Becoming King

by Troy Jackson

  25. Robinson, interview by Garrow. King included the story of Mother Pollard in his published sermon collection (King Jr., “Antidotes for Fear,” in Strength to Love, 125).

  26. Minutes, Alabama Council on Human Relations, December 7, 1955, in Burns, ed., Daybreak of Freedom, 97; Friedland, Lift up Your Voice Like a Trumpet, 27–28.

  27. King Jr., Stride toward Freedom, 109–12; Tom Johnson, “4-Hour Huddle: Bus Boycott Conference Fails to Find Solution,” Montgomery Advertiser, December 9, 1955, in Burns, ed., Daybreak of Freedom, 98–99; King to the National City Lines, Inc., December 8, 1955, in Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr. 3: 80–81; King, “Statement of Negro Citizens on Bus Situation,” December 10, 1955, in Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., 3: 81–83.

  28. Friedland, Lift up Your Voice Like a Trumpet, 28.

  29. Juliette Morgan, “Lesson from Gandhi,” Montgomery Advertiser, December 12, 1955.

  30. Robert Graetz, letter to editor, Time, December 22, 1955, Folder 30, Box 107, King Papers, Boston University.

  31. Vaughn and Wills, eds., Reflections on Our Pastor, 5–6, 16–17, 28.

  32. Rosa Parks, minutes, Montgomery branch executive committee special meeting, December 13, 1955, Montgomery NAACP Papers (NN-Sc).

  33. Garrow, ed., The Montgomery Bus Boycott and the Women Who Started It, 67. Michael Eric Dyson highlights the significant contributions of grassroots leaders in Montgomery whose efforts were minimized in Stride toward Freedom: “Without WPC’s ingenious tactical maneuvers, quick response, and organizational efficiency, the Montgomery bus boycott may have never occurred. But beyond a token nod to their efforts and those of Rosa Parks, King barely recognized WPC’s achievements in his account of the year-long boycott, Stride toward Freedom. Moreover, without the spur of grass-roots leaders like E. D. Nixon, the ministers who seized the helm of leadership, or were forced to take up the reins of the boycott—might never have acted bravely to exploit Parks’s act of social rebellion for the black community” (Dyson, I May Not Get There with You, 203).

  34. King, “Our God Is Able,” January 1, 1956, in Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., 6: 243–46.

  35. Richard Lischer argues King’s sermons functioned similarly in 1968: “Although he is preaching to others the value of rising above the forces that threaten to destroy ‘our personalities,’ it is clear that the preacher, beleaguered by criticism of his anti-war activities and his plans for the Poor People’s Campaign, is ministering to his own spirit…. As King desperately exhorts his congregation to choose life over death, it is himself he is urging to persevere” (Lischer, The Preacher King, 167–68). Cone, Malcolm and Martin and America, 124.

  36. Parks, Horton, and Nixon, interview by Terkel.

  37. Allen, interview by Millner, 522–23.

  38. Burns, ed., Daybreak of Freedom, 139; King Jr., Stride toward Freedom, 78.

  39. Uriah J. Fields, “Negroes Cannot Compromise,” Montgomery Advertiser, January 5, 1956, in Burns, ed., Daybreak of Freedom, 113–14; Erna Dungee, MIA Executive Board minutes, January 23, 1956, ibid., 121–24.

  40. “To the Commissioners of the City of Montgomery,” January 9, 1956, in Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., 3: 97–98. Montgomery Advertiser, January 10, 1956.

  41. Alabama Tribune, January 13, 1956.

  42. King Jr., “How to Believe in a Good God in the Midst of Glaring Evil,” January 15, 1956, in Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., 6: 247–49.

  43. Hughes, interview by Holden.

  44. Anna Holden, “Notes from ACHR meeting,” January 20, 1956, Montgomery, Ala., Valien Collection.

  45. King Jr., Stride toward Freedom, 125–26. The historian Steven M. Millner argues the response of the people to the settlement announcement was “a pointed warning to the MIA’s leaders that they too had no room for shabby backroom deals that might be perceived as the proverbial sellout. The protest’s leaders were thus put on notice that a firm refusal to back down was their sole leadership alternative. This strengthened the faction of militants with whom King increasingly aligned in backroom debates” (Millner, “The Montgomery Bus Boycott,” in Garrow, ed., The Walking City, 478). MIA press release, “The Bus Protest Is Still On,” January 22, 1956, in Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., 3: 100–101.

  46. King Jr., “Redirecting Our Missionary Zeal,” January 22, 1956, in Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., 6: 249–50.

  47. Thrasher, interview by Holden. J. Mills Thornton claims Thrasher was at the meeting on January 21 with the three black ministers who agreed to the settlement. Thrasher and Hughes probably met with white ministers the previous week, came up with a proposed compromise solution, and presented it to the city commissioners and bus officials. Then, without Thrasher or Hughes present, these commissioners presented the plan to three hand-selected African American ministers, who accepted the plan without communication with the MIA. See Thornton, Dividing Lines, 72.

  48. T. T. Allen to Ella Baker, March 29, 1942, Group II, Box C-4, Montgomery NAACP Papers; West, interview by Lee; King Jr., Stride toward Freedom, 78.

  49. “Notes on MIA Executive Board Meeting, by Donald T. Ferron,” January 23, 1956, in Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., 3: 101–5. Uriah Fields claims King was in favor of dropping the demand for black bus drivers (Fields, Inside the Montgomery Bus Boycott, 79). King Jr., Stride toward Freedom, 114; Hughes, interview by Holden, January 18, 1956.

  50. Thornton, Dividing Lines, 73.

  51. Whatley, interview by Holden; Hughes, interview by Holden, March 27, 1956; Parks, Pierce, and Graetz, “Montgomery Story.”

  52. King Jr., Stride toward Freedom, 134–35.

  53. Miller, Voice of Deliverance, 138; Cone, Martin and Malcolm and America, 124; Warren, King Came Preaching, 40; Baldwin, There Is a Balm in Gilead, 189n87.

  54. “‘Montgomery Dangerous’ Negro Warns after Weekend of Violence,” New York Post, January 28, 1957.

  55. Burns, ed., Daybreak of Freedom, 128–29; Donald T. Ferron, “Notes on MIA Executive Board Meeting,” January 30, 1956, in Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., 3: 109–12.

  56. Willie Mae Lee, “Notes on MIA Mass Meeting at First Baptist Church,” January 30, 1956, in Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., 3: 113–14.

  57. Joe Azbell, “Blast Rocks Residence of Bus Boycott Leader,” Montgomery Advertiser, January 31, 1956, in Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., 3: 114–15. For other accounts of the bombing and King’s response, see Willie Mae Lee, “The Bombing Episode,” January 31, 1956, Valien Collection; and King Jr., Stride toward Freedom, 136–38.

  58. Miller, Voice of Deliverance, 87.

  59. Burns, Daybreak of Freedom, 76–77. Burns cites transcript of Browder v. Gayle federal court testimony, Montgomery, Ala., May 11, 1956, p. 23 (Burns, ed., Daybreak of Freedom, 266); Lewis and Ligon, interview by Lumpkin.

  5. “Living under the Tension”

  1. King Jr., “It’s Hard to Be a Christian,” February 5, 1956, in Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., 6: 251–52.

  2. Thornton, Dividing Lines, 78. Thornton argues the primary focus of the boycott was not integrating the buses, but rather challenging white supremacy. He asserts that the protesters “sought not the right to sit with whites, but rather the right not to be unseated in favor of whites, as well as at least a degree of protection from public humiliation at the hands of white bus drivers.” While this may have been true for some in the boycott, Nixon and others in his camp always saw the legal side of the Parks case as the critical portion, with a trajectory that began four days before the decision was made to extend the bus boycott indefinitely. While satisfying the conditions may have ended the boycott, it would not necessarily have ended the legal battle. Thornton more accurately describes the perspective of the white leadership in writing: “Segregation on the initiative of blacks and under black control was unacceptable because authorities’ genuine motive, whether consciously or unconsciously, was not the separation of the races but the subordination of blacks to whites.”

  3. Donald T.
Ferron, “Notes on MIA Executive Board Meeting,” February 2, 1956, in Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., 3: 120.

  4. Gray, Bus Ride to Justice, 70; Nixon, interview by Lumpkin, 2–3. See also Newton, Montgomery in the Good War, 137–38. According to J. Mills Thornton, Arthur Madison was persuaded by one of his brothers to return to the South to help the family gain the requisite number of registered voters to gain a municipal charter for Madison Park as an all-black town (Thornton, Dividing Lines, 28).

  5. Donald T. Ferron, “Notes on MIA Executive Board Meeting,” February 2, 1956, in Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., 3: 120, 122. See also Gray, Bus Ride to Justice, 78.

  6. Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., 3: 121; Glasco, interview by Ferron; Wilson, interview by Ferron.

  7. King, interview by Ferron. For further information on King’s meeting with Folsom, see Cliff Mackay, “Ala. Bus Boycotters Sing ‘My Country ‘Tis of Thee,’” Baltimore Afro-American, February 11, 1956.

  8. Donald T. Ferron, “Notes on MIA Executive Board Meeting,” February 2, 1956, in Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., 3: 120. King later claimed that, after the bombing, friends and church leaders encouraged him to hire a bodyguard, which he resisted, claiming, “I had no fears now, and consequently needed no protection.” He eventually acquiesced, however, and “also went down to the sheriff’s office and applied for a license to carry a gun in the car; but this was refused” (King Jr., Stride toward Freedom, 140). King Jr., interview by Ferron.

  9. Burns, ed., Daybreak of Freedom, 159. See also Garrow, Bearing the Cross, 66–67. Rustin, “Montgomery Diary,” in Liberation, April 1956, 7.

  10. Rustin, “Montgomery Diary,” in Liberation, April 1956, 8.

  11. Garrow, Bearing the Cross, 68.

  12. John M. Swomley Jr. to Glenn Smiley, February 29, 1956, Fellowship of Reconciliation Papers; Garrow, Bearing the Cross, 70.

  13. Burns, ed., Daybreak of Freedom, 153–54; Draper, Conflict of Interests, 22–24; Clifford Durr, interview by Holden. See also Montgomery Advertiser, February 11, 1956. Draper, Conflict of Interests, 31–32.

  14. Frazier, interview by Holden.

  15. Burns, ed., Daybreak of Freedom, 181; Southern Exposure 9, no. 1 (spring 1981): 18.

  16. Lawrence Reddick, report on Fred D. Gray, July 17, 1956, Folder 7, Box 2, Reddick Papers.

  17. Birmingham, interview by Holden.

  18. Azbell, interview by Holden.

  19. Box 3, Morgan Papers; Clifford Durr and Virginia Durr, interview by Lumpkin, 14–16; Morgan, interviews by Holden, February 7, 1956, March 26, 1956.

  20. “Fellowship of the Concerned: The Supreme Court Decision—Building Community Understanding, Meeting Minutes,” Folder 1, Andrews Collection; The Children Coming On, 203.

  21. Parks, Pierce, and Graetz, “Montgomery Story.”

  22. King Jr., Stride toward Freedom, 121–22; Matthews, interview by Holden.

  23. Ralph Abernathy, Memo to the Men of Montgomery, February 20, 1956, Garrow Collection; Matthews, interview by Holden; King Jr., Stride toward Freedom, 122.

  24. State of Alabama v. M.L. King, Jr., March 22, 1956, in Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., 3: 186–87; Lawrence D. Reddick, “The Bus Boycott in Montgomery,” March 15, 1956, in Garrow, ed., The Walking City, 80; Abernathy, Memo to the Men of Montgomery, February 20, 1956.

  25. Indictment, State of Alabama v. M.L. King, Jr., et al., in Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., 3: 132–33; Bayard Rustin, “Montgomery Diary,” Liberation, April 1956, 8.

  26. King Jr., Stride toward Freedom, 143–46; Wayne Phillips, “Negroes Pledge to Keep Boycott,” New York Times, February 24, 1956.

  27. King Jr., “Faith in Man,” February 26, 1956, in Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., 6: 253–55. See also Wayne Phillips, “Negro Pastors Press Bus Boycott by Preaching Passive Resistance,” New York Times, February 27, 1956.

  28. King’s growing awareness of security issues led him to cancel a scheduled speaking engagement in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, noting “my present position of leadership in Montgomery demands that I take all precaution possible. The letter was sent a day after riots in Tuscaloosa had led to the temporary dismissal of Autherine Lucy from the University of Alabama. The invitation for King to speak in Tuscaloosa had come on January 10 and was subsequently accepted. Clearly, the climate in both Montgomery and Tuscaloosa changed significantly within a short month (King to Fred Drake, February 7, 1956, in Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., 3: 127–28). Donald Ferron, “Report on MIA Mass Meeting,” February 27, 1956, in Burns, ed., Daybreak of Freedom, 174.

  29. In February, nearby Tuscaloosa played host to a showdown over the court-ordered integration of the University of Alabama. Autherine Lucy, in a case argued by the NAACP attorney Thurgood Marshall, had won admission to the school leading the university to admit her as the school’s first black student on February 3. Peaceful protests soon gave way to rioting in the city. A few days later, the board of trustees decided Lucy could no longer attend classes out of concern for her own safety, and eventually the school suspended her. Montgomery residents committed to resisting racial change were undoubtedly emboldened by this reactionary course of action by University of Alabama officials (Burns, ed., Daybreak of Freedom, 43). An editorial in the February 7, 1956, Tuscaloosa News concluded: “Yes, there’s peace on the University campus this morning. But what a price has been paid for it!” King, “When Peace Becomes Obnoxious,” March 18, 1956, in Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., 6: 257–59.

  30. King, “When Peace Becomes Obnoxious,” March 18, 1956, in Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., 6: 257–59. King repeated the story of his encounter with a white Montgomery resident in Stride toward Freedom, 40.

  31. “Testimony in State of Alabama v. M.L. King, Jr.,” March 22, 1956, in Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., 3: 183–97. For further testimony from the trial, see Burns, ed., Daybreak of Freedom, 59–73.

  32. King Jr., “Reactions to Conviction,” March 22, 1956, in Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., 3: 198–99; King Jr., “Address to MIA Mass Meeting at Holt Street Baptist Church,” March 22, 1956, ibid., 3: 199–201.

  33. King Jr., interview by Azbell.

  34. Reverend Thomas R. Thrasher, “Alabama’s Boycott,” March 1956, in Garrow, ed., The Walking City, 59–67.

  35. Introduction to vol. 3 of Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., 3: 46; King Jr., “Address to MIA Mass Meeting at Day Street Baptist Church,” April 26, 1956, ibid., 3: 230–32; King Jr., “Fleeing from God,” April 29, 1956, ibid., 6: 259–61. See also Art Carter, “Rev. King is ‘King’ in Montg’ry,” Baltimore Afro-American, May 12, 1956.

  36. Almena Lomax, “Mother’s Day in Montgomery,” Los Angeles Tribune, May 18, 1956, in Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., 3: 263–67.

  37. “Recommendations to MIA Executive Board,” May 1956, ibid., 3: 271–73.

  38. On April 25, 1956, National City Lines informed the MIA that they would be unable to guarantee the hiring of African American bus drivers due to union contracts (Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., 3: 45). Burns, ed., Daybreak of Freedom, 138, 245. See also Lewis, interview by Ferron.

  39. Garrow, ed., The Montgomery Bus Boycott and the Women Who Started It, 113–14; Robinson, interview by Lee.

  40. King Jr., Stride toward Freedom, 73. For more on Solomon Seay’s contributions, see Yeakey, “The Montgomery Alabama Bus Boycott,” 83–93; Gray, Leventhal, Sikora, and Thornton, The Children Coming On, 226.

  41. Gray, Leventhal, Sikora, and Thornton, The Children Coming On, 134; King Jr., Stride toward Freedom, 86.

  42. Parks, Pierce, and Graetz, “Montgomery Story.”

  43. Ibid.; Lawrence D. Reddick, “The Bus Boycott in Montgomery,” March 15, 1956, in Garrow, ed., The Walking City, 81.

  44. Azbell, interview by Holden.

  45. Underwood, interview by Lumpkin.

  46. Thomas, interview by Lee.

  47. Race Relations Law Reporter (August 1956): 669–78, in Burns, ed., Daybreak of Freedom, 272–73.

/>   48. American Socialist, April 1956, 11.

  49. Gray, Leventhal, Sikora, and Thornton, The Children Coming On, 13. Palmer, interview by Ferron.

  50. MIA Nominating Committee to MIA President and Executive Board, May 24, 1956, Montgomery Improvement Association Collection. In the meeting, held on May 16, Fields was officially replaced by Reverend W. J. Powell as recording secretary. Nominating committee members included Reverend A. W. Wilson (chairman), Dr. Moses Jones, Mrs. Jo Ann Robinson, Reverend A. W. Murphy, Reverend B. J. Simms, Reverend R. J. Glasco, and Mrs. Erna A Dungee (secretary).

  51. MIA newsletter, vol. 1, no. 2 (June 23, 1956), Montgomery Improvement Association Collection.

  52. Nixon, interview by Millner, 550; Graetz, A White Preacher’s Memoir, 107–8.

  53. Carr, interview by Millner, 530; Simms, interview by Millner, 579; Fields, interview by Millner, 536; Nixon, interview by Millner, 548.

  54. Allen, interview by Millner, 524–25.

  55. King Jr., Stride toward Freedom, 157–58, 186. Following the bombing, Graetz sent a letter to the U.S. Justice Department seeking an investigation of all racially motivated violence in the city. In the letter to U.S. Attorney General Herbert Brownell, Graetz reported rumors that Commissioner Sellers may have had foreknowledge of the bombings of King’s and Nixon’s homes the previous winter. Regarding the bombing of his own home, Graetz claimed he was most concerned about Mayor Gayle’s assertion that blacks had done it for publicity: “And apparently the police have been ordered to find the colored people who did it, or at least someone that it can conveniently be blamed on. At least four colored men have been arrested with the bombing” (Graetz to Brownell, September 4, 1956, Graetz Papers).