At Canaan's Edge (124 page)

sedan stalled by the riverfront hotel: FRUS, Vol. 2, p. 494; Langguth,
Vietnam,
pp. 351–52; Sheehan,
Bright,
pp. 463–64; NYT, March 30, 1965, p. 1; STJ, March 30, 1965, p. 1.

“we're not sure if it's male or female”: LBJ phone call with Situation Room duty officer, 8:10
A.M.
, March 30, 1965, Cit. 7181, Audiotape WH6503.16, LBJ.

“cleared up the policy on taps”: LBJ phone call with Robert McNamara, 8:14
A.M.
, March 30, 1965, Cit. 7182, Audiotape WH6503.16, LBJ.

the White House was preparing a statement: “Statement by the President on the Bombing of the U.S. Embassy in Saigon, March 30, 1965,” PPP, 1965, p. 347.

“with a high wall around it”: LBJ phone call with McGeorge Bundy, 9:12
A.M.
, March 30, 1965, Cit. 7183–84, Audiotape WH6503.16, LBJ.

fellow New England aristocrat: Bird,
Color,
pp. 15, 32; Yoder,
Joe Alsop's,
pp. 33–39.

an ambulance, a truck, twenty-six cars: WATS report, Selma, March 29, 1965, March 30, 1965, 12:45
P.M
. and 1:30
A.M.
, Reel 15, SNCC; Mobile LHM dated April 2, 1965, p. 6, FDCA-771.

longshoreman and hotel bellhop: Branch,
Pillar,
pp. 125–27.

had defied his own deacons to open Tabernacle Baptist: Ibid., pp. 64–65, 81–84.

“hasten the day when every man”: NYT, March 31, 1965, p. 16.

assigning Lowndes among new trial projects: Int. Silas Norman, June 28, 2000; int. Bob Mants, Sept. 8, 2000; int. Timothy Mays, March 9, 2000.

“Don't go to Greene County”: Int. Mattie Lee Moorer, March 10, 2000.

Golden Frinks of North Carolina: Mobile LHM dated April 2, 1965, p. 6, FDCA-771, p. 7; Branch,
Pillar,
pp. 139–41.

“I pay traffic fines here”:
Chicago Tribune,
March 31, 1965, p. 14.

an anticlimactic freedom petition to the governor: “Wallace Meets Biracial Group,” NYT, March 31, 1965, p. 1; SAC, Mobile, to Director, March 27, 1965, FSMM-362.

16: BEARINGS IN A WHIRLWIND

by way of Los Angeles: SAC, Los Angeles, to Director, March 29, 1965, FK-1076.

to record him among the dignitaries:
Jet,
April 22, 1965, pp. 28–29; Stanton,
From Selma,
p. 178.

“soon died out because few knew the words”: NYT, March 31, 1965, p. 22.

Observed from the gate by FBI surveillance agents: FBI New York to Director, March 31, 1965, FK-1148.

King suffered a letdown from Selma: Int. Harry Wachtel, Nov. 29, 1983; int. Clarence Jones, Jan. 16, 1984; int. Bayard Rustin, Sept. 24, 1984; int. Andrew Young, Oct. 26, 1991.

a windfall gift of $25,000 for SCLC: Hoffa to King, March 29, 1965, A/KP12f44; King to Hoffa, April 12, 1965, A/KP12f44.

Wachtel forwarded the papers to Anthony Liuzzo: Wachtel to Anthony Liuzzo, March 31, 1965, A/KP25f29.

he privately called “stupid”: Hoover to Katzenbach, April 2, 1965, FSC-279; FBI HQ LHM dated April 2, 1965, FK-2831.

announcing in King's name: NYT, March 28, 1965, p. 1.

“we want the federal government to come in here”: Fairclough,
Redeem,
p. 258.

“are of course admirable”: NYT, March 30, 1965, p. 46.

Other newspapers decried the notion: BAA, April 3, 1965, p. 24.

SCLC board met through the week: Garrow,
Bearing,
pp. 415–17.

“throw thousands of Negroes in Alabama”: NYT, April 2, 1965, p. 24.

“with a fifty-dollar hat”: Garrow,
Bearing,
p. 415.

into the cities of the North: Minutes, SCLC board meeting, April 1–2, 1965, p. 1, A/KP29f5.

Bevel wondered what could trouble city Negroes: Int. Bernard Lafayette, May 28, 1990.

Rustin, who favored attention to issues of economic justice: NYT, March 12, 1965, p. 17.

“We must not split what we have”: Minutes, SCLC board meeting, April 1–2, 1965, A/KP29f5.

Bevel campaigned to undermine him with King's executive staff: Int. Hosea Williams, Oct. 29, 1991.

somewhere at the Atlanta airport: FBI Baltimore to Director, April 1, 1965, FVL-75.

“and I am busier than Hoover”: SAC, Atlanta, to Director, April 14, 1965, FSC-NR.

Pressures of the world stage: Minutes, SCLC board meeting, April 1–2, 1965, pp. 1–16, A/KP29f5; Jesse L. Douglas to MLK, April 7, 1965, A/SC144f17; C. T. Vivian to MLK, April 9, 1965, A/KP28f2; Chauncey Eskridge to Andrew Young, April 13, 1965, A/SC39.

“I know of no one that articulates my ideas”: Minutes, SCLC board meeting, April 1–2, 1965, p. 7, A/KP29f5.

Board members first recoiled in shock: Garrow,
Bearing,
p. 417.

depressed before Selma: Ibid. Branch,
Pillar,
pp. 530–33, 540–43.

a new black mistress of stylish discretion: Int. Clarence Jones, Jan. 16, 1984; int. John Lewis, May 31, 1984; confidential interviews; Garrow,
Bearing,
p. 421.

Settlement was imminent: Garrow,
Bearing,
p. 421.

house of $10,000 was a haunting luxury: Ibid. Also Stein,
Journey,
pp. 108–9.

“conscience fairly devoured him”: King,
My Life,
pp. 75, 179.

Afro-American
devoted an issue: BAA, April 3, 1965, pp. 1, 27–28.

fraud arrests at a local barber school:
Baltimore Sun,
April 1, 1965, p. 54.

Rev. C. K. Steele admonished King: Garrow,
Bearing,
p. 417.

Rustin disparaged Abernathy: Int. Bayard Rustin, Sept. 24, 1984.

“Who are we”: Int. Clarence Jones, Jan. 16, 1984; int. Harry Wachtel, Nov. 29, 1983; int. Bayard Rustin, Sept. 24, 1984; int. Andrew Young, Oct. 26, 1991.

“We must by all means protect his symbolism”: Minutes, SCLC board meeting, April 1–2, 1965, p. 11, A/KP29f5.

King sought out Stanley Levison: Hoover to Katzenbach, April 15, 1965, FK-1212; Fairclough,
Redeem,
p. 257.

“Dear Martin”: Levison to MLK, April 7, 1965, A/KP14f40.

Wachtel and others slowly accommodated: Int. Harry Wachtel, Nov. 29, 1983.

scour future SCOPE workers: Hoover to SAC, Albany, “Summer Community Organization and Political Education (SCOPE) Program, Information Concerning (Internal Security),” n.d. (April 1965, based on Baumgardner to Sullivan, April 8, 1965), FSC-NR. Hoover's instructions concluded: “All offices are cautioned to conduct no inquiry which might give the impression that the FBI is investigating the legitimate activities of the SCLC.”

“If we can obtain information disproving”: Hoover to SACs, Atlanta, Knoxville, April 6, 1965, FK-1154.

Levison had read to fill hours: Int. Beatrice Levison, Jan. 3, 1984; int. Andrew Levison, Aug. 6, 1999.

“Selma was bigger than Birmingham”: Levison to MLK, April 7, 1965, A/KP14f40.

King was “too humble”: Int. Beatrice Levison, Jan. 3, 1984.

electing a broomstick: Wood,
Radicalism,
p. 366.

ordained the first female rabbi: Nadell,
Women,
pp. 168–69. Recent scholarship suggests that Regina Jonas of Offenbach, Germany, may have become history's first female rabbi in 1935, but Jonas and most records of the era were lost in the Holocaust. Cf. Elisa Klapheck,
Fräulein Rabbiner Jonas: The Story of the First Female Rabbi
. Wiley, 2004.

“a natural inclination in mankind”: Wood,
Radicalism,
p. 28.

17: TEN FEET TALL

Sculptress Jimilu Mason: PDD, April 6, 1965, p. 3, LBJ.

“I'm going to hold out that carrot”: Steel,
Walter Lippmann,
pp. 562–63; Bird,
Color,
p. 316.

“The vast Mekong River”: PPP, 1965, pp. 394–99.

Johnson mentioned a dream to end war itself: LBJ sent a succinct note of credo and congratulations to his confidante on issues of world peace and economics, British economist Barbara Ward: “My dear Barbara: Much of what you have written and what you have said and what you inspired was in that Baltimore speech. I have said that we must understand the world as it is if ever we want it to be as we wish. The Baltimore speech says exactly what I believe and what I hope.” LBJ to “Lady [Barbara Ward] Jackson, April 15, 1965, Name File, Barbara Jackson, LBJ.

“I call heaven and earth to record”: Deuteronomy 30:19.

“master stroke”: Max Ascoli in
The Reporter,
April 22, 1965, p. 8. “His speech on Vietnam, which was called definitive by the newspapers even before it was delivered, is the supreme evidence of the President's capacity for arousing consent among men of hitherto different opinions,” wrote Ascoli.

“a very timely and fine move”: LBJ phone call with Dwight D. Eisenhower, 5:58
P.M.
, April 8, 1965, Cit. 7330, Audiotape WH6504.03, LBJ.

mail to the White House shifted overnight: Logevall,
Choosing,
p. 371; FRUS, Vol. 2, p. 544.

Goldschmidt had collaborated: Oral history int. of Arthur E. Goldschmidt and Elizabeth Wickenden, June 3, 1969, LBJ.

never negotiate if the positions were reversed: Dallek,
Flawed,
p. 261.

social policy advocate since the New Deal: Ibid. Oral history int. of Elizabeth Wickenden, Nov. 6, 1974, LBJ; Caro,
Path,
pp. 451–54.

“Yeah, we're gonna pass it tonight”: LBJ phone call with Arthur “Tex” Goldschmidt, 10:27
A.M.
, April 8, 1965, Cit. 7329, Audiotape WH6504.03, LBJ.

Medicare did pass: Dallek,
Flawed,
p. 208.

Both education and voting rights cleared Senate hurdles: Associated Press,
World in 1965,
p. 259; Mann,
Walls,
p. 467.

Air Force jet fighter that was missing and presumed shot down: LBJ phone call with General James M. Fogel and Assistant Secretary of Defense Cyrus Vance, 12:05
A.M.
, April 9, 1965, Cit. 7331, Audiotape WH6504.03, LBJ; FRUS, Vol. 2, p. 535.

“I believe you can go”: LBJ phone call with McGeorge Bundy, 11:00
A.M.
, April 8, 1965, Cit. 7339, Audiotape WH6504.04, LBJ.

the first Major League baseball game ever played indoors: Associated Press,
World in 1965,
p. 78.

home run to right-center: NYT, April 10, 1965, p. 1.

Milwaukee Braves and Detroit Tigers played: NYT, March 28, 1965, p. F-15.

“on ground we didn't own”: Pomerantz,
Peachtree,
p. 381.

fifth year of a nationwide boom economy: NYT, March 28, 1965, p. F-14.

“I am not a prophet”: “Remarks at the Dedication of the Gary Job Corps Center, San Marcos, Texas, April 10, 1965,” PPP, 1965, pp. 408–12.

“Come over here, Miss Katie”: “Remarks in Johnson City, Tex., Upon Signing the Elementary and Secondary Education Bill,” April 11, 1965, PPP, 1965, pp. 412–14.

$1.3 billion, which covered only 6 percent: Dallek,
Flawed,
pp. 196–203; Goldman,
Tragedy,
pp. 350–63.

“Poverty has many roots”: Associated Press,
World in 1965,
pp. 76–77.

Johnson waxed euphoric: Goldman,
Tragedy,
pp. 363–65.

He mingled at the ceremony: PDD, April 11, 1965, pp. 5–6, LBJ.

mimicking his awkward gringo gait: Caro,
Path,
pp. 167–71; Adler,
Johnson Humor,
p. 91. 209 Quoting Thomas Jefferson's admonition: Dallek,
Flawed,
p. 201.

On Palm Sunday in Selma: Eagles,
Outside Agitator,
p. 51.

“The bishop says”: Judy Upham oral history dated June 9, 1966, p. 24, JDC.

pull on dress gloves: Jonathan Daniels, “A Burning Bush,”
New Hampshire Churchman,
June 1965.

“You goddam scum”: Upham and Daniels, “To Whom It May Concern,” May 12, 1965, BIR/C8f24; Judy Upham oral history dated June 9, 1966, p. 25, JDC.

Daniels and Upham stifled rage: Daniels and Upham, “Report from Selma—April, 1965,” in
Episcopal Theological School Journal,
January 1966, p. 6, JDC.