Malcolm X: I’m for intelligent, disciplined defense of rights

Malcolm X: The Last Speeches is one of Pathfinder’s August Books of the Month. These excerpts are from a speech and discussion at a Feb. 15, 1965, rally of the Organization of Afro-American Unity, attended by 700 people in New York. After splitting with the Nation of Islam, Malcolm founded the OAAU in June 1964. Its aim, he said, was “to use whatever means necessary to bring about a society in which the 22 million Afro-Americans are recognized and respected as human beings.” This talk was given soon after Malcolm’s Feb. 3-4 trip to Alabama and the day after the firebombing of his house, one of several attempts on his life by the Nation. A week later, on Feb. 21, 1965, this outstanding working-class revolutionary leader was assassinated. Copyright © 1989. Reprinted by permission of Pathfinder Press.

BY MALCOLM X
I went to Alabama purposely to see what was happening down there. While I was there, I wasn’t trying to interfere with [Martin Luther] King’s program, whatever it was. He was in jail. I talked, I spoke at Tuskegee, [Laughter] I spoke at Tuskegee Institute last Tuesday night, I think it was. There were over 3,000 students and others. And it was the students themselves that night who insisted that I go with them the next morning to Selma, some students from SNCC [Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee]. So I went. After giving it careful thought, I went.

When I got to Selma, the press began to bug me right away. And I wouldn’t even tell them my name. I just ignored them completely. So they insisted that I hold a press conference. I didn’t ask for a press conference. They insisted that I hold a press conference. Which was held. And while the press was there, the Klan was there. When you’re looking at the cops in Alabama, you’re looking at the Klan. That’s who the Klan is. [Applause]

Knowing where I was, right then and there, I reminded Lyndon B. Johnson of the promise he had made to good, well-meaning Americans when he was running for president. He said that if he were elected he would pull the sheets off the Ku Klux Klan. Did he not say that? Yes, he did. So, here you’ve got Klansmen knocking little babies down the road with a. … You’ve got Klansmen knocking Black women down in front of a camera and that poor fool Black man standing on the sidelines because he’s nonviolent. Now, we don’t go along with a thing like that. [Applause]

Well, it was then, in Selma, Alabama, in front of the face of the Ku Klux Klan that I demanded in your name, the Organization of Afro-American Unity — could I make that demand in your name? [Applause] — that since 97 percent of the Black people in this country had supported Lyndon B. Johnson and his promise, and now that his party has the largest majority that any president has had in a long time, Lyndon B. Johnson is obligated to the Black man in this country to put up an immediate federal commission to investigate the Ku Klux Klan, which is a criminal organization organized to murder and maim and cripple Black people in this country.

And, I pointed out that if Lyndon B. Johnson could not keep his promise and expose the Ku Klux Klan, then we would be within our rights to come to Alabama and organize the Black people of Alabama and pull the sheets off the Klan ourselves. [Applause] And we can do it. Brothers and sisters, we can do it. And the federal government won’t do it. Since then, they’ve been talking about a little investigation of the Klan and the Citizens’ Council and the Black Muslims and some of the others. But they’re not going to do anything. The only way the Klan is going to be stopped is when you and I organize and stop them ourselves. Yes, that’s what’s out there. …

Don’t I think that we should become involved in some direct action, demonstrations? We are going to unveil our program on that next Sunday at two o’clock. Brother, I’m for anything you’re for as long as it’s going to get some results. I’m for anything you’re for. [Applause] As long as it’s intelligent, as long as it’s disciplined, as long as it’s aimed in the right direction — I’m for it.

And what determines what we should do, or shouldn’t do, will in no way be influenced by what the man downtown thinks. We don’t need anybody on the outside laying the ground rules by which we are going to fight our battles. We’ll study the battle, study the enemy, study what we’re up against, and then outline or map our own battle strategy. And we’ll get some results. But as long as you have someone coming in from the outside telling you how you should do it and how you shouldn’t do it — and always what they tell you is nonviolence, peaceful, love everybody, forgive them Lord, they know not what they do. As long as you get into that kind of bag, why you’ll never get anywhere.

What we want is to let them know that our aims are just. Our aims are within the realm of justice. And since they are, we’re justified in going after those aims.

Don’t you know it’s a disgrace for the United States of America to let — to have Martin Luther King, my good friend, the Right Reverend Dr. Martin, in Alabama, using school children to do what the federal government should do. Think of this. Those school children shouldn’t have to march. Why Lyndon Johnson is supposed to have troops down there marching. Your children aren’t supposed to have to get out there and demonstrate just to vote. Is it that bad? It shows our so-called leaders have been outmaneuvered.

Every day, you look on the television, you listen to the radio, you read the newspaper, and see where Black people are going to jail by the hundreds, by the thousands. You don’t do this in a civilized country. In any other country, the government would do its job. But this exists only because the government is not doing its job. They’ve got Martin Luther King down there with crocodile tears crying his way into jail and still coming out and haven’t got the ballot yet. We can get the ballot. [Applause]

Didn’t they pass the civil rights bill? Just a minute, didn’t they pass the civil rights bill and have made it legal. Don’t you know that anywhere our people want to register and vote they’re within their legal rights? All you and I have to do is show that we’re men. And when we, and when they go to vote, we go with them. With them. With them. Prepared! [Applause]

Not prepared to make trouble. Not prepared to cause trouble. But prepared to protect ourselves in case trouble comes our way. [Applause] And no one can find fault with that.

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