.[90] "Our problem today is that we have allowed
the internal to become lost in the external ... So much of modern life can be
summarized in that arresting dictum of the poet Thoreau: 'Improved
means to an unimproved end'." - Martin Luther King,
Jr., Nobel
Lecture, December 11, 1964
Opposition to the Vietnam War
Starting in 1965, King began to
express doubts about the United States' role in the Vietnam War. In an April 4,
1967 appearance at the New York City Riverside Church—exactly
one year before his death—King delivered a speech titled "Beyond Vietnam".[91]
He spoke strongly against the U.S.'s role in the war, insisting that the U.S.
was in Vietnam "to occupy it as an American colony"[92]:107 and calling the U.S.
government "the greatest purveor/vendor/ of violence in the world
today".[92]:102 He also argued that the
country needed larger and broader moral changes:
A true revolution of values will soon look
uneasily on the glaring contrast of poverty and wealth. With righteous
indignation, it will look across the seas and see individual capitalists of the
West investing huge sums of money in Asia, Africa and South America, only to
take the profits out with no concern for the social betterment of the
countries, and say: "This is not just."[92]:109
King also was opposed to the Vietnam
War on the grounds that the war took money and resources that could have been
spent on social welfare services like the War on Poverty.
The United States Congress was spending more and more on the military and less and
less on anti-poverty programs at the same time. He summed up this aspect by
saying, "A nation that continues year after year
to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is
approaching spiritual death".[92]:109
King's opposition cost him
significant support among white allies, including President Johnson, union
leaders and powerful publishers. "The press is being stacked against
me," King complained.[93] Life magazine called the speech "demagogic
slander that sounded like a script for Radio Hanoi",[92]:109 and The Washington Post declared that King had "diminished his
usefulness to his cause, his country, his people."[94]:148
King stated that North Vietnam
"did not begin to send in any large number of supplies or men until
American forces had arrived in the tens of thousands".[92]:106 King also criticized the United States' resistance to North
Vietnam's land reforms.[95]
He accused the United States of having killed a million
Vietnamese, "mostly children."[96]
The speech was a reflection of
King's evolving political advocacy in his later years, which paralleled the
teachings of the progressive Highlander
Research and Education Center,
with whom King was affiliated.[97][98]
King began to speak of the need for fundamental changes in the political and
economic life of the nation. Towards the time of his
murder, King more frequently expressed his opposition to the war and his desire
to see a redistribution of resources to correct racial and economic injustice.[99]
Though his public language was guarded, so as to avoid being linked to
communism by his political enemies, in private he sometimes spoke of his
support for democratic socialism. In one speech, he stated that "something
is wrong with capitalism" and
claimed, "There must be a better distribution of
wealth, and maybe America must move toward a democratic socialism."[100]
King had read Marx while at Morehouse, but while he rejected "traditional
capitalism," he also rejected Communism because of its "materialistic
interpretation of history" that denied religion, its "ethical
relativism," and its "political totalitarianism."[101]
King also stated, in his
"Beyond Vietnam", speech that "true
compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar ... it comes to see
that an edifice/structure/ which produces beggars needs restructuring".[102]:122 King
quoted a United States official who said that, from Vietnam to Latin America,
the country was "on the wrong side of a world revolution."[102]:122
King condemned America's "alliance with the landed
gentry of Latin America," and said that the United States should support
"the shirtless and barefoot people" in the Third World rather than suppressing their attempts at revolution.[102]:122–3
King spoke at an Anti-Vietnam
demonstration where he also brought up issues of civil rights and the draft.
I have not urged a mechanical fusion of the civil
rights and peace movements. There are people who have come to see the moral
imperative of equality, but who cannot yet see the moral imperative of world
brotherhood. I would like to see the fervor of the civil-rights movement imbued
into the peace movement to instill it with greater strength. And I believe
everyone has a duty to be in both the civil-rights and peace movements. But for
those who presently choose but one, I would hope they will finally come to see
the moral roots common to both.[103]
In 1967,
King gave another speech, in which he lashed out against what he called the
"cruel irony" of American blacks fighting and dying for a country
which treated them as second class citizens:
We were taking the young black men who had been
crippled by our society and sending them eight thousand miles away to guarantee
liberties which they had not found in Southwest Georgia and East
Harlem. ... We have been repeatedly faced with the cruel irony of watching
Negro and white boys on TV screens as they kill and die together for a nation
that has been unable to seat them in the same schools.[104][105]
On January 13, 1968, the day after
President Johnson's State of the Union Address, King called for a large march
on Washington against "one of history's most cruel and senseless
wars".[106][107]
We need to make clear in this political year, to
congressmen on both sides of the aisle and to the president of the United
States, that we will no longer tolerate, we will no longer vote for men who
continue to see the killings of Vietnamese and Americans as the best way of advancing
the goals of freedom and self-determination in Southeast Asia.[106][107]
Personality
and public image
FBI
surveillance and wiretapping
J. Edgar Hoover, the director of the Federal
Bureau of Investigation, for
years had been suspicious about potential influence of communists in social movements
such as labor unions and civil rights.[157]
Hoover directed the FBI to track King in 1957, and the SCLC as it was
established (it did not have a full-time executive director until 1960);[51]
its investigations were largely superficial until 1962, when it learned that
one of King's most trusted advisers was New York City lawyer Stanley Levison.
The FBI found Levison had been involved with the Communist Party USA.[158]:
233 The FBI feared Levison was working
as an "agent of influence" over King,
in spite of its own reports in 1963 that Levison had left the Party and was no
longer associated in business dealings with them.[158]:71–3[158]:70–4 Another King lieutenant, Hunter Pitts O'Dell, was also linked to the Communist Party by sworn testimony
before the House
Un-American Activities Committee
(HUAC).[159]
However, by 1976 the FBI had acknowledged that it had
not obtained any evidence that King himself or the SCLC were actually involved
with any communist organizations.[160]
The Bureau received authorization to
proceed with wiretapping from Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy in the fall of
1963[161]
and informed President John F. Kennedy, both of whom unsuccessfully tried to
persuade King to dissociate himself from Levison.[162]
Although Robert Kennedy only gave written approval for limited wiretapping of
King's phones "on a trial basis, for a month or so",[163]:372 Hoover extended the clearance so his men were
"unshackled" to look for evidence in any areas of King's life they
deemed worthy.[163]:372–4 The Bureau placed wiretaps on Levison's and King's home and
office phones, and bugged King's rooms in hotels as he traveled across the
country.[162][164]
For his part, King adamantly denied
having any connections to Communism, stating in a 1965 Playboy interview
that "there are as many Communists in this freedom
movement as there are Eskimos in Florida",[77]:362 and claiming that Hoover was
"following the path of appeasement of political powers in the South"
and that his concern for communist infiltration of the civil rights movement
was meant to "aid and abet the salacious claims of southern racists and
the extreme right-wing elements".[160]
Hoover did not believe his pledge of innocence and replied by saying that King
was "the most notorious liar in the country."[165]
After King gave his "I Have A Dream" speech during the March on
Washington on August 28, 1963, the FBI described King as "the most dangerous and effective Negro leader in the
country".[164]
They alleged that King was "knowingly, willingly
and regularly cooperating with and taking guidance from communists".[158]:83
The attempt to prove that
King was a Communist was related to the feeling of many segregationists that
blacks in the South were happy with their lot but had been stirred up by
"communists" and "outside agitators".[166]
However, the civil rights movement arose from activism within the black
community dating back to before World War I. King said that "the Negro revolution is a genuine revolution, born from
the same womb that produces all massive social upheavals—the womb of
intolerable conditions and unendurable situations."[77]:363
Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm
X, March 26, 1964.
Allegations
of adultery
Having concluded that King
was dangerous due to communist infiltration, the FBI shifted to attempting to
discredit King through revelations regarding his private life. FBI surveillance of King, some of it since made public,
attempted to demonstrate that he also engaged in numerous extramarital affairs.[164]
Lyndon Johnson once said that King was a "hypocritical
preacher".[167]
Ralph Abernathy, a close associate of King's, stated in his 1989 autobiography And
the Walls Came Tumbling Down that King had a
"weakness for women".[168]
In a later interview, Abernathy said he only wrote the term "womanizing", did not specifically say King
had extramarital sex and that the infidelities King had were emotional
rather than sexual.[169][170]
King's biographer David Garrow wrote about a number of extramarital affairs,
including one woman King saw almost daily. According to Garrow, "that relationship, rather than his marriage,
increasingly became the emotional centerpiece of King's life, but it did not
eliminate the incidental couplings...of King's travels." King explained
his extramarital affairs as "a form of anxiety reduction." Garrow
noted that King's promiscuity was the cause of "painful and overwhelming
guilt".[171]
The FBI distributed reports
regarding such affairs to the executive branch, friendly reporters, potential
coalition partners and funding sources of the SCLC, and King's family.[172]
The Bureau also sent anonymous letters to King
threatening to reveal information if he did not cease his civil rights work.[173]
One anonymous letter sent to King just before he received the Nobel Peace Prize
read, in part, "The American public, the church
organizations that have been helping—Protestants, Catholics and Jews will know
you for what you are—an evil beast. So will others who have backed you. You are
done. King, there is only one thing left for you to do. You know what it is.
You have just 34 days in which to do (this exact number has been selected for a
specific reason, it has definite practical significant [sic]). You are done.
There is but one way out for you. You better take it before your filthy
fraudulent self is bared to the nation."[174]
King interpreted this as encouragement for him to commit suicide,[175]
although William Sullivan, head of the Domestic Intelligence Division at the
time, argued that it may have only been intended to "convince Dr. King to
resign from the SCLC."[160]
King refused to give in to the FBI's threats.[176]
Judge John Lewis Smith, Jr. in 1977 ordered that all known copies of the recorded
audiotapes and written transcripts resulting from the FBI's electronic
surveillance of King between 1963 and 1968 to be held in the National
Archives and sealed from public access until
2027.[ Across from the Lorraine Motel, next to the boarding
house in which James Earl Ray was staying, was a fire station. Police officers
were stationed in the fire station to keep King under surveillance.[178] Using papered-over windows with
peepholes cut into them, the agents were watching the scene while Martin Luther
King was shot.[179] Immediately following the shooting,
officers rushed out of the station to the motel, and Marrell McCollough, an
undercover police officer, was the first person to administer first aid to
King.[180] The antagonism between King and the
FBI, the lack of an all points bulletin to find the killer,
and the police presence nearby have led to speculation that the FBI was
involved in the assassination 177]
I'd like somebody to
mention that day that Martin Luther King Jr. tried to give his life serving
others. I'd like for somebody to say that day that Martin Luther King Jr. tried
to love somebody.
I want you to say that day
that I tried to be right on the war question. I want you to be able to say that
day that I did try to feed the hungry. I want you to be able to say that day
that I did try in my life to clothe those who were naked. I want you to say on
that day that I did try in my life to visit those who were in prison. And I
want you to say that I tried to love and serve humanity.
Yes, if you want to say that I was a drum major.
Say that I was a drum major for justice. Say that I was a drum major for peace.
I was a drum major for righteousness. And all of the other shallow things will
not matter.[129]
Public stance on political parties
As the leader of the SCLC,
King maintained a policy of not publicly endorsing a U.S. political party or
candidate: "I feel someone must remain in the position of non-alignment,
so that he can look objectively at both parties and be the conscience of both—not
the servant or master of either."[29]
In a 1958 interview, he
expressed his view that neither party was perfect, saying, "I don't think
the Republican Party is a party full of the almighty God nor is the Democratic Party.
They both have weaknesses ... And I'm not inextricably bound to either
party."[30]
King critiqued both
parties' performance on promoting racial equality:
Actually, the Negro has been betrayed by both the
Republican and the Democratic Party. The Democrats have betrayed him by
capitulating to the whims and caprices of the Southern Dixiecrats. The
Republicans have betrayed him by capitulating to the blatant hypocrisy of
reactionary right wing northern Republicans. And this coalition of southern
Dixiecrats and right wing reactionary northern Republicans defeats every bill
and every move towards liberal legislation in the area of civil rights.[31]
Personal
political advocacy
Although King never
publicly supported a political party or candidate for president, in a letter to
a civil rights supporter in October 1956 he said that he was undecided as to
whether he would vote for the Adlai Stevenson or Dwight Eisenhower, but
that "In the past I always voted the Democratic ticket."[32]
In his autobiography,
King says that in 1960 he privately voted for Democratic candidate John F.
Kennedy: "I felt that Kennedy would make the best president. I never came
out with an endorsement. My father did, but I never made one." King adds
that he likely would have made an exception to his non-endorsement policy in
1964, saying "Had President Kennedy lived, I would probably have endorsed
him in 1964."[33]
ምንም አስተያየቶች የሉም:
አስተያየት ይለጥፉ