the ballot or the bullet speech pdf

Because this is the year of politics. [applause] At present I am the minister of the newly founded Muslim Mosque Incorporated, which has its offices in the Theresa Hotel right in the heart of Harlem, that's the black belt in New York City. My religion is still Islam. But in the spring of 1964, when Malcolm X gave his "Ballot or the Bullet" speech, he was regarded by a majority of white Americans as a menacing character. What about Eastland? And as long as you think that old sit-down thought, you'll be in some kind of sit-down action. One of the 22 million black victims of the Republicans and one of the 22 million black victims of Americanism. Rev. Contribute now…, Support American RadioWorks with your Amazon.com purchases. Guerilla action takes heart, take nerve, and he doesn't have that. In fact, America is more so a colonial power than they, because she is a hypocritical colonial power behind it. The man who is controlling the stores in our community is a man who doesn't look like we do. And that's the same way with you. As long as you got a sit-down philosophy you'll have a sit-down thought pattern. Whoever runs the Democrats is also the father of the Dixiecrats. I'm going to say what's on my mind because the preachers already proved to you that they got a syndicate. is the year of the ballot or the bullet, I would like to clarify some things that refer to me per-sonally - concerning my own personal position. You're the one who put the present Democratic administration in Washington, D.C. 7. Cleage, right here, is a Christian minister, here in Detroit, he's head of the Freedom Now Party. [cheering] He's brave when he's got tanks. And because these Negroes, who have been misled, misguided, are breaking their necks to take their money and spend it with the Man, the Man is becoming richer and richer, and you're becoming poorer and poorer. [applause] My religion is still Islam. 9. No, I'm not for separation and you're not for integration, what you and I are for is freedom. And in 1964, this seems to be the year. A chump can sit, a coward can sit, anything can sit. [cheering] Cassius Clay can sing. [laughter] He made the mistake of teaching me that Patrick Henry was a patriot, and George Washington – wasn't nothing non-violent about ol' Pat, or George Washington. [applause], So I studied this man, Billy Graham, who preaches white nationalism. Malcolm X was one of the most dynamic, dramatic and influential figures of the civil rights era. A Dixiecrat is nothing but a Democrat. A fox and a wolf are both canine, both belong to the dog family. He publicly blamed the Nation of Islam and predicted he would be killed. Cleage, brothers and sisters and friends, and I see some enemies. Don't join any church where white nationalism is preached. And once you and I go into business, we own and operate at least the businesses in our community. [applause], Any time you throw your weight behind a political party that controls two-thirds of the government, and that party can't keep the promise that it made to you during election-time, and you're dumb enough to walk around continuing to identify yourself with that party, you're not only a chump but you're a traitor to your race. He's the one who opened my eyes. %%EOF [applause] It governs my personal life, my personal morals. So what he does – the way he circumvents the jealousy and envy that he ordinarily would incur among the heads of the church – whenever you go into an area where the church already is, you going to run into trouble. Malcolm X was one of the most dynamic, dramatic and influential figures of the civil rights era. Oh, I say you been misled. As Malcolm X's national prominence grew, so did a rift between him and Elijah Muhammad. So this is a con game, and this is what they've been doing with you and me all of these years. [applause], By the same token, the time when that same white man, knowing that your eyes are too far open, can send another Negro in the community, and get you and me to support him, so that he can use him to lead us astray, those days are long gone too. The white man made the mistake of letting me read his history books. Black nationalism is a self-help philosophy. And then you have the audacity to complain about poor housing in a rundown community, while you're running down yourselves when you take your dollar out. [applause], When this country here was first being founded, there were thirteen colonies. That don't happen even in Hollywood [laughter] You don't have a revolution in which you love your enemy. You're in a position to determine who'll go to the White House and who'll stay in the doghouse. Historically, revolutions are bloody, oh yes they are. I know you don't like me saying that. 4. So today, though Islam is my religious philosophy, my political, economic and social philosophy is black nationalism. Today, our people can see that we're faced with a government conspiracy. The ballot or the bullet explains itself. He joined the Nation of Islam (NOI) and changed his name to Malcolm X, eliminating that part of his identity he called a white-imposed slave name. No! [cheering], So it's the, it's the ballot or the bullet. He read voraciously while serving time and converted to the Black Muslim faith. Tell me where he's winning – nowhere. A defiant Earl Little shot at the arsonists as they got away. He outlined a new, global sensibility in the fight for racial justice: "We intend to expand [the freedom struggle] from the level of civil rights to the level of human rights. coming in. Don't say it's southern senators, this is the government. [applause], So I say in my conclusion, the only way we're going to solve it: we got to unite. Were we to come out here discussing religion, we'd have too many differences from the out start and we could never get together. [laughter, applause], You, today, are in the hands of a government of segregationists. Whenever you got a racial powder keg sitting in your lap, you're in more trouble than if you had an atomic powder keg sitting in your lap. The Christian Century 109:38 (December 1992), 1189-1194. It's liberty or it's death. They'll lynch in Texas as quick as they'll lynch you in Mississippi. A vote for a Democrat is nothing but a vote for a Dixiecrat. You would never have found—you can't open up a black store in a white community. No, they're getting it through nationalism. These Northern Democrats are in cahoots with the southern Democrats. Malcolm X was a polarizing figure who both energized and divided African Americans, while frightening and alienating many whites. [applause], Twenty-two million black victims of Americanism are waking up and they are gaining a new political consciousness, becoming politically mature. They've become dissatisfied. So you and I, even when we try and spend our money on the block where we live or the area where we live, we're spending it with a man who, when the sun goes down, takes that basket full of money in another part of the town. In the South they're outright political wolves, in the North they're political foxes. We've only suffered from America's hypocrisy. [applause], The political … the economic philosophy of black nationalism only means that we have to become involved in a program of reeducation, to educate our people into the importance of knowing that when you spend your dollar out of the community in which you live, the community in which you spend your money becomes richer and richer, the community out of which you take your money becomes poorer and poorer. And my religious philosophy is personal between me and the God in whom I believe, just as the religious philosophy of these others is between them and the God in whom they believe. This government has failed us. [applause], They didn't care about the odds. Only 33 are Republicans. And Dr. King is a Christian minister from Atlanta Georgia, or in Atlanta Georgia, but he's become more famous for being involved in the civil rights struggle. Well, you and I been sitting long enough and it's time for us today to start doing some standing and some fighting to back that up. [applause]. Ҧ$� �Y n���2�������b``$���X� � �8 It's freedom for everybody or freedom for nobody. And the father of all of them is sitting in the White House. White man won't even patronize you. Elijah Muhammad and the NOI had a long history of using violence and intimidation against members who strayed. The conflict deepened when Muhammad suspended Malcolm X for saying that President John F. Kennedy's assassination represented "the chickens coming home to roost" because of the war in Vietnam.4 Finally, in March 1964, Malcolm X left the Nation of Islam and charted his own course of militant, black nationalism. [applause], Why is America – why does this loom to be such an explosive political year? We don't see any American dream. And you don't have a revolution in which you are begging the system of exploitation to integrate you into it. [applause] They're going to come in with false promises. 128 0 obj <> endobj All of 'em from the same enemy. In February, 1965, Malcolm X's home was firebombed. Martin Luther King Jr. Why not make him the president? Only in Texas they lynch you with a Texas accent, in Mississippi they lynch you with a Mississippi accent. [applause] How can Johnson be his friend and your friend too? Mr. Moderator, Brother Lomax, brothers and sisters, friends and enemies: I just can't believe everyone in here is a friend, and I don't want to leave anybody out. [applause], The political philosophy of black nationalism only means that if you and I are going to live in a black community – and that's where we're going to live, 'cause as soon as you move into one of their….soon as you move out of the black community into their community, it's mixed for a period of time, but they're gone and you're right there all by yourself again. The blazing heat of Malcolm X's rhetoric sometimes overshadowed the complexity of his message, especially for those who found him threatening in the first place. But they got to make you go with one of 'em or the other. In the last months of his life, Malcolm X's conflict with the Nation of Islam grew increasingly bitter. You never see them until election time. "9 In death, he became a seminal figure to an increasingly militant generation of young African Americans, a beacon for activists in the 1960s Black Power and Black Arts movements. So it means that the white man today is without a weapon. I'm no politician. No, you're nothing but a 20th century slave. This is how big it was, yet these thirteen little scrawny states, tired of taxation without representation, tired of being exploited and oppressed and degraded, told that big British Empire, "Liberty or death." So some of them stood up and said, "Liberty or death!"

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