Pillar of Fire (112 page)

met secretly in Brookhaven: Cagin and Dray,
We Are Not Afraid
, p. 325; Nelson,
Terror in the Night
, p. 26.

“Selfishness is the festive queen”: Dillard,
Clear Burning
, p. 124.

“We are men who humbly submit”: Ibid., p. 121.

“We are being deluged”: Moses to Lowenstein, nd (circa Feb. 1964), b9f302, Lowenstein Papers, UNC.

sixty counties on a single night: Whitehead,
Attack on Terror
, p. 26.

“mushroomed toward ten thousand”: Cagin and Dray,
We Are Not Afraid
, p. 325.

Hamer was distributing: Report by Tom Scarbrough, Investigator, Feb. 21, 1964, MSSC.

“not to give this group”: Ibid.

curtail Tougaloo College: Johnson to Gov. Johnson, Lt. Gov. Carroll Gartin, and State Senator E. K. Collins, March 26, 1964, MSSC.

“a list of the trustees”: Erle Johnston, Jr., to File, subject, “Tougaloo College,” April 13, 1964, MSSC.

“we are in a position to guarantee”: Johnston to Dr. W A. Hotchkiss, April 17, 1964, MSSC. Wesley Hotchkiss, the Sovereignty Commission's target, was a senior official in the United Church of Christ. As mentor and employer to Andrew Young, Hotchkiss shepherded Martin Luther King's citizenship program and as mentor to Robert Spike and the new Commission on Religion and Race, he became a linchpin of national church support for Mississippi Freedom Summer. (Int. Andrew Young, Oct. 26, 1991.)

President Beittel submitted: Dittmer,
Local People
, pp. 234-36. Dittmer suggests more darkly that the CIA accomplished Beittel's removal through its connections with another Tougaloo trustee, president Barnaby Keeney of Brown University.

“We have put into action”: Johnston to Herman Glazier, Office of the Governor, June 9, 1964, MSSC.

publisher William Loeb: Whalen and Whalen,
The Longest Debate
, p. 145.

“Don't Forget to Vote”:
Manchester Union Leader
, March 5, 1964, p. 1.

“the Negro will gain the upper hand”: Ibid.

“rolling into the Granite State”: Ibid.

“ROAR APPROVAL OF BARRY”:
Manchester Union Leader
, March 6, 1964, p. 1.

presented as “The Gipper”:
Manchester Union Leader
, March 6, 1964, p. 11.

“A democracy cannot exist”: Ibid.

“supported a statewide ballot initiative”: Edwards,
Reagan
, p. 123.

harbinger of national backlash:
Time
, Sept. 25, 1964, p. 23; Totton J. Anderson and Eugene C. Lee, “The 1964 Election in California,”
The Western Political Quarterly
, June 1965, pp. 451-74; G. V. Kennard, “Fair Housing Showdown in the West,”
America
, Jan. 28, 1967, pp. 142-46.

“Every citizen must rise up”:
California Eagle
, Feb. 20, 1964, p. 1.

personal inspection on March 6: Lesher,
George Wallace
, p. 274. A month later, after Wallace stunned the nation by gathering 264,000 votes in Wisconsin, the
New York Times
published a story about his haphazard campaign there on the spontaneous initiative of “Delores Herbstreith, a 34-year-old mother of three.” NYT, April 12, 1964, p. 76.

“The Negroes are starting”: Reinhold Niebuhr to Will Scarlett, Feb. 3, 1964, Box 33, RN.

half a million children stayed home: PC, Feb. 15, 1964, p. 3.

“alienates the friends”: Norman Thomas to Allard Lowenstein, March 18, 1964, b3f307, Lowenstein Papers, UNC.

headquarters moved swiftly: Sizoo to Sullivan, Feb. 4, 1964, FR-77; SAC, New York, to Director, Feb. 5, 1964, FR-NR.

“the Negro people”:
New York Daily News
, Feb. 6, 1964, p. 4.

“Rustin is now at the very least”: SAC, New York, to Director, and NY LHM, March 2, 1964, FR-NR.

“a tremendous opportunity”: SAC, New York, to Director, Feb. 7, 1964, FBI File No. 100-3-104-34, Serial 518. In March, Director Hoover notified his New York office that the Rustin wiretap suggested a parallel opening to develop “certain animosities” between Rustin and Wyatt Walker, who was leaving King's Atlanta staff to live in New York. He added that the Rustin-Walker rivalry offered “potential for Bureau exploitation in neutralizing the influence of Martin Luther King….” Director to SAC, New York, March 19, 1964, FK-NR.

twenty-one incoming officers: Baumgardner to Sullivan, March 25, 1964, and May 8, 1964, both from the file on the National Council of Churches, FBI File No. 100-50869.

“widen the rift”: Bland to Sullivan, Feb. 7, 1964, with attached anonymous press release, “The Rift Widens Between Elijah Muhammad and His Principal Lieutenant Malcolm X Little,” FMX-NR.

fed directly into the
Chicago Defender
: CD, Feb. 11, 1964, p. 2. With candor rare among recipients of FBI leaks, the
Defender
acknowledged that its source was an “anonymous, alleged ‘insider.'” The portions of the letter printed in the paper are slightly more sophisticated than the headquarters draft, suggesting that the text was improved by Muslim specialists in the Chicago FBI office.

“All the papers have it”: Wiretap intercept of Feb. 11, 1964, in SAC, Chicago, to Director, Feb. 14, 1964, FMX-4092, p. 4.

evening of February 17: Int. Burke Marshall, Sept. 26, 1984, int. Cartha “Deke” DeLoach, June 1, 1984.

“who desperately wants to become Vice President”: DeLoach to Hoover, Feb. 18, 1964, FK-315.

“Katzenbach did his dirt”: Hoover's handwritten note, Ibid.

fn “excised Lee Harvey Oswald's name”: Gentry,
J. Edgar Hoover
, p. 556.

Johnson fired two White House aides: DeLoach to Hoover, March 6 and March 9, 1964, Section 92, FHOC.

“We'll let Bobby and them”: LBJ phone call with Ed Weisl, Sr., Feb. 5, 1964, Cit. 1901, Audiotape WH6402.07, LBJ.

Johnson personally supervised: Cf. LBJ phone call with political adviser Cliff Carter, Feb. 10, 1964, Cit. 2006, Audiotape WH6402.13; LBJ phone call with DNC chairman John Bailey, Feb. 11, 1964, Cit. 2047, Audiotape WH6402.14; LBJ phone call with Cliff Carter, Feb. 12, 1964, Cit. 2056, Audiotape WH6402.15, LBJ.

“my two bits”: LBJ phone call with Cliff Carter, Richard McGuire, and Kenneth O'Donnell, Feb. 11, 1964, Cit. 2050, Audiotape WH6402.14, LBJ.

“it's gonna be a problem”: Ibid.

“shocking indeed”: Baumgardner to Sullivan, March 4, 1964, FK-312.

“We have not lost”: CDD, March 11, 1964, p. 18.

“Drawbacks plagued each option.”: Garrow,
Bearing the Cross
, pp. 314-16; int. James Bevel, May 17, 1985; int. Diane Nash, April 26, 1990.

fn received suspended sentences: NYT, March 10, 1964, p. 30; March 14, 1964, p. 19.

King broke away for: Garrow,
Bearing the Cross
, p. 316; SAC, New Haven, to Director, March 12, 1964, FK-NR.

Marquette had dropped: SAC, Milwaukee, to Director, March 9, 1964, FK-323.

commendation upon the agent: O'Reilly,
Racial Matters
, pp. 148-49.

another honorary degree: Baumgardner to Sullivan, April 2, 1964, FK-348.

“said if it were not”: DeLoach to Mohr, April 8, 1964, FK-349.

Kennedy's body had not yet cooled: DeLoach to Hoover, March 6, 1964, Section 92, FHOC.

“I made no comment”: Ibid.

Guthman peace feeler: Int. Edwin Guthman, June 25, 1984.

in the White House pool: PDD, March 9, 1964, LBJ.

“absolutely clean”: Hoover file memo of 3:07
P.M.
, March 12, 1964, Section 92, FHOC; LBJ phone call with J. Edgar Hoover, March 12, 1964, Cit. 24912, Audiotape WH6403.09, LBJ.

batch of weekly reports: Garrow,
FBI and Martin
, p. 110.

second thoughts on hiring Bayard: Hoover to Walter Jenkins, March 9, 1964, FK-NR.

report on Paul Corbin: LBJ phone call with DeLoach, March 12, 1964, Cit. 2489, Audiotape WH6403.09, LBJ.

the Bureau's chief suspect: Hoover file memo of 4:34
P.M.
, March 9, 1964, Section 92, FHOC; LBJ phone call with Hoover, March 9, 1964, Cit. 2422, Audiotape WH6403.06, LBJ.

“I do
not
want anything on King”: Hoover's handwritten note on DeLoach to Mohr, March 16, 1964, FK-320.

fn “I told Judge Smith”: Ibid. DeLoach recorded that Ed Willis of Louisiana, then chairman of the House Committee on Un-American Activities, also sought permission to attack King with FBI materials.

his forthcoming poverty program: DeLoach to Mohr, “Re: President Johnson's ‘Message on Poverty,'” March 10, 1964, Section 92, FHOC.

“The informality, yet quiet dignity”: DeLoach to LBJ, March 16, 1964, WHCF, PR, Box 367, LBJ

Court's announcement: NYT, March 10, 1964, p. 1.

“a bunch of niggers”: NYT, March 9, 1964, p. 42. Cox's comments were made to John Doar of the U.S. Justice Department in the presence of
Times
correspondent Claude Sitton. Aaron Henry, Bob Moses, David Dennis, and Edwin King soon tried to force Cox off civil rights cases because of demonstrated bias. Pleadings in the case were retained in King's files, A/SC14f23.

“so concerned about being”: King oral history int. by Berl Bernhard, March 9, 1964, p. 9, JFK.

“They had me chained”: Ibid., p. 14.

“They were very, very upset”: Ibid., p. 40.

“I really think we saw”: Ibid., p. 9, also p. 26.

“At this point”: Ibid., p. 31.

“He's rather a psycho”: RFK oral history int. by John Bartlow Martin, April 13, 1964, p. 195, JFK.

“a very dangerous organization”: Ibid., p. 197.

“in every way”: Ibid., pp. 191, 194.

agents had spotted Stanley Levison: SAC, Atlanta, teletype to Director and New York, March 10, 1964, FSC-NR.

made King send for Levison: Wiretap transcripts of telephone conversations between Stanley Levison and Clarence Jones, March 2, 1964, FLNY9-460a, and March 5, 1964, FLNY9-463a; also wiretap transcript of Stanley and Bea Levison, March 10, 1964, FLNY9-468a, and wiretap transcript of Stanley Levison and Roy Bennett, Feb. 29, 1964, FLNY9-458a.

starve to death: Wiretap transcript of telephone conversation between Stanley Levison and his brother, Roy Bennett, Feb. 27, 1964, FLNY7-710a.

labored over publishing conflicts: Wiretap transcripts of telephone conversations between Stanley Levison and King's literary agent, Joan Daves, Feb. 18, 1964, FLNY7-701a, and February 26, 1964, FLNY9-450a; also Daves to MLK on book rights, Feb. 19, 1964, A/KP27f9.

“It, of course”: Baumgardner to Sullivan, March 20, 1964, FK-NR, regarding King's article “The Hammer of Civil Rights” in
The Nation
, March 9, 1964, pp. 230-34.

second bonanza of microphone surveillance: Garrow,
FBI and Martin
, pp. 108-9.

twenty-one reels of tape: “Summary—Highly Sensitive Coverage—Martin Luther King, Jr.,” Nov. 27, 1964, FK-1024.

West Coast SCLC office: Int. Thomas Kilgore, Feb. 11, 1988.

not cried this time: Dora McDonald to MLK, Feb. 18, 1964, A/SC1f15.

professorship for King: Ibid.

could not and would not: Hoover sent a summary of the intercepted King material to Walter Jenkins on March 6, but waited until after his March 9 meeting with President Johnson to send the summary, dated March 4, to Kennedy. Brennan to Sullivan, April 18, 1968, FK-3388; Garrow,
FBI and Martin
, p. 110.

cipher without duties: RFK oral history int. by John Bartlow Martin, April 13, 1964, p. 195, JFK.

crueler, gratuitous sting: Garrow,
FBI and Martin
, p. 110.

“Look at her”: Author's interviews with FBI officials.

“vilification of the late President”: Hoover blind file memo of April 9, 1968, Section 24, FHOC.

“deep personal appreciation”: RFK to MLK, June 5, 1964, A/KP24f22.

18. T
HE
C
REATION OF
M
UHAMMAD
A
LI

Harlem radio station WWRL: NYT, March 7, 1964, p. 15.

“That's political!”: Int. Benjamin Karim, Aug. 31, 1991.

Malcolm had taken liberties: ADW, March 7, 1964, p. 1.

“I am honored”:
New York Post
, March 9, 1964, p. 4; FMXNY-4149.

intercepted Malcolm on the Triborough Bridge: NY LHM of March 16, 1964, FMX-107.