Summary—Chapter Fourteen: Black Muslims
In 1957,
after visiting the black-run Herald Dispatch in
Los Angeles, Malcolm founds Muhammad Speaks, the
Nation of Islam’s own newspaper. A surge of publicity comes in 1959,
when a man named C. Eric Lincoln publishes a book called The
Black Muslims in America and a program on the Nation called The
Hate that Hate Produced airs on television. Both titles
enrage Malcolm, who realizes that the media will spin everything
for shock value. Soon, mainstream publications, including Life and Time, feature
articles about the Nation of Islam. Malcolm now spends hours a day
on the telephone defending the Nation and attacking his interviewers
with countercharges, clarifications, and assertions of bias. Increasingly, organizations
invite Malcolm to represent Elijah Muhammad on panels and lecture
circuits.
In the fall of 1959,
Malcolm travels as an emissary to places where leaders are becoming
interested in the Nation of Islam project: Egypt, Arabia, Sudan,
Nigeria, and Ghana. Exposed to more radical ideas, he becomes increasingly
critical of black civil rights leaders, calling them “integration-mad
Negroes” and “Uncle Toms.” At first, Elijah Muhammad
discourages any disparagement of other black leaders, but when attacks
on the Nation become too frequent, he lets Malcolm vent his feelings
publicly. By 1960,
the Nation of Islam starts holding mass rallies with Elijah Muhammad
as the main attraction. At first the Nation admits no white people
to these rallies, but eventually they admit the white press and
then anyone with curiosity.
The size and militance of the Nation attracts the attention
of the FBI and the police, who begin infiltrating rallies and tapping
the telephones of higher-ups, including Malcolm X. Part of this
government interest comes from the high proportion of Nation of
Islam members who are or were in prison. Convicts embrace the Nation because
their prison experiences have conditioned them both to take an especially
grim view of white society and to excel at the discipline and austerity
that the codes of the Nation demand. The Nation also succeeds in
reforming drug addicts.
Summary—Chapter Fifteen: Icarus
On the recommendation of the aging Elijah Muhammad’s doctors, the
Nation buys Elijah Muhammad a home in Arizona, where he begins to
spend most of the year. Elijah Muhammad’s geographical distance
and diminished health, as well as the growing administrative demands
of the Nation, lead Malcolm to make a greater number of decisions
without notifying Muhammad. By 1963 both
the Nation of Islam and Malcolm X are inundated with publicity.
Now the second most sought-after university lecturer in America,
Malcolm X savors the excitement of the intellectual confrontations
that follow his speeches at top universities. Elijah Muhammad disapproves
of the university lecture circuit, while other Muslims frequently
accuse Malcolm of trying to take over the Nation of Islam. Malcolm
notices that his name is appearing less and less in Muhammad
Speaks, the newspaper he himself founded. He begins turning down
publicity opportunities in Life and Newsweek, hoping
to reduce Elijah Muhammad’s jealousy.
Summary—Chapter Sixteen: Out
Malcolm’s relationship to the Nation of Islam becomes
more complex when Elijah Muhammad faces paternity suits from two
temple secretaries. At first, Malcolm pretends that he does not
know about the allegations and changes his temple teachings to skirt
the issue of the moral code. Eventually, however, he approaches
Elijah Muhammad for advice. Elijah Muhammad compares himself to
the great men of scripture whose accomplishments outweigh their
occasional transgressions. Malcolm accepts this explanation and
assumes that Elijah Muhammad will confess and explain himself to
the Nation. Elijah Muhammad does not publicly confess, however.
Relations worsen between Malcolm and the Nation of Islam after
President John F. Kennedy is assassinated. Malcolm breaks an order
by Elijah Muhammad that no minister comment on the assassination.
He calls the murder in Dallas a case of “the chickens coming home
to roost,” a statement that implies that the murder was somehow
justifiable. To distance the Nation from such a controversial stance,
Elijah Muhammad silences Malcolm for a ninety-day period. Malcolm
soon realizes, however, that Elijah Muhammad’s outrage over the
Kennedy quote is merely an excuse for the Nation to cast him off,
as it has been plotting to do for some time. Malcolm is deeply shocked
at Elijah Muhammad’s betrayal of him, describing it as a sudden
divorce after twelve years of beautiful marriage.
Malcolm hears rumors of a warrant out for his death, and
one of his assistants at the New York temple confesses that the
Nation has ordered him to kill Malcolm. To distance himself from
the Nation of Islam and absorb the shock of the symbolic divorce,
Malcolm accepts the invitation of boxer Cassius Clay for Malcolm
and his family to stay in Florida while Clay prepares for his fight
against Sonny Liston. The sight of Clay, who has Islamic leanings,
defeating a fighter who is physically stronger through a combination
of will, cleverness, and training strengthens Malcolm’s faith in
Allah. Clay announces his Muslim affiliation after the fight, taking
the name “Muhammad Ali.”
Once Malcolm accepts his estrangement from
the Nation of Islam, he thinks about how he can continue to serve
the political and economic interests of black people. He decides
to use his celebrity status to found an organization called “Muslim Mosque,
Inc.” in Harlem. Malcolm envisions the organization as more inclusive
and more active than the Nation of Islam in its pursuit of black
political and economic independence. Before things really get going,
however, Malcolm decides that it is time for him to make his pilgrimage
to the Islamic holy city of Mecca. Cut off from his sole source
of income, the Nation, Malcolm asks Ella for money for the trip,
and she obliges.
Analysis—Chapters Fourteen, Fifteen & Sixteen
Malcolm makes use of what he learns early in life as a
hustler to gain and maintain prominence in the Nation of Islam.
While he does not condone the hustler’s life, his comments imply
a respect for the hustler’s code of ethics. The street rules—“be
suspicious,” “know your enemy,” and “image is everything”—are as
well suited to Malcolm’s outspoken public life as to his petty hustling
life. By never trusting anyone outside his close circle of friends,
Malcolm keeps the growing network of mosques across America under
his direct control as he expands the reach of the Nation of Islam.
His occasional failure to follow these rules illustrates how important
they are. Malcolm puts his faith in Elijah Muhammad after the scandal
breaks that Elijah Muhammad slept with his secretaries, and Elijah
Muhammad repays Malcolm by silencing him, exiling him, and repeatedly
trying to have him killed. When Malcolm trusts Elijah Muhammad too much
and thereby breaks one of the hustler’s rules, he experiences grave
consequences.
Like a hustler, Malcolm tries to understand his enemy’s
psychology in order to guard against danger and tries to develop
a strong public image to inspire fear. As Malcolm deals with the
resistance of the police and the white press to his political activities,
he never loses sight of the necessity of knowing how they work in
order to be able to challenge them effectively. For instance, after
visiting a Los Angeles newspaper for a week, Malcolm becomes ready
to launch an informed counterattack, in the form of his own Muslim
newspaper, Muhammad Speaks. Furthermore, as an
activist Malcolm carefully shapes his public image, just as he does
earlier as a hustler. While his obsession with defending his image
leads Malcolm to near-death in a duel with West Indian Archie, it
allows him to deal effectively with the white press. Not afraid
to ignore questions or answer questions that are different from
the ones the press poses him, Malcolm uses his smooth-talking skill
to fine-tune his public image to his advantage. His understanding
of the similarity between hustling individuals and hustling the
public enables him to stay out of the way, temporarily, of the dangerous
intentions that his ideas provoke.
The skills Malcolm acquires as a hustler in Harlem also
help him turn his ambitions for the expansion of the Nation of Islam
into a reality. As Malcolm rapidly rises through the Nation’s ranks,
a religious fervor for recruitment drives him, and he eventually
crosses the country to found temples in Boston, Harlem, Detroit,
Philadelphia, and Los Angeles. His experience as a quick judge of
character helps him run the new temples smoothly, and his knowledge
of street psychology and slang makes him more persuasive than his Christian
competitors to many young black city-dwellers. Still, with all his
credibility, he finds the majority unreachable, plagued by social,
spiritual, economic, and political problems. The most important
part of Malcolm’s Harlem experience is the knowledge that blacks
must be aggressive about helping themselves if they want to improve
their situation.
Although Malcolm and Elijah Muhammad both fight for black rights,
they differ in their estimation of how the struggle for these rights
should be carried out. While Elijah Muhammad wants American blacks
to adopt an Asian identity and speak Arabic, Malcolm continues to
believe in a version of his father’s pan-Africanism, inspired by
Marcus Garvey. While Elijah Muhammad wants American blacks to be
their own kind of middle-class Americans in conservative suits,
Malcolm remains more interested in the plight of the poor. Both
men agree that the correct response to segregation is not integration
but cultural and economic separation. However, they could
not disagree more on how to achieve these goals: while Elijah Muhammad
wants to keep his organization wholly apart from politics, Malcolm
often wants to be engaged in action for racial justice. That there
are such differences of opinion between two leaders within the same
group illustrates the complexity of the race issue in America.
