01:53:53,489 --> 01:53:57,655
for the regular civil rights leaders

1399
01:53:57,655 --> 01:54:02,593
to meet with Malcolm X to work out the differences between us

1400
01:54:02,593 --> 01:54:07,872
so we could come from that meeting with a common platform.

1401
01:54:07,872 --> 01:54:12,251
Once again, A. Phillip Randolph were there, Whitney Young was there, Dorothy Height was there...

1402
01:54:12,251 --> 01:54:18,064
Malcolm X was there. Several others were there. Martin Luther King couldn't make it,

1403
01:54:18,064 --> 01:54:19,709
but he sent a representative.

1404
01:54:19,709 --> 01:54:23,656
And we spent that day discussing Malcolm's philosophy,

1405
01:54:23,656 --> 01:54:26,686
the mistakes he made, what he wanted to do now

1406
01:54:26,686 --> 01:54:34,417
and how he could get on board the people's struggle that was taking place.


1407
01:54:34,417 --> 01:54:39,744
In his effort to support a black united front,

1408
01:54:39,744 --> 01:54:43,058
Malcolm accepted an invitation from SNCC,

1409
01:54:43,058 --> 01:54:48,289
the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee, to speak in Selma, Alabama.

1410
01:54:48,289 --> 01:54:53,242
It was the first time he had traveled south to work with the civil rights movement.

1411
01:54:53,242 --> 01:54:59,060
MALCOLM X: And I think that the people in this part of the world would do well

1412
01:54:59,060 --> 01:55:04,159
to listen to Dr. Martin Luther King and give him what he's asking for

1413
01:55:04,159 --> 01:55:08,881
and give it to him fast, before some other factions come along

1414
01:55:08,881 --> 01:55:11,804
and try to do it another way.


1415
01:55:11,804 --> 01:55:16,159
The next week, Malcolm was denied entry into France

1416
01:55:16,159 --> 01:55:21,451
on the grounds that his presence would disturb public order.

1417
01:55:21,451 --> 01:55:23,971
By this time, Malcolm began to believe that

1418
01:55:23,971 --> 01:55:29,844
the forces arrayed against him were bigger than the Nation of Islam,

1419
01:55:29,844 --> 01:55:35,890
but he maintained his relentless pace.

1420
01:55:35,890 --> 01:55:41,419
Whenever I saw my father out publicly, you know, from a child's perspective, you know,

1421
01:55:41,419 --> 01:55:45,885
at an airport ... it was an invasion. You know, you're going to pick up Daddy from the airport

1422
01:55:45,885 --> 01:55:51,297
and there's a slew of photographers and other people and you haven't seen him in two or three weeks

1423
01:55:51,297 --> 01:55:54,714
and all you want is that hug.

1424
01:55:54,714 --> 01:55:58,350
I was certainly privy to the fact that we were being stalked as a family,

1425
01:55:58,350 --> 01:56:00,745
that the atmosphere surrounding the house,

1426
01:56:00,745 --> 01:56:06,062
the cars that would be parked, faces that were familiar to me once upon a time

1427
01:56:06,062 --> 01:56:10,026
their attitudes had changed.



1428
01:56:10,026 --> 01:56:16,939
The night Malcolm returned from Europe, his family's home was firebombed.

1429
01:56:16,939 --> 01:56:22,856
Asleep in the house were Malcolm, his pregnant wife, his four children.

1430
01:56:22,856 --> 01:56:25,629
They escaped unharmed.

1431
01:56:25,629 --> 01:56:30,768
And this was probably the thing that surfacely upset him most

1432
01:56:30,768 --> 01:56:40,554
because this got underneath the image of Malcolm, the fearsome, the indomitable Malcolm X.

1433
01:56:40,554 --> 01:56:48,159
This got to the father and the husband of Sister Betty and their daughters.

1434
01:56:48,159 --> 01:56:54,094
He has told me in the past that he has been having some harassment.

1435
01:56:54,094 --> 01:56:56,930
Could you give us an idea of some of the things that have happened?


1436
01:56:56,930 --> 01:57:00,353
Well, in July when I was in the hospital having my last baby,

1437
01:57:00,353 --> 01:57:05,148
my three small daughters saw my husband almost killed across the street and...

1438
01:57:05,148 --> 01:57:09,644
:How was he almost killed?

1439
01:57:09,644 --> 01:57:19,178
Well, some... he was in his car and some men were rushing to the side of his car, on both sides of it.

1440
01:57:19,178 --> 01:57:21,042
And he managed to get away.



1441
01:57:21,042 --> 01:57:23,472
Had you had any threats... anything like this?


1442
01:57:23,472 --> 01:57:27,816
Had any threats? That's all I get is threats!!!

1443
01:57:27,816 --> 01:57:35,362
I get not less than six or seven threatening phone calls everyday.

1444
01:57:35,362 --> 01:57:40,703
I was surprised to hear that the house had been bombed,

1445
01:57:40,703 --> 01:57:46,676
but I was not surprised to know or that it had been done by Muslims,

1446
01:57:46,676 --> 01:57:51,653
because I know that's the way they fight.

1447
01:57:51,653 --> 01:57:56,648
I know... be that the case, it could not have happened without Yusuf Shah...

1448
01:57:56,648 --> 01:57:58,390
could not have happened.

1449
01:57:58,390 --> 01:58:03,577
It could not have happened except by the Muslims that are there in New York!

1450
01:58:03,577 --> 01:58:09,737
The Nation of Islam accused Malcolm of setting fire to his own home,

1451
01:58:09,737 --> 01:58:12,740
rather than vacating, as ordered by the court.

1452
01:58:12,740 --> 01:58:19,554
Later that day, the Nation's representative, Captain Joseph, inspected the scene.

1453
01:58:19,554 --> 01:58:21,440
Who bombed his house?

1454
01:58:21,440 --> 01:58:24,933
I don't know. All we know, it just got on fire.

1455
01:58:24,933 --> 01:58:26,635
Does Malcolm know who bombed his house?

1456
01:58:26,635 --> 01:58:28,835
I don't know. He never said,

1457
01:58:28,835 --> 01:58:32,981
and if he did, you know, he should.... should have brought them to justice.

1458
01:58:32,981 --> 01:58:39,941
There were news reports of threats against his life.

1459
01:58:39,941 --> 01:58:42,005
Was his life really in danger?

1460
01:58:42,005 --> 01:58:47,039
Maybe it was. He said it was. He said it was.

1461
01:58:47,039 --> 01:58:52,286
Do you feel now that there was a climate within the Nation itself that put his life in danger?

1462
01:58:52,286 --> 01:58:55,318
Well, as you know, in the Nation,

1463
01:58:55,318 --> 01:59:00,958
you have all kinds of people, and they have different thoughts.

1464
01:59:00,958 --> 01:59:03,121
You have sympathizers.

1465
01:59:03,121 --> 01:59:07,125
They'd have different thoughts, you know.

1466
01:59:07,125 --> 01:59:11,894
And you have people, they're not even attached to the community

1467
01:59:11,894 --> 01:59:14,938
that like what they hear but they just can't live the life.

1468
01:59:14,938 --> 01:59:19,301
Anything might happen. That scare you!

1469
01:59:19,301 --> 01:59:26,470
So anything could happen. The atmosphere was there. It was being said it was there.

1470
01:59:26,470 --> 01:59:32,407
You see, you got to understand, you know, Mr. Muhammad and what he represented.

1471
01:59:32,407 --> 01:59:35,705
That's what the people don't understand.


1472
01:59:35,705 --> 01:59:38,829
MALCOLM X: I wanted you to know that my house was bombed.

1473
01:59:38,829 --> 01:59:45,090
It was bombed by the Black Muslim movement upon the orders of Elijah Muhammad.

1474
01:59:45,090 --> 01:59:47,281
Now, they had come around to...

1475
01:59:47,281 --> 01:59:51,401
they had planned to do it from the front and the back so that I couldn't get out.

1476
01:59:51,401 --> 01:59:55,969
And the fire hit the window and it woke up my second oldest baby.

1477
01:59:55,969 --> 01:59:59,485
And then it... but the fire burned on the outside of the house.

1478
01:59:59,485 --> 02:00:01,804
But had that fire... had that one gone through the window,

1479
02:00:01,804 --> 02:00:06,090
it would have fallen on a six-year-old girl, a four-year-old girl and a two-year-old girl.

1480
02:00:06,090 --> 02:00:11,308
And I'm going to tell you, if it had done it, I'd taken my rifle and gone after anybody in sight.

1481
02:00:11,308 --> 02:00:15,135
I would not wait, 'cause in... and I said it because of this.

1482
02:00:15,135 --> 02:00:20,642
The police know the criminal operation of the Black Muslim movement

1483
02:00:20,642 --> 02:00:23,790
because they have thoroughly infiltrated.

1484
02:00:23,790 --> 02:00:28,325
The only thing that I regret in all of this

1485
02:00:28,325 --> 02:00:34,999
is that two black groups have to fight and kill each other off.

1486
02:00:34,999 --> 02:00:39,304
Elijah Muhammad could stop the whole thing tomorrow just by raising his hand.

1487
02:00:39,304 --> 02:00:40,850
Really, he could.

1488
02:00:40,850 --> 02:00:44,211
He could stop the whole thing by raising his hand, but he won't.

1489
02:00:44,211 --> 02:00:46,223
He doesn't love black people.

1490
02:00:46,223 --> 02:00:47,962
He doesn't even love his own followers,

1491
02:00:47,962 --> 02:00:50,107
proof of which, they're killing each other.

1492
02:00:50,107 --> 02:00:53,804
They killed one in the Bronx. They shot another one in the Bronx.

1493
02:00:53,804 --> 02:01:00,803
They tried to get six of us Sunday morning and the pattern has developed across the country.

1494
02:01:00,803 --> 02:01:04,296
The man has gone insane, absolutely out of his mind.

1495
02:01:04,296 --> 02:01:08,445
Besides, you can't be 70 years old and surround yourself

1496
02:01:08,445 --> 02:01:15,430
by a handful of 16-, 17-, 18-year-old girls and keep your right mind. You can't do it!

1497
02:01:18,322 --> 02:01:23,049
My name is Gene Roberts and I was assigned by the New York City Police Department

1498
02:01:23,049 --> 02:01:35,419
to infiltrate Malcolm's organization, report back membership, names, weapons, if any.

1499
02:01:35,419 --> 02:01:44,919
And I attended meetings and was part of the security on occasions.

1500
02:01:44,919 --> 02:01:55,833
And at this particular meeting, I was standing up front along with about four or five others guys,

1501
02:01:55,833 --> 02:02:09,048
and I heard a commotion in the middle to my right.

1502
02:02:09,048 --> 02:02:11,115
I started for the commotion

1503
02:02:11,115 --> 02:02:15,272
and I see this young fellow come down the middle aisle

1504
02:02:15,272 --> 02:02:24,094
and then slip into about the second or third row and take a seat.

1505
02:02:24,094 --> 02:02:30,344
And he was wearing a blue suit, a white shirt and red tie,

1506
02:02:30,344 --> 02:02:36,978
which is basically the uniform for the members of the Nation of Islam.

1507
02:02:36,978 --> 02:02:41,977
So after the meeting, I reported back to the department that

1508
02:02:41,977 --> 02:02:47,358
I felt I had just saw [sic] a dry run on Malcolm's life

1509
02:02:47,358 --> 02:02:52,064
and when that was going to go down I wasn't sure.


1510
02:02:52,064 --> 02:02:56,271
Malcolm did not expect to live another week.

1511
02:02:56,271 --> 02:02:59,960
He promised to reveal the names of those plotting his death

1512
02:02:59,960 --> 02:03:04,723
at next Sunday's meeting at the Audubon Ballroom.

1513
02:03:04,723 --> 02:03:09,504
The night before, he had said he didn't think it would be a good idea

1514
02:03:09,504 --> 02:03:17,726
for us to come to the Audubon, and then the next day,

1515
02:03:17,726 --> 02:03:23,004
he called and said that we could come.

1516
02:03:23,004 --> 02:03:30,533
And I was very happy, you know, that I could go because I had not seen him in 24 hours.

1517
02:03:30,533 --> 02:03:40,926
When my mother received the call from my father for us to all get together and come down to the Audubon,

1518
02:03:40,926 --> 02:03:46,058
I knew that was different. That was a rhythm change by that time,

1519
02:03:46,058 --> 02:03:49,237
with all of the things that were going on.

1520
02:03:49,237 --> 02:04:01,294
And all the while, it was still an exciting venture to get ready and go see Daddy. And we got there

1521
02:04:01,294 --> 02:04:09,053
he was late, and we sat at a booth stage right, downstage right.


1522
02:04:09,053 --> 02:04:21,524
Malcolm came in and I escorted him from about the middle of the ballroom to the wings backstage.

1523
02:04:21,524 --> 02:04:30,925
When I got there, I had noticed there were some people already present,

1524
02:04:30,925 --> 02:04:39,242
and there was three people sitting on the first row.

1525
02:04:39,242 --> 02:04:41,358
They were sitting there, reading newspapers.

1526
02:04:41,358 --> 02:04:46,927
Nobody's paying them any mind. And Malcolm was still in the back.

1527
02:04:46,927 --> 02:04:51,987
Benjamin Goodman came out and opened up the meeting.

1528
02:04:51,987 --> 02:04:59,722
I opened up for him, and he had set down behind me and he said, "Make it plain."

1529
02:04:59,722 --> 02:05:07,305
"Make it plain" is the code word that he used for us to bring him forward.

1530
02:05:07,305 --> 02:05:10,708
So, anyway, I did. I brought Minister Malcolm forward.

1531
02:05:10,708 --> 02:05:14,592
He didn't like a lot of icing...you know, "Here's Minister Malcolm, the great" and all that.

1532
02:05:14,592 --> 02:05:18,377
He didn't like that. Just plain, you know.

1533
02:05:18,377 --> 02:05:27,707
Then I heard a lot of shots and I looked up,

1534
02:05:27,707 --> 02:05:31,911
and these three that was sitting across the front

1535
02:05:31,911 --> 02:05:39,477
are now working their way from Malcolm's right to Malcolm's left, shooting at him.

1536
02:05:41,892 --> 02:05:48,736
I saw my husband falling back

1537
02:05:48,736 --> 02:05:52,787
falling back... He didn't bend.

1538
02:05:52,787 --> 02:06:01,621
He just fell straight back. And then I tried to ... I forgot my children. I tried to get to him.

1539
02:06:01,621 --> 02:06:10,457
I was facing the assassins, so I saw them stand up and take my father's life...

1540
02:06:10,457 --> 02:06:17,219
an image that... I wondered if I could have prevented it.


1541
02:06:53,936 --> 02:06:56,351
I was going to the Audubon that day,

1542
02:06:56,351 --> 02:07:03,237
had gotten lazy and had said, simply, "Ah, I'll go next week,"

1543
02:07:03,237 --> 02:07:06,879
and so proceeded to go into the kitchen, put some coffee on,

1544
02:07:06,879 --> 02:07:08,193
turn on the radio...

1545
02:07:08,193 --> 02:07:15,149
In my little apartment there, I had a little black-and-white kitchen table with these little black chairs

1546
02:07:15,149 --> 02:07:18,784
and had this little black radio on that table.

1547
02:07:18,784 --> 02:07:25,425
And I clicked the radio on, as I stood there, thinking about what had happened the night before.

1548
02:07:25,425 --> 02:07:33,727
Turned towards the stove to pick up my coffee and a flash came through on this station

1549
02:07:33,727 --> 02:07:38,438
and said Malcolm had been assassinated.



1550
02:07:51,335 --> 02:07:55,119
[weeping] And I froze.

1551
02:07:55,119 --> 02:08:02,082
I remember turning in that kitchen and screaming.


1552
02:08:02,082 --> 02:08:08,905
I was in the home of a Jewish family,

1553
02:08:08,905 --> 02:08:13,855
and they said very casually that, "Malcolm X has been assassinated."

1554
02:08:13,855 --> 02:08:17,743
[weeping] Then someone said,

1555
02:08:17,743 --> 02:08:25,441
"After all he was anti-Semitic," and I took exception to this,

1556
02:08:25,441 --> 02:08:30,264
knowing full well he was not.

1557
02:08:30,264 --> 02:08:43,133
Then I excused myself and I went into the bathroom and cried for about 15 minutes.

1558
02:08:43,133 --> 02:08:52,047
There nothing on earth would make me accept Malcolm's assassination, nothing.

1559
02:08:52,047 --> 02:08:54,452
As far as I'm concerned, it may sound a bit weird,

1560
02:08:54,452 --> 02:08:59,239
but he's alive, very much, and one day I'll get even.

1561
02:08:59,239 --> 02:09:04,118
That's the way I go to bed every night.


1562
02:09:06,209 --> 02:09:10,460
Three members of the Nation of Islam were arrested and convicted of the murder,

1563
02:09:10,460 --> 02:09:19,573
but the question of a larger conspiracy to silence Malcolm X was never explored.

1564
02:09:19,573 --> 02:09:23,981
Well, Malcolm X said that the Black Muslims were trying to kill him

1565
02:09:23,981 --> 02:09:28,360
and he was going to name those he thought would commit the crime yesterday before he was shot.

1566
02:09:28,360 --> 02:09:30,426
Could you comment on that?

1567
02:09:30,426 --> 02:09:35,787
I don't know... I don't have any knowledge of anyone trying to kill Malcolm.

1568
02:09:35,787 --> 02:09:40,033
I wasn't remorseful, I wasn't sorry.

1569
02:09:40,033 --> 02:09:43,606
For what?

1570
02:09:43,606 --> 02:09:50,064
And as Mr. Muhammad said, he taught violence and he died violently.

1571
02:09:50,064 --> 02:09:52,964
And he was a hypocrite.

1572
02:09:52,964 --> 02:09:56,560
And I say that he was a Benedict Arnold.

1573
02:09:56,560 --> 02:10:12,282
The night before the funeral, the Nation of Islam held its annual Savior's Day convention in Chicago.

1574
02:10:12,282 --> 02:10:19,345
Well, I got the news that my brother Malcolm had been shot dead and I was shocked,

1575
02:10:19,345 --> 02:10:27,286
but I know that he was traveling on a very reckless and dangerous course

1576
02:10:27,286 --> 02:10:33,625
and if I was able to say I was not shocked, I would be telling a lie.

1577
02:10:33,625 --> 02:10:40,863
But, brothers and sisters, I appreciate these few minutes of speaking to you.

1578
02:10:40,863 --> 02:10:47,221
Brother Malcolm is dead and there's nothing we can do to bring him back.
AUDIENCE: Right.


1579
02:10:47,221 --> 02:10:54,891
And we would be ignorant, with conditions as they are today for the so-called Negro,

1580
02:10:54,891 --> 02:10:59,442
to get confused and go to fighting and arguing among ourselves...
AUDIENCE: Right.


1581
02:10:59,442 --> 02:11:03,771
...and forget all about the one that caused us to be in this condition in the first place.

1582
02:11:07,770 --> 02:11:10,511
On the day of Malcolm's funeral,

1583
02:11:10,511 --> 02:11:20,811
I was in the hotel room with my brother, and we were watching it, Philbert and I.

1584
02:11:20,811 --> 02:11:25,275
And so we saw it on television.

1585
02:11:25,275 --> 02:11:29,814
I didn't have... maybe thought I should have been there,

1586
02:11:29,814 --> 02:11:33,907
but I had no intentions of being out there.

1587
02:11:33,907 --> 02:11:38,129
When you knew the circumstances and the kind of people that you were dealing with,

1588
02:11:38,129 --> 02:11:40,661
you had to do your own thinking.

1589
02:11:40,661 --> 02:11:45,982
And there was no place for me at that time.


1590
02:11:45,982 --> 02:11:49,471
You don't know what kind of nut sitting around there,

1591
02:11:49,471 --> 02:11:53,050
thinking that they're doing God's will and all this kind of stuff,

1592
02:11:53,050 --> 02:11:55,322
and here's a member of his family.

1593
02:11:55,322 --> 02:11:57,554
You don't know what they're liable to do...

1594
02:11:57,554 --> 02:12:05,328
So, for that reason, I wasn't there. And that's why I'm still here, I guess.

1595
02:12:30,541 --> 02:12:34,707
Of all the leaders that I knew and loved and admired

1596
02:12:34,707 --> 02:12:38,020
and just walked with and walked behind, this one,

1597
02:12:38,020 --> 02:12:41,281
as I said before, had been closest to me.

1598
02:12:41,281 --> 02:12:44,711
I felt I was losing a son.

1599
02:12:44,711 --> 02:12:49,448
So I thought that I would like my children and generations to come

1600
02:12:49,448 --> 02:12:55,434
to know this most important aspect of Malcolm X,

1601
02:12:55,434 --> 02:12:59,228
that he was indeed our manhood, you know,

1602
02:12:59,228 --> 02:13:01,028
our shining black prince

1603
02:13:01,028 --> 02:13:07,330
who didn't hesitate to die because he loved us so.

1604
02:13:07,330 --> 02:13:18,078
I thought that, in honoring him, we honored the best in ourselves.


1605
02:13:22,493 --> 02:13:26,403
When the funeral was over and then the Muslims came

1606
02:13:26,403 --> 02:13:31,596
and dressed him for a proper Muslim burial.

1607
02:13:31,596 --> 02:13:36,900
And after that we went out to the cemetery.

1608
02:13:36,900 --> 02:13:39,792
When we got there, you know,

1609
02:13:39,792 --> 02:13:46,433
the professional gravediggers were standing there with their shovels, but some of the black brothers said, "No, uh-uh.

1610
02:13:46,433 --> 02:13:55,432
We can't let you do that. We dig this grave," you know, "We cover this brother with dirt."

1611
02:13:55,432 --> 02:14:01,503
And I was proud, at that moment, to be black.

1612
02:14:14,332 --> 02:14:16,295
I don't think we ever got to be friends or ever could have.

1613
02:14:16,295 --> 02:14:23,804
I think our respective skin colors and his view of this great division would have prevented that,

1614
02:14:23,804 --> 02:14:25,944
but I think we did get to a...

1615
02:14:25,944 --> 02:14:31,971
we moved from a relationship in which these encounters were interviews

1616
02:14:31,971 --> 02:14:35,461
to a relationship in which they were conversations.

1617
02:14:35,461 --> 02:14:40,897
And even at my first encounter, I never felt

1618
02:14:40,897 --> 02:14:45,245
it's weird to say this, but I never took it personally.

1619
02:14:45,245 --> 02:14:49,366
Even with my blue eyes and even with him talking about the "blue-eyed devil,"

1620
02:14:49,366 --> 02:14:56,370
I never took it personally. I knew I was part of the indited group,

1621
02:14:56,370 --> 02:15:00,633
but he had a way of making you feel comfortable, feel as if you were talking man to man.

1622
02:15:00,633 --> 02:15:07,201
I look at my watch or I show up late somewhere and I can hear Malcolm talking about

1623
02:15:07,201 --> 02:15:15,506
not trusting a person who doesn't wear a watch and who is careless with time.

1624
02:15:15,506 --> 02:15:24,622
And he first said that to me when I was 14 years old, and I hear it in my ear today like he's still there, saying it.

1625
02:15:24,622 --> 02:15:26,662
Well, what is your ultimate aim?

1626
02:15:26,662 --> 02:15:28,971
MALCOLM X: The only way the problem can be solved

1627
02:15:28,971 --> 02:15:33,678
first, the white man and the black man have to be able to sit down at the same table.

1628
02:15:33,678 --> 02:15:36,325
The white man has to feel free to speak his mind

1629
02:15:36,325 --> 02:15:38,856
without hurting the feelings of that Negro,

1630
02:15:38,856 --> 02:15:41,635
and the so-called Negro has to feel free to speak his mind

1631
02:15:41,635 --> 02:15:44,472
without hurting the feelings of the white man.

1632
02:15:44,472 --> 02:15:47,221
Then they can bring the issues that are under the rug out on top of the table

1633
02:15:47,221 --> 02:15:49,562
and take an intelligent approach to get the problem solved.


1634
02:15:49,562 --> 02:15:52,297
REPORTER: Do you consider yourself militant?

1635
02:15:52,297 --> 02:15:59,184
MALCOLM X: (laughing) I consider myself Malcolm!

1636
02:16:01,255 --> 02:16:14,022
(subtitles by deniseactivarq)