September 10, 2018 • 26 mins
Fifty years ago, Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated after leading the most influential protest movement in American history. King revolutionized the use of nonviolent resistance to combat racial injustice in the United States, but the Alabama preacher did not always believe in nonviolence. In fact, early on, King relied on armed guards for his protection until an older Quaker activist named Bayard Rustin walked into King’s home and changed the direction of the civil rights movement.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:03):
It's May nineteen sixty three. The eyes of the world
are on Birmingham, Alabama. Hundreds of Birmingham's black residents, including
scores of teenagers, pour into the streets in their church
clothes on a warm Sunday afternoon. Birmingham's police chief, Eugene
Bull Connor, watches the scene unfold. Connor is a burly
(00:24):
white man in his mid sixties, slipped back, gray hair,
horn rimmed glasses. He looks a lot like the warden
from the Shawshank Redemption. In recent days, the frustrated Connor
has turned to police dogs and fire hoses to put
down the stream of protesters, and he has drawn national
attention to himself and his city in the process. The
(00:46):
marchers are given one more chance to turn around and disperse.
They refuse. The angry Connor whirls and shouts to his men,
damn it, turn on the hoses. Many protesters take to
their knees, prepared to stand a ground peacefully against the
coming onslaught. But what happened next is not what you
think or what you may have seen in the black
(01:07):
and white photos of protesters, dogs and fire hoses. What
happened next surprised even the man behind the protests in Birmingham,
Martin Luther King Jr. What happened next, or the dogs
that didn't bark, the fire hoses that didn't spread. What
happened next was what Dr King called the pride and
the power of nonviolence. We are so jess in ay.
(01:40):
We have to find, we have to ruy, we got
to love the bo we got to all it up.
We I'm Sean brass Well. Then this is The Thread.
(02:02):
Each season we unravel the stories behind some of the
most important lives and events in history to discover, essentially
how one thing leads to another. To do so, we
travel back through history, one story at a time to
explore the origins of an important event, an iconic figure,
or a big idea. This year marks the fiftieth anniversary
(02:22):
of the death of the iconic civil rights leader Dr
Martin Luther King Jr. And so in season three of
The Thread, we explore the origins of a revolutionary idea,
one very near and dear to the heart of Doctor King,
the principle of nonviolent resistance, the counterintuitive notion that the
best way to reform your enemies is to love them.
(02:44):
The best way to counter their blows is to absorb them.
King established the use of mass, nonviolent protest on American soil,
but it did not begin with him. We'll take you
on a journey through the minds of some remarkable individuals
and across the globe this season on the Thread, we
find out how a single powerful idea can spread and
(03:05):
remake the world. When Martin Luther King Jr. Was fourteen
years old, he had a formative experience aboard a segregated bus.
King and his high school teacher were on their way
back to Atlanta from an oratory contest in southern Georgia.
They were asked to give up their seats when two
white passengers boarded the bus. The teenage King stood and
(03:28):
stewed for hours at the back of the bus. He
later recalled quote, it was the angriest I have ever
been in my life. Twelve years later, a forty two
year old seamstress found herself in a similar situation, but
his history has well told. Rosa Parks refused to give
(03:49):
up her seat, and his fate would have it. The
now twenty six year old doctor King had just accepted
a job as a minister in the city where Parks
took her famous ride Montgomery, Alabama. Mrs Rose of Parks
was arrested and taken down to jail, taken from the
bus just because she refused to give up a seat.
(04:10):
That is the young King addressing reporters about the events
unfolding in Montgomery. A boycott of the city's buses was
proposed four days after Parks was arrested. This is David
Garrow King, biographer and the Pulitzer Prize winning author of
Bearing the Cross. That's when Dr King debuted as the
lead spokesperson for this new citywide bus boycott effort. You
(04:35):
have been moved that a second the resolution the red
will be received a dollar. Are you read about a
question all in fable that had been known by standing
on your feet? King and his wife Kreta woke up
early on the first day of the boycott. They watched
the bus stott near their house from the front window
(04:57):
and looked on in amazement as bus after by passed by.
Most of the buses contained not a single black passenger.
Grant was the day that we started a bust protest
which literally electrified the nation. And that was a day
(05:19):
when we decided that we were not going to take
segregated buses any longer. King saw a powerful social movement
come together before his eyes. Well several weeks now were
the Nigro citizens of Montgomery have been involved in a
non violent protest against the injustices which we have experienced
(05:44):
on the buses a number of years. Soon the boycott
went from weeks to months, and Montgomery's white community started
to press back. This is historian John Demilio, So imagine
a protest like this developing in Alabama in n segregation
(06:05):
is the rule. Um, white supremacists have no reluctance to
use violence to keep African Americans in line. Uh. They
lynch people, they shoot people, They're willing to burn houses.
They will do anything that they have to do. King
quickly became a primary target for that violence. David Garrow again.
(06:30):
Doctor King gradually becomes a more and more visible figure
in local Montgomery news coverage. Not long thereafter, Uh, there's
a small bomb that's detonated on the porch of his
home when he's out at a rally. It breaks some windows. Uh,
(06:54):
No one fortunately is injured. An angry crowd had gathered
outside Dr King's home by the time here back. They
refused to obey police instructions to disperse, King stepped onto
the front porch. He asked them not to retaliate. Then,
referring to the people who had nearly killed his wife
and child an hour before, King told the crowd quote,
(07:15):
I want you to love our enemies. Be good to them,
love them, and let them know you love them. And
you can see in his remarks that evening how his
fundamental Christian belief in a in an ethnic and doctrine
of love, even love for one's enemies, uh is at
(07:36):
the very core of his being. Finally, Montgomery City leaders
agreed to the protesters demands after a community of more
than fifty thousand people had protested for three hundred and
eighty two days. Montgomery's buses would never be segregated again,
and King and his allies had launched a powerful new
form of protests in America. Nonviolent resistance give passive resistance
(08:05):
means just passively accepting violence and justice. If it means
cowardice and stagnant passivity, then that is a difference. Because
non violent resistance that there is resist it is dynamically active.
Governments think it's a dangerous idea. It's a cherished notion
(08:27):
of government that they have an exclusive right to violence.
This is Mark Kurlansky, author of non Violence, The History
of a Dangerous idea. If your opponents are violent, uh,
and you're violent, you're playing to their strong suit. Whereas
if you're non violent, you're they don't really know what
to do. Uh. And that's what happened with the civil
(08:51):
rights movement. King's non violent approach transformed that movement. Before
the Montgomery bus boycott, the U s Civil rights movement
was based in the North, with organizations like the Inn
Double A c P, which won the landmark school desegregation
decision Brown Versus Board of Education a year after the boycott.
King and several other Southern black ministers and activists formed
(09:12):
the Southern Christian Leadership Conference or SCLC in nineteen fifty seven,
and that's when the center of the civil rights movement
began to shift to the South, and so the black
religious leaders like King, who waged a new war of
non violence. David Garrow. The lesson of Montgomery was that
local black communities, just ordinary residents citizens could take meaningful
(09:38):
action on their own against racial segregation without waiting for
leadership from new York City. Dr King was a unique
personality because he was a conflict resolver. He acted as
(09:59):
a lubricant and a persuader to get people to compromise
and do things in keeping with his tradition of the
non violent techniques. This is Timothy Jenkins, a civil rights
leader who helped organize students, sit ins and other non
violent protests during the nineteen sixties, and he was an
advocate of techniques of persuasion that did not revolve around
(10:22):
force or arms or threats, and that led to I
think a unique character to this movement as opposed to
normal political movements, because it was not a test of
power and the test of authority. It was a test
of moral suasion. But it was a test that did
not always work. John Demilio again. Dr King had been
(10:47):
in supporting protests in Albany, Georgia in nineteen sixty two
for much of the year and it was a very
frustrating experience, um in part because the sheriff in Albany,
Georgia had the foresight not to respond to these protests
(11:08):
with violence, and so the protests didn't capture headlines. The
Southern non violence campaign stalled by the end of nineteen
sixty two. In many ways, non violent protests depends upon
violence from those in authority to succeed, and King knew
that the movement needed a confrontation to regain the nation's attention.
Mark Kurlansky. He realized that, you know, resisting non violently
(11:34):
would only work if people saw you doing it, which
is how King and the SCLC came to be in Birmingham, Alabama,
the most segregated city in America in early nineteen sixty three.
Birmingham has one of the most brutal white sheriffs in
the South, John Demilio. Again he went by the name
(11:57):
of Bull Connor, which tells you something about out how
people perceived him. He was as determined and fierce as
a bull. Here the animated Connor in a white shirt
and black tie defends his actions in Birmingham. You can
never with the boy if you don't keep you and
him separated. I found out out bleming him. You've got
(12:19):
to keep your white and a black separn King and
local black leaders were banking on the fact that Connor
would take any means necessary to ensure that Birmingham's races
remained separate. The demonstrations began during Easter Week nineteen sixty.
About fifty supporters turned out for the first march on
Good Friday. After four and a half blocks, the marchers,
(12:42):
including King, were met by Connor's officers, placed under arrest,
and taken to the city jail. For the next few weeks,
the demonstrations did not have their intended effect David Garrow.
Initially in Birmingham, King and SCLC had a good degree
of trouble in recruiting Black community members to participate in protests.
(13:07):
Connor and the Birmingham police remained restrained, avoiding the media
attention that King counted on. So a new tactic was adopted.
Leaflets are circulated in Birmingham's black high schools urging students
to join the next demonstration in Birmingham. They decide to
mobilize young people, not young adults, not college students, but
(13:28):
high school students and younger and that gets a lot
of publicity and at a certain point Bull Connor and
the police just lose it and they start beating people
and arresting them on mass Police arrested more than five
students in the first two days. The jails were full
and Connor's patients was running thin. He unleashed the police
(13:51):
dogs and ordered the fire hoses be turned on demonstrators.
Water from the high powered hoses tore the clothes off
some protesters backs for agraphers and television cameras captured the
brutal attack. Images of police officers beating protesters, the teenagers
getting slammed against walls by water, and if dogs snarling
at young girls made headlines across the country. Many whites
(14:14):
in the rest of the country, we're going about their
lives not even noticing that this was going on in
the South. Well, you couldn't not notice this, And so
Birmingham really brings the civil rights struggle up to a
new level of visibility. But perhaps the most remarkable part
(14:39):
of the Birmingham story happened on that Sunday afternoon in
early May where we started this episode. The protesters, many
on their knees, braced themselves yet again for the Birmingham
police to unleash the dogs and the fire hoses. Bull
Connor himself gives the order for them to do so.
Then for the next thirty seconds, something astonishing occurs. Connor's
(15:04):
men do nothing. Slowly, the protesters stand up and continue
forward with their march. Doctor King later described the scene.
Connor's men as though hypnotized, fell back, their hoses sagging
uselessly in their hands, while several hundred Negroes marched past
them without further interference. It would prove to be a
(15:26):
defining moment for the civil rights movement, and for King,
it was an eye opening event. As he later wrote,
I felt there for the first time the pride and
the power of nonviolence. The nonviolent movement had taken the
(15:51):
struggle to the heart of the Jim Crow South and
to the forefront of the national consciousness. King was thrilled.
The activity is which have taken place in Birmingham over
the last few days, into my mind, marked a non
violent movement coming of age. David Garrow again, the images
(16:16):
and impact of Birmingham convinced both of the Kennedy brothers
that they needed to finally move forward with a meaningful
civil rights bill. That's the real tangible impact of Birmingham.
Congress passes the most sweeping civil rights bill ever to
(16:38):
be written into the law, and thus reaffirms the conception
of equality for all men that began with Lincoln and
the Civil War one hundred years ago. The summer of
nineteen sixty three was a revolution, King later said, because
it changed the face of America. By the time it
was over, hundreds of lunch counters, hotels, parks, and other
public places had been integrated. King and his nonviolent movement
(17:04):
continued to win victories and historic legislation over the next
few years, but not without cost. King led a march
for voting rights in Alabama in nineteen sixty five that
resulted in what was called Bloody Sunday. Armed police attacked
King and other peaceful demonstrators as they walked across the
Edmund Pettis Bridge in Selma, just like in Birmingham. Television
(17:24):
carried the beatings to audiences across the country and the world.
Mark Kurlanski again, you know it worked in a way
that I don't think his opponents understood how well it worked,
or they wouldn't have done things like the Pettis Bridge.
You know, the power of people seeing that all over
the world. King's non violent campaign was working, but he
(17:45):
sensed that violence still bubbled just beneath the surface during
the turbulent times. Here's King on Meet the Press in
nineteen sixty five. Realism impel impelled me to admit, however,
that when there is justice and the pursuit of justice,
violence disappears. And where there is injustice and frustration, the
potentialities for violence are great on those frustrations, and the
(18:11):
potential for violence would grow with the nineteen sixties war
on Up. Next, we dip into the shadows of history
to meet the remarkable man who inspired Dr. King's non
violent approach in the first place. Men, for years now
(18:53):
have been talking about one piece. But now no longer
can we just talk about it is no longer The
choice between violence and non violence in this world is
non violence on non existence. That is where we are
to date. Good evening. Dr Martin Luther King, the apostle
(19:24):
of non violence in the civil rights movement, has been
shot to death in Memphis, Tennessee. Doctor King was standing
on the balcony of his second floor hotel room tonight when,
according to a companion, a shot was fired from across
the street, and the friend's words, the bullet exploded in
his face. Martin Luther King's legacy is inextricably tied to
(19:54):
the non violent approach he championed, but the civil rights
leader was not always opposed to violence. As a seminary student,
he expressed skepticism about the virtues of pacifism and non violence.
Even in the opening days of the Montgomery boycott, King
had not yet found his non violent voice. Mark Kurlansky,
it's kind of funny the way he's portrayed today, especially
(20:16):
in schools, you know, as as just this kind of
dreamy guy who's about peace and love. He was a
very determined political activist who eventually embraced non violence because
he became convinced that that would work. And one man
above all others convinced King that it would work. But
(20:37):
King would have to make some changes. First. Let's go
back to Montgomery. It's February ninety. King's house has just
been bombed David Garret. As the Montgomery bus boycott begins
to achieve national news coverage, um civil rights supporters around
(20:57):
the country begin asking them selves what they can do
to assist the Montgomery protesters. One of those prominent northern
activists was a forty three year old black Quaker from
Pennsylvania named Bayard Rustin. A longtime advocate of nonviolent protest,
Ruston was concerned by what he saw when he arrived
(21:18):
in Montgomery. So at the beginning there in Montgomery, even
though doctor King believed in a Christian doctrine of love,
his interest in nonviolence was not such that he was
prohibiting black community members from standing armed guard. After King's
house was bombed, armed men kept guard out front each night.
(21:41):
Byar Rustin came to King's home shortly after the bombing,
but byed himself. Is is taken somewhat aback um when
he sits down in a chair at doctor King's home
and realizes there's a gun in it. King explained that
they did not intend to use the firearms harm anyone
unless they were violently attacked. This is Rustin biographer John
(22:04):
Damelio again, and Rustin explains to him that if you
want to be modeling non violence, you can't possess guns.
You actually have to live out completely the philosophy of
non violence. That was just the first lesson Rustin would
(22:24):
provide to the young King. The weapons and armed guards
were removed, and so Rustin becomes his tutor and instructor.
And really within the space of a few weeks, it
is not an exaggeration to say that in terms of
the strategy, tactics, and philosophy of non violence. Buyard Rustin
(22:48):
becomes Dr King's most trusted and closest advisor. The tall,
cosmopolitan Quaker and the short, eloquent Baptist preacher made for
quite a pair. It was to be one of the
most productive relationships in American history. Rustin immediately recognized King's
raw talent and potential as a leader, but knew he
(23:09):
still had a long way to go. Doctor King justifiably
has become such a heroic figure and so closely associated
with non violence and a mass movement that most people
don't realize that. At the time that Rustin meets him
in the early stages of the boycott, Doctor King knows
(23:32):
about non violence, but he has no training in it.
He has no direct experience in the tactics and strategy
of a non violent movement, and so, starting in Montgomery,
Rustin and King had lengthy conversations about non violent principles,
organizing tactics, and strategic thinking. Rustin even started ghostwriting some
(23:54):
of King's speeches. King could not have had a better tutor.
Many in the activist community considered Rusting, to be quote
the American Gandhi. It was not hyperbole. Every fiber in
Ruston's being was dedicated to the principles of non violence.
Here's Buyer Drusted. I said to beget when you were
not like what I am saying. Those people who think
(24:18):
that we can use guns and knives against tanks and buzukas,
they are an ignorant bunks. In the next episode, we
learn more about King's mentor, Buyer Drusted, the remarkable individual
responsible for the March on Washington that launched King's dream,
(24:40):
a gay man banished behind the scenes of the civil
rights drama, but who still managed to change the course
of American history from its shadows. We are so in.
We have to fi. We got to all the good.
(25:09):
We've got to all it up. Well, we've got to cry.
We have to cry. We've got to all the threat
(25:30):
is produced by Libby Coleman, Robert Coulos, Sophia Perpetua, and
me Sean Braswell. Chris Hoff engineered our show. This episode
features the Montgomery Gospel Choir with a song called we
Are Soldiers in the Army. To learn more about the Thread,
visit AUSI dot com. Slash the thread all one word,
and make sure to subscribe to the thread on Apple Podcasts,
(25:52):
follow us on I Heart Radio, or listen wherever you
get your podcasts. Check us out at ausi dot com
or on Twitter and Facebook. If you love surprising, engaging
stories from history, look no further than the flashback section
of azzi dot com. That's ozy y dot com. We've
got to all the blast Day got that up until
It's May nineteen sixty three. The eyes of the world
are on Birmingham, Alabama. Hundreds of Birmingham's black residents, including
scores of teenagers, pour into the streets in their church
clothes on a warm Sunday afternoon. Birmingham's police chief, Eugene
Bull Connor, watches the scene unfold. Connor is a burly
(00:24):
white man in his mid sixties, slipped back, gray hair,
horn rimmed glasses. He looks a lot like the warden
from the Shawshank Redemption. In recent days, the frustrated Connor
has turned to police dogs and fire hoses to put
down the stream of protesters, and he has drawn national
attention to himself and his city in the process. The
(00:46):
marchers are given one more chance to turn around and disperse.
They refuse. The angry Connor whirls and shouts to his men,
damn it, turn on the hoses. Many protesters take to
their knees, prepared to stand a ground peacefully against the
coming onslaught. But what happened next is not what you
think or what you may have seen in the black
(01:07):
and white photos of protesters, dogs and fire hoses. What
happened next surprised even the man behind the protests in Birmingham,
Martin Luther King Jr. What happened next, or the dogs
that didn't bark, the fire hoses that didn't spread. What
happened next was what Dr King called the pride and
the power of nonviolence. We are so jess in ay.
(01:40):
We have to find, we have to ruy, we got
to love the bo we got to all it up.
We I'm Sean brass Well. Then this is The Thread.
(02:02):
Each season we unravel the stories behind some of the
most important lives and events in history to discover, essentially
how one thing leads to another. To do so, we
travel back through history, one story at a time to
explore the origins of an important event, an iconic figure,
or a big idea. This year marks the fiftieth anniversary
(02:22):
of the death of the iconic civil rights leader Dr
Martin Luther King Jr. And so in season three of
The Thread, we explore the origins of a revolutionary idea,
one very near and dear to the heart of Doctor King,
the principle of nonviolent resistance, the counterintuitive notion that the
best way to reform your enemies is to love them.
(02:44):
The best way to counter their blows is to absorb them.
King established the use of mass, nonviolent protest on American soil,
but it did not begin with him. We'll take you
on a journey through the minds of some remarkable individuals
and across the globe this season on the Thread, we
find out how a single powerful idea can spread and
(03:05):
remake the world. When Martin Luther King Jr. Was fourteen
years old, he had a formative experience aboard a segregated bus.
King and his high school teacher were on their way
back to Atlanta from an oratory contest in southern Georgia.
They were asked to give up their seats when two
white passengers boarded the bus. The teenage King stood and
(03:28):
stewed for hours at the back of the bus. He
later recalled quote, it was the angriest I have ever
been in my life. Twelve years later, a forty two
year old seamstress found herself in a similar situation, but
his history has well told. Rosa Parks refused to give
(03:49):
up her seat, and his fate would have it. The
now twenty six year old doctor King had just accepted
a job as a minister in the city where Parks
took her famous ride Montgomery, Alabama. Mrs Rose of Parks
was arrested and taken down to jail, taken from the
bus just because she refused to give up a seat.
(04:10):
That is the young King addressing reporters about the events
unfolding in Montgomery. A boycott of the city's buses was
proposed four days after Parks was arrested. This is David
Garrow King, biographer and the Pulitzer Prize winning author of
Bearing the Cross. That's when Dr King debuted as the
lead spokesperson for this new citywide bus boycott effort. You
(04:35):
have been moved that a second the resolution the red
will be received a dollar. Are you read about a
question all in fable that had been known by standing
on your feet? King and his wife Kreta woke up
early on the first day of the boycott. They watched
the bus stott near their house from the front window
(04:57):
and looked on in amazement as bus after by passed by.
Most of the buses contained not a single black passenger.
Grant was the day that we started a bust protest
which literally electrified the nation. And that was a day
(05:19):
when we decided that we were not going to take
segregated buses any longer. King saw a powerful social movement
come together before his eyes. Well several weeks now were
the Nigro citizens of Montgomery have been involved in a
non violent protest against the injustices which we have experienced
(05:44):
on the buses a number of years. Soon the boycott
went from weeks to months, and Montgomery's white community started
to press back. This is historian John Demilio, So imagine
a protest like this developing in Alabama in n segregation
(06:05):
is the rule. Um, white supremacists have no reluctance to
use violence to keep African Americans in line. Uh. They
lynch people, they shoot people, They're willing to burn houses.
They will do anything that they have to do. King
quickly became a primary target for that violence. David Garrow again.
(06:30):
Doctor King gradually becomes a more and more visible figure
in local Montgomery news coverage. Not long thereafter, Uh, there's
a small bomb that's detonated on the porch of his
home when he's out at a rally. It breaks some windows. Uh,
(06:54):
No one fortunately is injured. An angry crowd had gathered
outside Dr King's home by the time here back. They
refused to obey police instructions to disperse, King stepped onto
the front porch. He asked them not to retaliate. Then,
referring to the people who had nearly killed his wife
and child an hour before, King told the crowd quote,
(07:15):
I want you to love our enemies. Be good to them,
love them, and let them know you love them. And
you can see in his remarks that evening how his
fundamental Christian belief in a in an ethnic and doctrine
of love, even love for one's enemies, uh is at
(07:36):
the very core of his being. Finally, Montgomery City leaders
agreed to the protesters demands after a community of more
than fifty thousand people had protested for three hundred and
eighty two days. Montgomery's buses would never be segregated again,
and King and his allies had launched a powerful new
form of protests in America. Nonviolent resistance give passive resistance
(08:05):
means just passively accepting violence and justice. If it means
cowardice and stagnant passivity, then that is a difference. Because
non violent resistance that there is resist it is dynamically active.
Governments think it's a dangerous idea. It's a cherished notion
(08:27):
of government that they have an exclusive right to violence.
This is Mark Kurlansky, author of non Violence, The History
of a Dangerous idea. If your opponents are violent, uh,
and you're violent, you're playing to their strong suit. Whereas
if you're non violent, you're they don't really know what
to do. Uh. And that's what happened with the civil
(08:51):
rights movement. King's non violent approach transformed that movement. Before
the Montgomery bus boycott, the U s Civil rights movement
was based in the North, with organizations like the Inn
Double A c P, which won the landmark school desegregation
decision Brown Versus Board of Education a year after the boycott.
King and several other Southern black ministers and activists formed
(09:12):
the Southern Christian Leadership Conference or SCLC in nineteen fifty seven,
and that's when the center of the civil rights movement
began to shift to the South, and so the black
religious leaders like King, who waged a new war of
non violence. David Garrow. The lesson of Montgomery was that
local black communities, just ordinary residents citizens could take meaningful
(09:38):
action on their own against racial segregation without waiting for
leadership from new York City. Dr King was a unique
personality because he was a conflict resolver. He acted as
(09:59):
a lubricant and a persuader to get people to compromise
and do things in keeping with his tradition of the
non violent techniques. This is Timothy Jenkins, a civil rights
leader who helped organize students, sit ins and other non
violent protests during the nineteen sixties, and he was an
advocate of techniques of persuasion that did not revolve around
(10:22):
force or arms or threats, and that led to I
think a unique character to this movement as opposed to
normal political movements, because it was not a test of
power and the test of authority. It was a test
of moral suasion. But it was a test that did
not always work. John Demilio again. Dr King had been
(10:47):
in supporting protests in Albany, Georgia in nineteen sixty two
for much of the year and it was a very
frustrating experience, um in part because the sheriff in Albany,
Georgia had the foresight not to respond to these protests
(11:08):
with violence, and so the protests didn't capture headlines. The
Southern non violence campaign stalled by the end of nineteen
sixty two. In many ways, non violent protests depends upon
violence from those in authority to succeed, and King knew
that the movement needed a confrontation to regain the nation's attention.
Mark Kurlansky. He realized that, you know, resisting non violently
(11:34):
would only work if people saw you doing it, which
is how King and the SCLC came to be in Birmingham, Alabama,
the most segregated city in America in early nineteen sixty three.
Birmingham has one of the most brutal white sheriffs in
the South, John Demilio. Again he went by the name
(11:57):
of Bull Connor, which tells you something about out how
people perceived him. He was as determined and fierce as
a bull. Here the animated Connor in a white shirt
and black tie defends his actions in Birmingham. You can
never with the boy if you don't keep you and
him separated. I found out out bleming him. You've got
(12:19):
to keep your white and a black separn King and
local black leaders were banking on the fact that Connor
would take any means necessary to ensure that Birmingham's races
remained separate. The demonstrations began during Easter Week nineteen sixty.
About fifty supporters turned out for the first march on
Good Friday. After four and a half blocks, the marchers,
(12:42):
including King, were met by Connor's officers, placed under arrest,
and taken to the city jail. For the next few weeks,
the demonstrations did not have their intended effect David Garrow.
Initially in Birmingham, King and SCLC had a good degree
of trouble in recruiting Black community members to participate in protests.
(13:07):
Connor and the Birmingham police remained restrained, avoiding the media
attention that King counted on. So a new tactic was adopted.
Leaflets are circulated in Birmingham's black high schools urging students
to join the next demonstration in Birmingham. They decide to
mobilize young people, not young adults, not college students, but
(13:28):
high school students and younger and that gets a lot
of publicity and at a certain point Bull Connor and
the police just lose it and they start beating people
and arresting them on mass Police arrested more than five
students in the first two days. The jails were full
and Connor's patients was running thin. He unleashed the police
(13:51):
dogs and ordered the fire hoses be turned on demonstrators.
Water from the high powered hoses tore the clothes off
some protesters backs for agraphers and television cameras captured the
brutal attack. Images of police officers beating protesters, the teenagers
getting slammed against walls by water, and if dogs snarling
at young girls made headlines across the country. Many whites
(14:14):
in the rest of the country, we're going about their
lives not even noticing that this was going on in
the South. Well, you couldn't not notice this, And so
Birmingham really brings the civil rights struggle up to a
new level of visibility. But perhaps the most remarkable part
(14:39):
of the Birmingham story happened on that Sunday afternoon in
early May where we started this episode. The protesters, many
on their knees, braced themselves yet again for the Birmingham
police to unleash the dogs and the fire hoses. Bull
Connor himself gives the order for them to do so.
Then for the next thirty seconds, something astonishing occurs. Connor's
(15:04):
men do nothing. Slowly, the protesters stand up and continue
forward with their march. Doctor King later described the scene.
Connor's men as though hypnotized, fell back, their hoses sagging
uselessly in their hands, while several hundred Negroes marched past
them without further interference. It would prove to be a
(15:26):
defining moment for the civil rights movement, and for King,
it was an eye opening event. As he later wrote,
I felt there for the first time the pride and
the power of nonviolence. The nonviolent movement had taken the
(15:51):
struggle to the heart of the Jim Crow South and
to the forefront of the national consciousness. King was thrilled.
The activity is which have taken place in Birmingham over
the last few days, into my mind, marked a non
violent movement coming of age. David Garrow again, the images
(16:16):
and impact of Birmingham convinced both of the Kennedy brothers
that they needed to finally move forward with a meaningful
civil rights bill. That's the real tangible impact of Birmingham.
Congress passes the most sweeping civil rights bill ever to
(16:38):
be written into the law, and thus reaffirms the conception
of equality for all men that began with Lincoln and
the Civil War one hundred years ago. The summer of
nineteen sixty three was a revolution, King later said, because
it changed the face of America. By the time it
was over, hundreds of lunch counters, hotels, parks, and other
public places had been integrated. King and his nonviolent movement
(17:04):
continued to win victories and historic legislation over the next
few years, but not without cost. King led a march
for voting rights in Alabama in nineteen sixty five that
resulted in what was called Bloody Sunday. Armed police attacked
King and other peaceful demonstrators as they walked across the
Edmund Pettis Bridge in Selma, just like in Birmingham. Television
(17:24):
carried the beatings to audiences across the country and the world.
Mark Kurlanski again, you know it worked in a way
that I don't think his opponents understood how well it worked,
or they wouldn't have done things like the Pettis Bridge.
You know, the power of people seeing that all over
the world. King's non violent campaign was working, but he
(17:45):
sensed that violence still bubbled just beneath the surface during
the turbulent times. Here's King on Meet the Press in
nineteen sixty five. Realism impel impelled me to admit, however,
that when there is justice and the pursuit of justice,
violence disappears. And where there is injustice and frustration, the
potentialities for violence are great on those frustrations, and the
(18:11):
potential for violence would grow with the nineteen sixties war
on Up. Next, we dip into the shadows of history
to meet the remarkable man who inspired Dr. King's non
violent approach in the first place. Men, for years now
(18:53):
have been talking about one piece. But now no longer
can we just talk about it is no longer The
choice between violence and non violence in this world is
non violence on non existence. That is where we are
to date. Good evening. Dr Martin Luther King, the apostle
(19:24):
of non violence in the civil rights movement, has been
shot to death in Memphis, Tennessee. Doctor King was standing
on the balcony of his second floor hotel room tonight when,
according to a companion, a shot was fired from across
the street, and the friend's words, the bullet exploded in
his face. Martin Luther King's legacy is inextricably tied to
(19:54):
the non violent approach he championed, but the civil rights
leader was not always opposed to violence. As a seminary student,
he expressed skepticism about the virtues of pacifism and non violence.
Even in the opening days of the Montgomery boycott, King
had not yet found his non violent voice. Mark Kurlansky,
it's kind of funny the way he's portrayed today, especially
(20:16):
in schools, you know, as as just this kind of
dreamy guy who's about peace and love. He was a
very determined political activist who eventually embraced non violence because
he became convinced that that would work. And one man
above all others convinced King that it would work. But
(20:37):
King would have to make some changes. First. Let's go
back to Montgomery. It's February ninety. King's house has just
been bombed David Garret. As the Montgomery bus boycott begins
to achieve national news coverage, um civil rights supporters around
(20:57):
the country begin asking them selves what they can do
to assist the Montgomery protesters. One of those prominent northern
activists was a forty three year old black Quaker from
Pennsylvania named Bayard Rustin. A longtime advocate of nonviolent protest,
Ruston was concerned by what he saw when he arrived
(21:18):
in Montgomery. So at the beginning there in Montgomery, even
though doctor King believed in a Christian doctrine of love,
his interest in nonviolence was not such that he was
prohibiting black community members from standing armed guard. After King's
house was bombed, armed men kept guard out front each night.
(21:41):
Byar Rustin came to King's home shortly after the bombing,
but byed himself. Is is taken somewhat aback um when
he sits down in a chair at doctor King's home
and realizes there's a gun in it. King explained that
they did not intend to use the firearms harm anyone
unless they were violently attacked. This is Rustin biographer John
(22:04):
Damelio again, and Rustin explains to him that if you
want to be modeling non violence, you can't possess guns.
You actually have to live out completely the philosophy of
non violence. That was just the first lesson Rustin would
(22:24):
provide to the young King. The weapons and armed guards
were removed, and so Rustin becomes his tutor and instructor.
And really within the space of a few weeks, it
is not an exaggeration to say that in terms of
the strategy, tactics, and philosophy of non violence. Buyard Rustin
(22:48):
becomes Dr King's most trusted and closest advisor. The tall,
cosmopolitan Quaker and the short, eloquent Baptist preacher made for
quite a pair. It was to be one of the
most productive relationships in American history. Rustin immediately recognized King's
raw talent and potential as a leader, but knew he
(23:09):
still had a long way to go. Doctor King justifiably
has become such a heroic figure and so closely associated
with non violence and a mass movement that most people
don't realize that. At the time that Rustin meets him
in the early stages of the boycott, Doctor King knows
(23:32):
about non violence, but he has no training in it.
He has no direct experience in the tactics and strategy
of a non violent movement, and so, starting in Montgomery,
Rustin and King had lengthy conversations about non violent principles,
organizing tactics, and strategic thinking. Rustin even started ghostwriting some
(23:54):
of King's speeches. King could not have had a better tutor.
Many in the activist community considered Rusting, to be quote
the American Gandhi. It was not hyperbole. Every fiber in
Ruston's being was dedicated to the principles of non violence.
Here's Buyer Drusted. I said to beget when you were
not like what I am saying. Those people who think
(24:18):
that we can use guns and knives against tanks and buzukas,
they are an ignorant bunks. In the next episode, we
learn more about King's mentor, Buyer Drusted, the remarkable individual
responsible for the March on Washington that launched King's dream,
(24:40):
a gay man banished behind the scenes of the civil
rights drama, but who still managed to change the course
of American history from its shadows. We are so in.
We have to fi. We got to all the good.
(25:09):
We've got to all it up. Well, we've got to cry.
We have to cry. We've got to all the threat
(25:30):
is produced by Libby Coleman, Robert Coulos, Sophia Perpetua, and
me Sean Braswell. Chris Hoff engineered our show. This episode
features the Montgomery Gospel Choir with a song called we
Are Soldiers in the Army. To learn more about the Thread,
visit AUSI dot com. Slash the thread all one word,
and make sure to subscribe to the thread on Apple Podcasts,
(25:52):
follow us on I Heart Radio, or listen wherever you
get your podcasts. Check us out at ausi dot com
or on Twitter and Facebook. If you love surprising, engaging
stories from history, look no further than the flashback section
of azzi dot com. That's ozy y dot com. We've
got to all the blast Day got that up until
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