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It is my delight to introduce this year's higher lecture . DR panel. E joseph dr joseph is the Barbara Jordan Chair in ethics and political values. The founding director of the Center for the Study of Race

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and Democracy at the LBJ School of Public Affairs and professor of history at the University of texas Austin. Dr joseph's career focus has been on black power studies , which encompasses interdisciplinary fields such as africana studies,

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law and society, women's and ethnic studies and political science. Prior to joining the UT faculty, joseph was professor at Tufts University where he founded the school's Center for the Study of Race and Democracy to promote

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engaged research and scholarship focused on the ways issues of race and democracy affect people's lives. In addition to being a frequent commentator on issues of race, democracy and civil rights, joseph wrote the award winning books

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, Waiting Till the Midnight Hour, a narrative history of black power in America and dark days, Bright nights from Black Power to Barack Obama. His most recent book, Stokely a Life has been called the

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definitive biography of Stokely Carmichael, the man who popularized the phrase black power. And I will note after the lecture concludes at 12 30 we will be having a book signing here in this room. Dr joseph

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. Welcome to Austin Seminary. You look forward to the word you bring to us today. All right , thank you for that introduction and really thank you for this invitation. Um I want to talk today

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um a little bit about my background um as a as an introduction into a discussion of really Race, democracy, the civil rights movement, um black political activism and really citizenship. Both this idea and this

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quest for black citizenship and where we're at at this particular moment in time, especially considering what we've seen on the national stage, not just with the 2016 election And the last almost 24 months of um Of

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Potus 45. Um but also the recent Supreme Court uh hearings and confirmation of Brett Kavanaugh. And what does that mean in terms of four american democracy uh In terms of my background, I've been in Austin

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for four years, but I'm a native new yorker , very proud of that fact. Um But I'm also the proud son of immigrants from Haiti. So I'm very proud to be the descendant of of of

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Haitian activists and Haitian uh scholars and Haitian people who are really the first group of people who achieved independence in the Western hemisphere uh during the age of slavery , global hemispheric slavery. Um And I say that

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because I come to the study of african american history and politics and culture through a very specific and particular lens. My mother uh jemaine joseph is 79 years old, is retired, was a hospital worker for

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over 40 years in new york city, which is part of a union 11 99 S. C. I. U. Hospital workers Union. And I was on my first picket line in new york city

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um when I was in elementary school. So all these issues of everything from racism to poverty um to feminism. My mother's a proud feminist. Uh She was my first historian, she's my first teacher and

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articulator of social justice. Um grew up in Southside Jamaica queens and Brooklyn and went to a southern black baptist storefront church called New Bethel baptist Church. And at that church we talked about social justice. We

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talked about Malcolm X. Martin Luther king Jr. We talked about Fannie Lou Hamer talked about Ella baker . We talked about the civil rights movement and really the period of the civil rights movement that my own

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scholarship is called, the heroic period of the civil rights movement. And that's that period from the Brown Supreme Court desegregation decision, May, 17, for all the way to the signing of the Voting,

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Rights Act, August six, Uh so in a way um what I want to talk about today really touches upon all those things, but I preface that because the when we think about uh politics and history

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and public policy, a lot of times, we talk about this in very dispassionate ways. Um and what really fuels my my vocation as a teacher, as a scholar, as an activist is really a

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passionate belief um in social justice, in racial justice and racial equality, but also in this notion of black citizenship. I'm working on a book now. Uh and I was telling a santa about this on

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martin Luther King Junior and Malcolm X called the Sword and the Shield. And that book makes an argument about King and Malcolm X as to revolutionary uh political figures. Um it goes against James cone and the

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idea of american dream versus nightmare, because in doing research and following the evidence, I make an argument that when we look at Malcolm X's public career, we look at dr martin Luther King Junior's public career

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, even as they are perceived as antagonists, and at times they even perceive themselves to be antagonist. Um they are both political revolutionaries who are trying to transform the relationship between black people and the american government

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, but also transformed the idea of black humanity on the global stage. So I make an argument that Malcolm X is pursuing what he calls radical black dignity and Dr King is pursuing what he calls radical black

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citizenship and I'm gonna touch upon that during this talk , because One of the things that we find ourselves a place that we find ourselves in in 2018, really, um over half a century after that heroic

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period of the civil rights movement and really in the aftermath of the black power movement, is really grappling with this idea of black citizenship, and we've seen a social movement erupt in the context of the Black

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Lives Matter movement, that has pushed people to try to reconsider this notion of black citizenship. And when I think about this notion of black citizenship, I'm thinking about citizenship that goes beyond the 13th and 14th

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and 15th amendments, citizenship that goes beyond the voting rights act, that Fair Housing Act, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 citizenship. That in in the way that DR King imagined, and then I'll talk

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about the way the doctor that Malcolm X imagined citizenship that included an end to Jim Crow racial segregation, both in public schools and residential segregation, citizenship that included um food justice and health care. When we

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think about the poor people's campaign citizenship that was more expansive than just ending the politics of racial oppression and economic injustice in the United States. What King argued for when he talked about citizenship, and I think

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that the Black Lives Matter movement has argued for this as well, is an idea of citizenship that goes beyond just eliminating negative structures of oppression and really talks about fulsome citizenship, a citizenship that means that black

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people have active access to democratic institutions in american society , and that ranges from the criminal justice system to voting two equal and fair access to employment, um public schools that work Children that live in environmentally safe

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areas. When we think about the data right now , black Children are disproportionately living in environmentally unsafe areas and it's not just flint michigan, we're thinking about disproportionately um diagnosed with asthma disproportionately um are food insecure

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, disproportionately um are not at age appropriate reading level . And all this has to do with the politics of not just institutional racism and structural inequality, but the politics of white supremacy. And when we think

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about white supremacy, where Malcolm X comes in, is that Malcolm really serves as black America's prosecuting attorney in the context of post war american and African american history, because Malcolm X is unflinching in documenting the

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politics and practices of racial oppression on poor black people , both physically but also spiritually and psychologically Malcolm X in an age before mass incarceration. But in an age where African Americans were disproportionately embedded in the criminal

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justice system, spends almost seven years in prison. From 1946 up until August seven, at three different correctional facilities in the state of Massachusetts. And it's in prison that Malcolm X gains access to black history

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, he gains access to reading the classics uh in western literature, but it's in prison that he hones his debating skills, and he comes out of prison . And really, for the next almost 13 years

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, about 12.5 years, becomes the most vociferous critic of white supremacy and champion of the black working class in the history of 20th century America. So, when you think about what Malcolm X does for all

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of us, who are grappling with this idea of democracy and race and citizenship. Malcolm X, Malcolm X articulates the politics of racial oppression, but he explains it to both black and white people in very

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, very specific ways. He charges whites with crimes against black humanity that stretched back from slavery to the present. Not just his present but our own present right here. Um and when he does that,

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he does that in a way where he uses history and he uses politics and he uses rhetoric to form a cohesive narrative of not just black subjugation and black oppression, but he forms a cohesive narrative of the

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politics and practices of white supremacy. And it's important to understand when you think about the politics and practices of white supremacy. They are cultural, they are political, they are psychological. Um and when we

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think about it it goes beyond the alt right, it goes beyond the clan. We are witnessing the politics and practices of white supremacy in our everyday political culture. That was what was on display during the

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Kavanaugh hearings. That was a display of white privilege , of white pride, certainly of of male privilege and patriarchal privilege. But what Brett Kavanaugh just got away with it is now a sitting Supreme Court justice

00:12:03.960 - 00:12:16.700

. What the President of the United States is consistently getting away with is all framed against the backdrop of white supremacy. They didn't invent it, they're just enjoying the fruits of it, right? And what's

00:12:16.700 - 00:12:33.370

important for us is that Malcolm X actually articulates that on the world stage. And so very, very briefly, when you think about Malcolm X's black radical dignity versus dr King's black radical citizenship, some people

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think of those as being in opposition with each other . I make an argument that that's not true, they're actually converging with each other and if anything, what we see during their political careers is that they

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come closer to each other at the end of their careers than they were at the start of their careers . So, for instance, by 1964 when Malcolm X is traveling all across africa, he's traveling all

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across the Middle East. He makes this argument that the civil rights movement has to be a human rights movement, he's not the first one to make that argument, paul robeson had made that argument, IDa

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B Wells had made that argument, w E B du bois had made that argument, but in the post war period Malcolm X as the avatar of black power radicalism, and we think about the black power

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movement, a movement for radical, social, political , cultural, economic self determination, the idea that black people were gonna define phenomenon for themselves, um um both both the context and the structures of oppression

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, but also the tools of liberation and emancipation for themselves. They weren't going to seek advice or or seek to view their own oppression through the lens of others. So Malcolm becomes the avatar of that black

00:13:50.460 - 00:14:05.750

power movement, but he's he's also very, very much well aware that the movement in the United States is connected to anti colonial movements and indigenous people movements and Third World liberation all across the world, Right

00:14:07.140 - 00:14:20.400

. But but what's important for us when we think about Malcolm and King converging by 60 for Malcolm is publicly saying that there are aspects of what king is trying to achieve, that he decided that he agrees

00:14:20.400 - 00:14:31.380

with, he just disagrees with tactics, right? He's talking about self defense, he's talking about the need for a revolution and dr king, Even as king is gonna become, by 1965, a radical

00:14:31.380 - 00:14:50.760

political figure. By 1967, a revolutionary political figure , he always maintains uh an alliance and a belief in Nonviolence um in our contemporary context, we we have really softened king and turned king into um uh

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just a big giant teddy bear, you know, somebody who loved all of us and he'd give us all this big, big hug if he met us . When in truth, King is a man on

00:15:01.960 - 00:15:16.760

fire for social and political justice. And when you think about King kings, revolutionary and radical uh inspiration is not just the larger black power movement and his relationship with Stokely Carmichael Kwame ture, which I've documented

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in my in my most recent book. It's really also Malcolm X when we think about King by 1965 in the aftermath of the Watts uprising in Los Angeles , which starts five days after the passage of the

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voting rights Act. So from august 11th to august 18th, Watts explodes in what was then the largest civil disturbance in american history up until Detroit. Two years later, um King becomes a radical figure who

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no longer believes that the economic and political reforms of the johnson administration are going to be enough. So King no longer believes once he interrupt the vacation, flies into los Angeles and sees the wreckage of Watts

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and that that wreckage, he understands because of advisors like buyers Rustin and other social justice advocates is really about the convergence of race and class. So King starts to redefine and reimagine citizenship and black citizenship and

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what it means. And he starts to push for a citizenship that goes beyond legal and public policy interventions . He starts to push for a citizenship that is , it's so expansive that it will lead to the

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redistribution of not just wealth in the United States, but the redistribution of justice globally. So by the time he goes to Chicago and tries to not just desegregate uh Jim Crow, um public facilities in Chicago

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and in cicero and other parts of of of Illinois . He's really taking a massive, massive turn, but he's taking a page from Malcolm X's structural critique of racism and white supremacy. He's no longer just

00:17:11.410 - 00:17:27.610

trying to change hearts and minds. He understands that racism and economic injustice and militarism. And remember by 67 at Riverside Church, a year to the day he's assassinated april 4th, 1967 Riverside Church in new

00:17:27.610 - 00:17:42.810

york. King says that the triple threats facing humanity , our materialism, militarism and racism. So King becomes an anti imperialist publicly. By 67 Malcolm had been an anti imperialist his whole career Malcolm spoke about

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the Vietnam war before Dr King did Malcolm spoke about what Eisenhower and what Kennedy were doing globally before DR King was willing to speak about that, right? So when we think about both of their careers,

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we see much more convergence politically than we usually are led to believe. Um I did want to keep this so we can get a dialogue, but I want to connect what I've just said to the present

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as well and we can in question and answers, we can we can uh really dig deep deeper into uh sort of the genealogy. I'm I'm trying to to to lay out here when we think about the

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contemporary moment that we're in, especially the last five years. And the politics of Black Lives Matter, The Black Lives Matter movement is drawing from both civil rights and black power. It's drawing from the civil

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disobedience um and the non violent protests of the civil rights movement, but it's also drawing from black power , structural critique of institutional racism, white supremacy and us militarism. Right? So when we think about

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this idea of black lives Matter in the context of really the murders of Trayvon martin, um, the murders of so many uh black women and men, much of which was was shown nationally at times on

00:19:10.500 - 00:19:26.530

people's twitter feeds on social media everywhere, from um Ferguson Michael Brown to Baltimore Freddie gray, 12 year old uh, in Cleveland, was was murdered by the Cleveland police, Tamir rice, um, um

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, for just playing in a school ground. And , and uh, most of these um deaths of black folks, there's been no um, justice, uh, we see in Chicago recently, um,

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a police officer was found guilty of second degree murder , but they've been, they've been rare and and really infrequent. Uh, when we think about where we're at over 50 years later, one of the

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reasons why black Lives Matter has been criticized is because there's a failure to understand that the heroic period of the civil rights movement did not establish black citizenship. There there is no full citizenship for the majority of

00:20:10.730 - 00:20:23.080

African Americans in this country. This doesn't mean that they're not outliers. We've all heard about Malcolm Gladwell and the outliers, right? It doesn't mean that we didn't have the first black president elected in November

00:20:23.080 - 00:20:37.810

of 2008. Absolutely, there are exceptions and there are african american millionaires. There's an african american upper middle class or african american elites, citizenship should not have classes in a democracy. We live in a

00:20:37.810 - 00:20:53.480

democracy where citizenship is something that is purchased both by skin color by gender, bisexuality and the common denominator is race. So when we think about the Black Lives Matter movement with Blm exemplifies is the fact that

00:20:53.490 - 00:21:07.560

the heroic period of the civil rights movement as much as we've wanted to celebrate that period, and we should, we've made an argument that that period established black citizenship Through the Voting Rights Act and the Civil

00:21:07.560 - 00:21:22.060

Rights Act and the Federal Housing Open Housing Act of 68. This is untrue except for streams of African Americans who are a plurality of minority within the black community because it was 42 million black people who have

00:21:22.060 - 00:21:37.460

had access to um elite universities who have had access to building up wealth and not just having income, who had tremendous opportunities. And we know who many of these people are. So on some levels,

00:21:37.470 - 00:21:52.670

their symbolism has been used in a way that's against the wider community, because people say if this group of people have made it, how come, for instance, african americans who were displaced during Hurricane Katrina

00:21:52.740 - 00:22:07.140

could not get out of Louisiana, they could not get out of new Orleans. The idea that there was generational poverty that could be traced back uh to antebellum slavery and that folks had no money for cars

00:22:07.150 - 00:22:21.990

or car insurance or health insurance is alien to many people. Same thing with Ferguson, the idea that you could have a municipality that at one point was predominantly white, um that is now 67% african american

00:22:22.000 - 00:22:37.310

. Um uh two thirds of whom live below the poverty line. Uh and and the fact that they're undergoing structural oppression and at the same time being targeted by Ferguson police and city officials to pay fines and

00:22:37.310 - 00:22:53.350

warrants to raise over a million dollars a year. When you read the Justice Department report on Ferguson, they say that Ferguson was a criminal enterprise that was enacted by elected officials, Directed, directed and targeting

00:22:53.360 - 00:23:06.490

the black community in Ferguson. And Ferguson is not the only municipality that that is undergoing um that kind of targeting of black people, right? So when you, when you, when you have a bigger

00:23:06.490 - 00:23:19.650

context to understand uh that the heroic period of the civil rights movement did not establish black citizenship, What we are left with is a contemporary um time period and a contemporary era that we're in right now,

00:23:19.660 - 00:23:36.820

where BLM is trying to do a few different things on one level, is trying to raise national consciousness about structural inequality on another. It's making an argument that the criminal justice system in the United States represents

00:23:36.830 - 00:23:49.490

a gateway to multiple systems of oppression. And again , BLM is not the first organization to make that argument. Black panthers made that argument. Student nonviolent coordinating committee made that argument. Many civil rights groups

00:23:49.490 - 00:24:03.420

have made that argument. It's just that the BLM is making that argument for a new generation, but they're making it arguably at a time where there's even more skepticism to this idea of black citizenship on multiple

00:24:03.420 - 00:24:17.120

levels. There's skepticism to to wanting to achieve black citizenship and wanting to achieve black equality, not just racial equality but black equality, but there's also skepticism when people say there is no such thing as black

00:24:17.120 - 00:24:34.590

citizenship right now in contemporary american society. So they're they're they're up against a very specific historical time period where the idea of racial justice has been inverted and it's been inverted through an unearned celebration of Barack Obama's

00:24:34.600 - 00:24:52.550

presidency, right? This idea of post racialism, this idea that electing one person president or having one first family was going to do all the hard work of racial justice and wealth redistribution and ending segregation that

00:24:52.560 - 00:25:07.360

we have been unable to do for generations. Right ? So, in the aftermath of Obama's election, the new york Times headline read last barrier shouted, shattered last barrier. So new York Times said that

00:25:07.370 - 00:25:21.270

that's it, that's it. The last barrier was getting a black person elected president of United States. So you can ask yourself well, what about poverty ? What about unemployment, nope, that's the last

00:25:21.270 - 00:25:36.140

barrier. So it was Obama and Obama's election was supposed to bring in some kind of racial utopia or nirvana instead, what we saw during the eight years of Obama was an uptick massive uptick when we think

00:25:36.140 - 00:25:55.580

about Southern poverty law center in hate groups, massive uptick in in um uh white supremacist online and social media presence. We saw Ferguson and Baltimore, um we saw more movement to try to eradicate mass incarceration

00:25:55.590 - 00:26:08.550

and we saw this paradox, this juxtaposition of the first black president um elected with the most popular votes in american history, presiding over the world's biggest prison industrial complex, right? And and really a president

00:26:08.550 - 00:26:22.070

who didn't speak about this publicly until 2015 in the context of Ferguson and Baltimore. And then the charleston shooting as well. And then he visited the federal prison in Oklahoma, did a terrific speech before the

00:26:22.080 - 00:26:37.460

NaacP and in Selma also did a really tremendous speech where he talked about african american history. He talked about the history of lynching, he talked about feminism , he talked about social justice as a core american

00:26:37.460 - 00:26:49.570

value that came, that came late. That came , that came really, really late. And I want to close. So we can I do want to have a dialogue. So my my point in

00:26:49.570 - 00:27:07.270

talking about uh Malcolm x struggle uh for for radical black dignity. Dr King's notion of radical black citizenship and black lives matter in the context of the age of trump The age of of Kavanaugh is really to

00:27:07.270 - 00:27:22.030

put some questions out there for all of you because you guys um the women and men in the room are our faculty, our students are are intellectuals and scholars in in training is to put out the question

00:27:22.040 - 00:27:37.920

of where how far have we come in the half century since uh dr martin Luther King Junior's assassination, thursday april 4th 1968. How far have we traveled in terms of racial progress? Um Are we closer

00:27:37.920 - 00:27:52.640

to King's dream and notion of a beloved community in 2018 than we were in 1968? If the answer is no, I'd love to have a discussion of why not why aren't we closer to that dream of

00:27:52.640 - 00:28:07.080

a beloved community? Especially given the fact that we celebrate dr King's holiday every january. Especially given the fact that there is a King memorial in Washington, D. C. Especially given the context of the

00:28:07.090 - 00:28:22.150

opening of the African American History Museum, which is really the largest uh single federal project devoted to african american culture and life and history uh in the history of the Republic. Um When you go and you

00:28:22.150 - 00:28:37.350

see that and you see the four stories, um it's unbelievable and it would in some people's mind a test to massive racial progress. But then when we look at social economic indicators right now, uh in

00:28:37.350 - 00:28:55.720

terms of 42 million african americans. And when you look at the latest book, black stats by the sociologist Monique Morris african americans are disproportionately underrepresented in every single positive social economic indicator and they're overrepresented in all

00:28:55.730 - 00:29:07.030

uh negative social economic indicators. So when we think about the race, racism, and anti black racism very specifically, um we can see it and feel it when we look at outcomes. When we look

00:29:07.030 - 00:29:19.220

at the numbers of black faculty at University of texas , Austin, the number of black latino students at Ut Austin and other elite places. The number of African American residents in a place like Hyde Park,

00:29:19.230 - 00:29:32.720

which is advertised in the late 20s and early 30s , is an all white neighborhood very proudly. And of course, the cities of Austin's master plan in the late 1920s, which really forces all African Americans

00:29:32.720 - 00:29:48.620

onto the, onto the east side. And we're still dealing with not not not just the legacies, we're still dealing with the continuation and the amplification of that kind of institutional racism today. Because we use

00:29:48.620 - 00:30:06.090

we use euphemisms like like legacy. Um we use euphemisms like diversity and inclusion and multiculturalism when we should be talking about black equality. We use euphemisms like inner city when we should say ghettos, because ghettos

00:30:06.100 - 00:30:18.840

are term that really show groups of people because they're historically have been jewish ghettos. There there have been chinese ghettos, there have been black ghettos, but it's and right now there are black and third world

00:30:18.840 - 00:30:36.150

ghettos all across both the United States and globally. But ghettos and the process of ghettoization is a very important word because it shows that groups of people are being pushed into certain communities by powerful forces and actors

00:30:36.160 - 00:30:51.660

. Right? So it's important to to to name names and to speak truth to power when we talk about race and democracy and political activism in our contemporary period. So, I'll close by saying, um

00:30:52.040 - 00:31:06.410

we are we are living in a very, very , very important historical time period. I think um most of us feel uh that that there's been these astonishing transformations that have occurred in a very, very

00:31:06.410 - 00:31:18.340

short period of time. Um, as a historian , I can say that a lot of what people are surprised that especially My white friends and colleagues are saying there's just so surprised by the 2016 election.

00:31:18.340 - 00:31:26.040

And then, you know, every single day is a new surprise for them. Um, they're surprised by Cavanaugh. They're surprised by just everything, right ? And I say, well, just, just

00:31:26.040 - 00:31:34.560

come on into the matrix that black people have always been a part of, right, because this is not, this is not a surprise. This is not a surprise. And again, we've had,

00:31:34.560 - 00:31:49.730

we've had huge periods in American history that are very , very similar to the period that we have that we're living in right now. Um, probably the biggest is reconstruction and redemption where right after the civil

00:31:49.730 - 00:32:05.430

war in 1865. And the passages by 1870 Of the 13th, 14th and 15th amendments, which provides citizenship and black male suffrage, just blackmail voting rights because women couldn't vote until 1920. Um we get

00:32:05.440 - 00:32:19.850

an onslaught of racist violence and racist public policy that we are all still dealing with to this day. We did not eradicate that period of redemption and the so called redeem or South. That gives us everything

00:32:19.850 - 00:32:32.910

from not just gone with the wind and birth of a nation and the clansman by by um thomas Dixon . But it also gives us things like um felony convictions and and convict lease and and setting it up

00:32:32.910 - 00:32:47.330

where black males and now women as well can't vote in certain states like florida if they've been convicted of a felony offense. And that was set up. It was public policy that was set up to ensure

00:32:47.340 - 00:33:00.460

the pervasiveness and the endurance of white supremacy, right ? And this goes back to Malcolm and martin in this sense, Malcolm realized this and he spends his entire life until he's assassinated, calling out the nation

00:33:00.460 - 00:33:13.720

for this, right? That's why some people really don't like Malcolm X till this day, right? Because he realizes that he doesn't just call out Racists and presidents, he also calls out black people and

00:33:13.720 - 00:33:24.360

white people and says that until people until and unless people can squarely look at this history, there's never gonna be any racial progress, right? So by the time he comes back from Africa and he's saying

00:33:24.360 - 00:33:37.510

that he no longer believes in what the nation of Islam was saying, and he believes in multiculturalism, multi racialism connected to his Islamic faith. And people say, well you've got a lot of white fans

00:33:37.510 - 00:33:52.030

and white admirers Malcolm says until these these these white folks who admire me treat all black folks in that same way. There is no context for racial justice because it's got to be universal. I can't be

00:33:52.030 - 00:34:04.460

the special black person that these groups of people like or love or celebrate right and King. And really this is really very, very important. And I'll close on this. I keep promising to close King

00:34:05.040 - 00:34:20.740

before his assassination is leading a poor people's campaign that is act asking demanding for wealth redistribution uh, in the nation's capital, right? They're gonna they're gonna stay in the nation's capital until there is anti meaningful

00:34:20.740 - 00:34:35.070

anti poverty legislation passed and King is demanding a guaranteed income. The new york times and mainstream journalists. And King is the advocate, the biggest advocate of Nonviolence to the point where people call them an american

00:34:35.070 - 00:34:49.470

Gandhi. They're saying that King coming to the nation's capital is as bad as black power activists coming to the nation. Nations capital. So King is coming to the nation's capital armed with civil disobedience and armed

00:34:49.470 - 00:35:07.050

with moral fervor to try to transform poverty and inequality and economic justice. And king is vilified. King is demonized. King forcefully talks about racism in congress , racism that's emanating from the White house racism.

00:35:07.060 - 00:35:23.990

That is an institutional part of american democracy in the last three years of his life. So King becomes this revolutionary figure who until we've reconstructed a sanitized version of King. King was viewed as a subversive,

00:35:23.990 - 00:35:34.770

which is why when you think about King and you you you you look at the FBI papers and I've had a chance to look at uh through the freedom of Information act Kings FBI file, which is tens

00:35:34.770 - 00:35:46.700

of thousands of pages Malcolm X's FBI file, which is tens of thousands of pages Stokely Carmichael's file was over 20 pages. These were folks who were considered subversives, but what they were talking about was reimagining

00:35:46.700 - 00:35:59.550

democracy where we could have equality and justice for all right, I'll close it right there. I can keep I can keep going. Thank you. And let's um let's get a dialogue going. Really?

00:36:00.030 - 00:36:17.310

Okay. Mhm. Yeah. Okay. Yes. And can you tell me who you are please? Caroline ticks. He lifted up both of the tactics of Malcolm X. And yeah, thank you.

00:36:17.320 - 00:36:32.950

Um reporting. Great. So in terms of tactics um and seeing how both the doctor martin Luther King junior and Malcolm X had different styles, different tactics that they drew from. Um as someone who teaches

00:36:32.960 - 00:36:49.530

uh in in public uh public policy, what are some of the types of tactics that you have seen work in kind of changing uh changing policies, changing minds uh in recent years? Yeah, no,

00:36:49.530 - 00:37:07.350

they definitely do use different tactics in a way Malcolm is um using a tactic of leveraging the specter of of racial violence to get and inspire social change. So this idea that black people are really fed up

00:37:07.430 - 00:37:17.140

, his own group is saying they're willing to use self defense, at least at the time, he's connected to the nation of Islam, but Malcolm never really leads um some kind of race war uh in

00:37:17.150 - 00:37:31.840

in in the United States, although many people are fearful that he will, it's the same thing with Stokely carmichael. Um uh Post nation of Islam, Malcolm's tactics become more uh you know, really,

00:37:31.840 - 00:37:44.660

even while he's with the nation of Islam, he's a pedagogy is a big part of, of of what I argue makes them so effective. So when you think about Malcolm X in addition to being an

00:37:44.660 - 00:38:04.510

organizer and an activist, we have to think about him as a public intellectual as well and a public intellectual who's who's um mhm whose constituency grows over time , but certainly Malcolm and in this sense he's as

00:38:04.510 - 00:38:17.560

influential in his own way as Marcus Garvey is very , very influential with um the groups of people who the late Derek Bell called the faces at the bottom of the well, so Malcolm is preaching to um

00:38:17.570 - 00:38:30.810

folks who are in a contemporary context, people label them a racial underclass of black underclass, Hillary clinton and others call them super predators and Malcolm. And then later the black panthers are trying to organize and

00:38:30.810 - 00:38:43.820

recruit and really make an argument that the only reason and again, Malcolm knew this by first hand experience . Malcolm is the son of an african american preacher who is, and who is a Marcus garvey supporter

00:38:43.820 - 00:38:57.920

and follower who was murdered in Lansing michigan in 1931 where Malcolm is six years old, his father Earl Little, and um when we think about Malcolm and the family really is torn apart by that Malcolm goes

00:38:57.920 - 00:39:10.150

from being The president of his 7th grade class in a predominantly white Junior High School, um to really dropping out of out of school before entering high school after he's told that he can't be a lawyer,

00:39:10.160 - 00:39:30.030

um he wanted to be a lawyer um and becomes a juvenile delinquent um from the age of 15 to roughly the time he is 20 years old And he's gonna spend the ages of 20 to 27 incarcerated,

00:39:30.420 - 00:39:45.540

right? And so for Malcolm, Malcolm's time in prison convinces him that black people in prison, whether they're innocent or guilty or human beings who have potential and that's very very important because when you think about

00:39:45.540 - 00:40:02.330

black activism and organizing, not all organizers and activists believe that right that people who are usually seen as very very marginal people even within the community are worth , not even so much as saving but are worth

00:40:02.340 - 00:40:19.030

the time and effort um to offer opportunities and to organize and to educate right? Um after after leaving the nation of Islam, he's not just a public intellectual but he's an international lobbyist trying to lobby the

00:40:19.030 - 00:40:30.650

United Nations and he goes to the U. N . All the time. If you interview people connected to the U. N. African and Caribbean and Third world diplomats, muslim diplomats especially Malcolm was always

00:40:30.660 - 00:40:40.560

in and out of the U. N. People knew who he was at the U. N. By the time cassius Clay soon to be Muhammad ali wins the heavyweight championship of the World, february 25th

00:40:40.560 - 00:40:58.010

1960 for Malcolm and Clay spend the next week at the U. N. Just going in and out of the United Nations. Um really talking to diplomats about how african and third world diplomats can leverage their

00:40:58.010 - 00:41:15.010

positions to help end jim Crow in the United States because Malcolm is always uh always concerned with what I call democracies, jagged edges. You know the jagged edges of white supremacy of racial violence, of domestic

00:41:15.010 - 00:41:31.620

terror against black bodies. Um uh poverty, commiseration , right, dehumanization, demonization. And so his tactics are multiple. Although we remember the rhetoric against white supremacy the most. So we remember things like

00:41:31.630 - 00:41:46.670

message to the grassroots where he says a revolution is bloody a revolution um is violent in a revolution. You don't sing, we shall overcome Um, you're too busy swinging to sing. So Malcolm is saying

00:41:46.670 - 00:42:00.640

these things rhetorically in the context of anti colonial upheavals that are happening globally, right, but he's not just saying those things. One of the things that I um look at in the, in the,

00:42:00.650 - 00:42:16.690

in my in my in my forthcoming book is how Malcolm listens to not only the king and Malcolm x Meat one time on March 26 1964 in the U . S. Senate during the filibuster of the civil

00:42:16.690 - 00:42:30.690

rights bill, 1964 civil rights bill. And they meet for a few minutes and there's a famous couple of famous photos of them together in the Senate. But That December after King has won the Nobel Peace

00:42:30.690 - 00:42:42.630

Prize, he's gonna be feted in New York for a whole 24 hour period to give him key to the city. Vice president, hubert Humphrey, is there Mayor robert Wagner? All these all these people

00:42:42.640 - 00:42:58.210

are are there. But that evening he goes to Harlem the Harlem 369th armory and he speaks before 8000 people. He does a long speech about what the Nobel prize means to him. And um Andy Young

00:42:58.210 - 00:43:07.870

, one of his, his his closest advisors is there and sitting next to Andy Young in Harlem is Malcolm X. And Malcolm X listens to that entire speech and later it talks about that it's not something

00:43:07.870 - 00:43:20.980

people uh is widely known and it was, it was something that took me a time to piece together and what you see is a real, even even just a few months before his death, real engagement

00:43:20.980 - 00:43:35.340

with king and kings ideas, but trying to further radicalize kings ideas. So on one level, he comes closer um um um to King talking about human rights, but he's also trying to radicalize King um

00:43:35.340 - 00:43:50.330

and make King understand the depth and breath of the problem. When we think about king's tactics goes from bus boycotting, which was not kings idea in Montgomery , to really setting up the southern christian leadership conference

00:43:50.340 - 00:44:05.630

as an organization that is trying to mobilize grassroots resistance against racial segregation on the ground. So we think about King ultimately, um and he's going to change in the last several years, but King, the

00:44:05.630 - 00:44:17.500

biggest thing that King does for the civil rights movement , is served as the most effective political mobilize er of already existing activism. Okay, so king um and and to the chagrin of some, sometimes people

00:44:17.500 - 00:44:31.750

say, well was King a usurper, he's not a usurper, but because he's the most Well known figure globally. And again by 1963 with the March on Washington, and by 64 with the Nobel Peace

00:44:31.750 - 00:44:46.170

Prize, he's the biggest figure globally talking about human rights. So you have to think about King as sort of nelson Mandela um amplified his biggest Mandela was after his release. When you think about King in

00:44:46.170 - 00:45:00.120

the context of 1963 64 King is is the biggest global figure Um of of of 20th Century American History , who's talking about human rights and social justice and non violence. Um um and so when we think

00:45:00.120 - 00:45:12.660

about his tactics, they're going to change over time , because King initially is quite cautious as a mobilize , er because he wants the federal government to be a friend, right, and he's convinced that structural

00:45:12.660 - 00:45:24.860

reform has a chance of working right, what's gonna people like Malcolm X, and remember Malcolm has a different experience than King, So king is arrested in Montgomery and other places, Right? But remember King

00:45:24.860 - 00:45:37.950

is innocent, right? Malcolm X is saying in his own autobiography, he goes to jail for things that he's saying he did do right. So he's got a different experience with structures of us democracy.

00:45:37.960 - 00:45:51.930

So, Malcolm X never thinks that a civil rights act or a civil rights bill or the Brown Supreme Court decision is going to transform institutions not just hearts and minds, but transforms institution. So Malcolm is

00:45:51.930 - 00:46:06.990

skeptical of american democracy, which he publicly calls. What american hypocrisy. Reason why he calls hypocrisy is because Malcolm much more so than King until King's final years is willing to articulate and confront the gap between

00:46:07.000 - 00:46:19.800

the rhetoric of american democracy on the one hand and the reality for black people and poor people on the other hand, right? So kings tactics change over time. So king becomes much more willing to use

00:46:19.800 - 00:46:32.310

muscular civil disobedience. It's always Nonviolence. He's always nonviolent. But the reason why in the south there are placards and huge billboards of DR king when he was at Highlander Folk School. Uh the racial integration

00:46:32.310 - 00:46:45.090

school in Highlander Tennessee. And they're saying king is a communist right is because people are scared of dr king and they should be. And I'm gonna say that again, people are scared of dr king and

00:46:45.090 - 00:46:59.910

they should be because King, although he's nonviolent, he's making a claim that the way of life in the United States and white supremacist, american political culture and racial democracy has to be eviscerated and changed.

00:47:00.280 - 00:47:12.850

That's bad news for a lot of people. I mean, kings argument means it's the anti trump argument . It means that you're not gonna have trump or cavanaugh or any of those people on the Supreme Court

00:47:12.860 - 00:47:23.560

or in the White House. They're not going to be part of political structures and institutions that control people's lives. Right? That's what he's saying. And so it's not just white citizens councils that are against

00:47:23.560 - 00:47:35.660

King because of that. It's millions and millions of people are very very much frightened of King. And I make an argument that they should be they should be frightened because even though somebody is saying nonviolently I

00:47:35.660 - 00:47:50.100

want all this change and transformation to happen. King is coercing people. King is saying he's gonna bring a nonviolent army into Washington D. C. Until there's a guaranteed minimum wage, there's a guaranteed income

00:47:51.080 - 00:48:00.930

. That's why the Wall Street Journal is saying Hey we take this as a threat. That's what they're writing in 1967. They're saying this guy is threatening us, he's not coming with any guns. King

00:48:00.930 - 00:48:14.610

doesn't even curse publicly or privately. But they're saying that they feel threatened because he's going to transform or saying he's saying he wants to transform their way of life. So the tactics are very important, but

00:48:14.610 - 00:48:29.840

Kings tactics become much more muscular, including a willingness . By the time he's in Memphis trying to help 1100 African American sanitation workers were on strike throughout the spring of 1968. The last speech he gives in

00:48:29.850 - 00:48:46.730

on April three, really, it starts Wednesday, but it goes into the early morning and he's assassinated that evening A little after six pm Memphis time. Um, he says that the greatness of America lies

00:48:46.730 - 00:49:00.250

in the right to protest for right and there's an injunction that is present preventing them from protesting and eventually they're going to get rid of that injunction. But rhetorically, he says that evening that um, when

00:49:00.250 - 00:49:12.910

they were in Birmingham, they didn't let fire hoses or dogs turn them around and he says, we're not gonna let any illegal injunctions turn us around as well. So by the end he's going for broke

00:49:12.920 - 00:49:25.480

. And this is somebody had always respected the law , even when racist judges were carrying out legal decisions that were um um guided by racism and that we're not morally or ethically correct. He abided by those

00:49:25.480 - 00:49:38.470

decisions. And by 67 68 he's no longer willing to do that as well. So when you think about King King is absolutely this and and Taylor Branch , really one of his best biographers. Um the

00:49:38.480 - 00:49:51.060

second volume of his three volume trilogy of King America and the King Years, which I recommend everybody here to read America and the King Years, Taylor Branch . Um the first volumes parting waters. Uh third

00:49:51.060 - 00:50:00.820

volume is at Canaan's edge. But the second volume is pillar of fire and pillar of fire is the way he the last words of the first volume. And um what he means by that he compares king

00:50:00.820 - 00:50:14.590

to moses and it says, you know, like , like, like moses he crossed over into a land less bound by race. Um um but to keep going, he became a pillar of fire and

00:50:14.590 - 00:50:24.800

when we think about king in the last um um several years of his life, he absolutely is that pillar of fire. You know, I teach at the LBJ school. King and LBJ were close in

00:50:24.800 - 00:50:37.310

65 66 by 67th. They're no longer on speaking terms because he's saying and kings no longer invited to the White House. There's no more fats at the White House. There's no more until until he's assassinated

00:50:37.310 - 00:50:45.610

. Cause then then once he's dead, everybody's like , whoa, what a great guy. You know , once he's dead. But but there's no more fits. There's no more congratulations. No more conversations

00:50:45.610 - 00:50:59.600

with with Lyndon johnson, because King is willing to speak truth to power and say that what's going on in the United States is so big and the breath and depth of the evil is so enormous that everything

00:50:59.600 - 00:51:13.390

has to fundamentally change. Presidents don't like to hear that. Even presidents who say that they're on your side, they don't like to hear that. So right right there. And then I wanted to ask

00:51:13.390 - 00:51:37.850

a question about Malcolm X's um critique of liberalism and particularly as it pertains to white supremacy and how liberals were more of a concern because of how they were able to disguise. Um yeah, Layton forms of

00:51:37.850 - 00:51:54.540

white supremacy over against um white supremacy. That was in your face. Very a matter of fact. And so I'm wondering how dangerous what that critique tells us about the the danger of of of a liberal

00:51:54.540 - 00:52:09.120

approach to race relations, and where we could sort of fine tune our discernment about that. Yeah, I think I think that's a great question. I think that's one of the ways that eventually uh dr

00:52:09.120 - 00:52:29.550

King converges with Malcolm X two, because King starts talking as early as letter from Birmingham jail about um white moderates, right? And and and white moderates , who would rather um preserve a piece um without

00:52:29.550 - 00:52:43.040

justice than than Rock the Boat um in service of justice and equality. Uh no, certainly Malcolm X has a huge critique of of white liberals, right ? Um he has a huge critique of this notion

00:52:43.040 - 00:52:55.550

that the South is really racially segregated and unjust and the North is better. Malcolm says that anything south of Canada is mrs is Mississippi, you're in Mississippi of your South of Canada because he he understands how

00:52:55.550 - 00:53:12.830

pervasive um anti black racism, structural racism, racial oppression, white supremacy is nationally. You know, black panthers understood it because they were uh southern migrants from places like Alabama. Monroe Louisiana texas for bobby

00:53:12.830 - 00:53:29.030

Seale's case. Monroe Louisiana Huey Newton's case, who went uh to California during the Postwar period, in search of jobs in the naval industry and in wartime industries, and they were instead relegated to segregated uh

00:53:29.040 - 00:53:40.750

cities like Richmond and East Oakland, all places that , like East Austin are actually being gentrified right now , as we speak, right? Um so when you think about Malcolm and the whole notion of Lyndon

00:53:40.750 - 00:53:59.110

johnson as the fox, and Barry Goldwater as the wolf Malcolm has a critique of john f Kennedy and and a kind of racial liberalism that he found uh deeply condescending and deeply patronizing and also deeply dangerous because

00:53:59.110 - 00:54:16.800

he felt that black people and civil rights advocates have been Hoodwinked bye. A kind of racial liberalism that rhetorically says that it's for justice, but substantively it stops far short of the institutional radical transformation that's required

00:54:16.800 - 00:54:27.290

to achieve justice, right? So that that's what that's what he talked about. And I think that's important because I think that in a contemporary sense, we're still faced with that, right? This this

00:54:27.290 - 00:54:39.990

idea that people can say that they're therefore racial justice , therefore black equality, therefore civil rights, but then what they're supporting in terms of policy is antithetical to that. It's the opposite of that, right

00:54:40.000 - 00:54:51.490

? And in a way, we we've actually gone further back in our contemporary period in this age and the age of trump. Um, it's an age of overt racism, right? It's an age of

00:54:51.490 - 00:55:04.830

naked racism. Um, you think about policy wise , in terms of their Justice Department's trump versus Ronald Reagan, it's actually going to be very, very similar. It's just that the Reagan Justice Department rhetorically

00:55:04.830 - 00:55:15.320

is going to say that it's for the promotion of civil rights, but they're not great on voting rights . They're not great on affirmative action. They're not great on equal Employment Opportunity Commission and Civil Rights commissions

00:55:15.320 - 00:55:23.970

and enforcement, because that was the whole thing. The devil is in the details. So Reagan is the one who makes Clarence thomas, the sitting Supreme Court justice now, the head of the E E

00:55:23.970 - 00:55:34.450

O. C. Right? And so the E E O. C. Equal Employment opportunity Commission, the lawsuits and the The number of complaints that it's willing to take on, when people say, Hey

00:55:34.450 - 00:55:45.420

, they've been discriminated against at work goes way, way down under Clarence Thomas, right? Because, you know, that's what, that's what we think about conservatives. By the late 70s, early 1980s

00:55:45.430 - 00:55:57.990

, they are promoting um an idea of colorblindness, right? And Ian Hanley Lopez and other people have called it colour blind racism. This idea of making an argument that we are all equal by fiat,

00:55:58.000 - 00:56:07.400

but it's all about outcome. So it's not enough to just tell us here, we're all equal, you know, to tell every single man, woman , child, irrespective of race, class, gender

00:56:07.400 - 00:56:21.350

, sexuality, we're all equal. That's great rhetorically . And it's a sentiment that I I agree and approve of. We have to understand substantively based on outcomes. Um, um if we are or not

00:56:21.360 - 00:56:32.660

, if the institution is living up to that sentiment were not. So I agree that that Malcolm um that critique of white liberalism is very, very important and endures. And I think that King, over

00:56:32.660 - 00:56:46.750

time develops a substantive critique of white liberalism as well . And really by the end of his life, no longer really has white liberal allies, in in a sense, you know, he's really um aligning

00:56:46.750 - 00:57:02.790

himself with um anti war activists and social justice activists who are thinking about deep institutional reform and changes that that turned them into pariahs. And again, King goes, he's a Nobel Prize winner. Um you

00:57:02.790 - 00:57:12.630

know, Time Man of the Year, and uh New York Times is saying, why are you talking about civil rights in the context of Vietnam? And the question to the new york Times is why wouldn't

00:57:12.630 - 00:57:25.360

you talk about civil rights in the context of Vietnam ? Right, So Vietnam, it was it was obvious it people don't suddenly understand by 1970 71 that Vietnam is a human rights issue. It was obvious

00:57:25.360 - 00:57:36.020

people, people have been through World War Two, have been through World War One, right? It's just that in the context of Cold War liberalism, the establishment, which includes the new york times,

00:57:36.030 - 00:57:45.730

is saying that we're not gonna talk about Vietnam in the context of human rights and so once King does and king wasn't the first person to do it. It's still nonviolent coordinating committee. It's Stokely carmichael,

00:57:45.740 - 00:57:55.330

they're the first people to really talk about it that way. But once he takes up that banner, he's on the outs of the establishment and it's really just a matter of time. Um um in terms

00:57:55.330 - 00:58:15.450

of the road to Memphis and what what happens there in terms of political assassination? Yeah. Think we can do one more question there. Mhm. Yeah . I just like a clarification on a few terms

00:58:15.450 - 00:58:32.310

you used uh you talked about Malcolm being an avatar , you spoke about building a genealogy and then you mentioned the term food justice. Can you further elaborate on those ideas? Okay, yeah, no,

00:58:32.310 - 00:58:50.700

by avatar, I just mean that Malcolm provides um in a way he's a he's a paradigm for black power in the Postwar period Malcolm after his assassination. Everyone from the Black Panther Party to organization us,

00:58:50.700 - 00:59:06.350

to Stokely carmichael, to revolutionary, Pan africanist, the black student union members, um the black arts movement activists. Um Leroy jones later, Amiri Baraka says the same thing that the two inspirations for the

00:59:06.350 - 00:59:22.250

black arts movement are Malcolm X and john Coltrane. So when you think about when you think about Malcolm as an avatar, he's going to be um paradigmatic for organizations and for individuals really at the global level

00:59:22.260 - 00:59:38.730

. Talking about not just black power, but black political self determination and black identity. Um Pan african identity, the idea of Malcolm going to africa and spending Um 25 weeks in Africa uh in 1964 and

00:59:38.730 - 00:59:55.670

making these connections and being in Ghana and Nigeria and so many other different places becomes absolutely a framework and a blueprint for many, many um political activists, black political activists, generationally, but also other political

00:59:55.670 - 00:00:00.000

activists who are non black. I mean, there's a whole third world dimension to what Malcolm is doing , and there's gonna be white activists who are very much inspired by what he's doing in that sense to

00:00:00.000 - 00:00:00.000

um uh food justice. So, food justice is this idea that has always existed in the black community of um and you can you can read about food justice in the slave narratives, you know, Frederick

00:00:00.000 - 00:00:00.000

Douglass talks about food justice. Harriet Jacobs talks about food justice, um it's the idea of um the politics around food production, who has access to it , who doesn't? Zora Neale Hurston talks about food

00:00:00.000 - 00:00:00.000

justice in her works. Um there's a whole scholarship on food ways the production of food, the contestation of the food that is produced, the contestation over whether it's um agricultural products, it's dairy products,

00:00:00.000 - 00:00:00.000

it's milk, who's got access to it, what enslaved Africans did with food, how they turn some of the worst aspects of food into um soul food and delicacies and how they re imagined food. So

00:00:00.000 - 00:00:00.000

, this idea of food justice goes back and really there's a connection to a contemporary environmental justice movement, but sometimes environmental Justice Act advocates don't get the connection with the black community. So they'll say food justice

00:00:00.000 - 00:00:00.000

is just all about food insecurity and the number of kids who don't have Food in a 24 hour period , that's a part of it, but a bigger context that when I say food justice is about the

00:00:00.000 - 00:00:00.000

power politics connected to food production and wellness in the United States and globally, and how black people historically have always understood those power politics, because they were the producers of the food, they were the cook

00:00:00.000 - 00:00:00.000

, they cooked the food, they made the food , um they carried the food. Um so they really intimately understood that. Um and when you think about King King's vision of food justice is very,

00:00:00.000 - 00:00:00.000

very important because he connects food justice to um the political economy of american democracy. So for him, he's connecting uh the idea of wellness to citizenship. So for for King, he makes an argument that

00:00:00.000 - 00:00:00.000

it's not enough to just say you're gonna break these bonds of racial injustice and now you're a citizen, right? He's making an argument. And Lyndon johnson actually articulates this argument very well In 1965, at

00:00:00.000 - 00:00:00.000

the Howard University um commencement speech that he gives June four, where he says that he compares, he says African Americans have been shackled and they haven't been able to run and compete in this race. And

00:00:00.000 - 00:00:00.000

he says that you can't unshackle a person and then tell them to just run and compete in the race . So in that speech, he makes an argument for not equality of opportunity, but equality of outcomes

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, right? So that that's the whole thing, he makes that. And then the third, the third one, I can't remember the third term. Yeah, no. I said I was going to

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lay out a genealogy or you know, and yeah . When we think about laying out a genealogy, just uh sort of a schematic of framework a lineage , a line of of intellectual thought, intellectual and

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political thought and activism about these different social movements that connected, intersect with each other all the way from that, that heroic period of the civil rights movement and before up until now. So that's all I

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mean, yeah. So this hour. Yes. No, thank you. This was a lot of fun, definitely. Oh, yeah. Okay.