Let the Trumpet Sound

by Stephen B. Oates

  “not going to be the movement” and “have lost freshness”: Xerona Clayton Brady in Atlanta Constitution, Jan. 14, 1978; Wainwright, “Martyr,” Life, 132, 134; PI, 77.

  “empathy”: MOY, 14.

  “pompous arrogance” and “never met a man”: Sam Williams in Friends; Walker interview, BOHC; also Gibson interview, ibid.; Wachtel interview with Oates; Lee interview with Oates; Rustin interview with Oates.

  “no messiah”: see, for example, King to Jackie Robinson, June 19, 1960, MLK(BU).

  “His jokes,” “tease you harder,” “practically fall”: Hosea Williams interview with Oates, Aug. 2, 1978; Lee interview with Oates; Young in Friends.

  “Aw right, Reverend” and “big Negro guy”: Wainwright, “Martyr,” Life, 126; Duckett interview with Oates.

  “Six, please”: Wachtel interview with Oates.

  “troubled soul”: SL, 126.

  “guilt-ridden man”: Levison in Stein and Plimpton, American Journey, 108–9; Wachtel interview with Oates.

  “felt that anger” and “basic article”: Friends; PI, 73.

  “deep longing” and 10 percent: SL, 60; King to Kivie Kaplan, Jan. 30, 1964, MLK(CSC).

  “My life”: Wainwright, “Martyr,” Life, 132, 134; PI, 77.

  “didn’t see Martin,” “historical obligations,” “number of women”: Williams interview with Oates; Schlesinger, Robert Kennedy, 362; Lee interview with Oates; and confidential interviews with Oates.

  “tragic lust,” “when we yield,” “adultery”: SL, 77, 18, 127; King’s speech, Gadsden, Ala., June 21, 1963, MLK(CSC); MOY, 13.

  “am conscious” and “is two selves”: Julius Lester, “The Martin Luther King I Remember,” Evergreen Review (Jan., 1970), 20–21, 70; King, “The Prodigal Son,” Sept. 4, 1966, MLK(CSC). See also King’s sermons, “Is the Universe Friendly,” Dec. 12, 1965, and “New Wine in Old Bottles,” Jan. 2, 1966, ibid.

  “destroy the burrhead” and “excellent data”: HSCAH, VI, 104, 193–94, 205–6; Garrow, FBI, 106, 109–10.

  “suffering” and “mistake”: King to Lucy Harris, Jan. 27, 1961, MLK(BU); Coretta King, 171.

  “my doubts,” “thrust forward,” “quality”: PI, 78; Bennett, Face to Face, 78; MOY, 27.

  “power,” “core of steel,” “truest militant”: Dana Swann interview with Oates, Aug. 4, 1978; Sitten, “King,” NYT Mag., 10; Williams in Atlanta Constitution, Jan. 14, 1978, and in Flip Schulke (ed.), Martin Luther King, Jr., A Documentary… (New York, 1976), 131.

  “able to find” and “strong-willed”: Young and Williams in Friends.

  “more at home” and “small talent”: MOY, 15; Paul Good, “Chicago Summer: Bossism, Racism and Dr. King,” Nation (Sept. 19, 1966), 240; Rustin interview, LBJ; also Lincoln, 121–22.

  “say it like that”: Walker interview, BOHC.

  “better job”: Wainwright, “Martyr,” Life, 132.

  “surrounded himself”: Gibson interview, BOHC; C. T. Vivian interview with Oates, Aug. 16, 1978.

  Vivian: Vivian interview with Oates; Vivian to King, Oct. 19 and 23, 1958, MLK(BU); Selby, 351–57.

  Williams: Williams interview with Oates; Raines, 436–45; PI, 236; Schulke, King, 130; Williams in Atlanta Constitution, Jan. 14, 1978; Vivian interview with Oates.

  King and his staff: Vivian interview with Oates; Williams interview with Oates; Lee interview with Oates; Walker interview, BOHC; Abernathy interview with Oates; Raines, 452; Fager, Uncertain Resurrection, 14; Rustin interview, BOHC.

  “a preacher”: Young, “Remembering Dr. King,” in Obst, Sixties, 232; also Abernathy interview with Oates, and Levison conversation with Oates, May 30, 1977.

  “Doc really communicated”: Vivian interview with Oates.

  “a tool”: Hanes Walton, Jr., The Political Philosophy of Martin Luther King (Westport, Conn., 1971), 105.

  “imaginative artists”: Mehta, “Gandhism Is Not Easily Copied,” NYT Mag. (July 9, 1961), 8–11. See also Lewis Chester, Martin Luther King (Geneva, Switzerland, 1971), 293.

  Black Mountain: Raines, 451–52; Wachtel interview with Oates; Lee interview with Oates; Walker interview, BOHC; Young interview, LBJ; Lincoln, 122; also King’s remarks at the SCLC Board Meeting, Apr. 16, 1964, MLK(CSC).

  Research Committee: Howell, 18; Wachtel interview with Oates; Rustin interview with Oates; Rustin interview, LBJ; documents pertaining to the Committee in MLK(CSC).

  “Hammer of Civil Rights”: Nation (Mar. 9, 1964), 230–34.

  St. Augustine involvement: Robert B. Hayling interview with John H. Britton, Aug. 16, 1967, and Gibson interview, BOHC; PI, 70; Watters, 280–82; John Dillin, “The Story of St. Augustine,” Christian Science Monitor, July 13, 1964; Kunstler, 289–95.

  “Negro takes pride”: King’s letter draft [1964], MLK(CSC); King’s telegram to RFK, July 8, 1964, ibid.; “wtw” to King, “Suggested Approach and Chronology for St. Augustine,” ibid.; Vivian interview with Oates; Lee interview with Oates.

  “quickie” and “many questions”: Daves to Gene Exman, Jan. 29, 1964, to Victor Weybright, Jan. 15, 1964, and to Dora McDonald, Jan. 25, 1964, JD; also King to Daves, Nov. 29, 1963, and to Hermine Popper, Jan. 2 and 10, Feb. 3, 1964, and Popper to King, Jan. 14 and May 1, 1964, MLK(CSC). King appears to have had more editorial and rewrite help on WCW than on his other books. Alfred Duckett assisted him in the initial stage, when WCW was intended as a “quickie.” Then Nat Lamar took over as King’s editorial and rewrite man, but Daves complained to King that Lamar, instead of editing the manuscript, was recasting it “into a different mold” that King might not recognize as his own. Finally King again prevailed on Popper to edit and polish the text and still preserve his style.

  “saw this”: Vivian interview with Oates; also J. L. Gibson, “St. Augustine, Florida,” May 2, 1964, MLK(CSC).

  “semblance” and “situation”: King to LBJ, May 29, 1964, and Lee White memo, June 1, 1964, King Name File, LBJ.

  “FBI insists,” “that man’s,” “hot seat”: Kunstler, 289–94; Miller, King, 188.

  King’s speech: MLK(CSC); Kunstler, 295–97, Watters, 287.

  “what on earth” and “opposite sides”: DeWolf interview, BOHC; DeWolf to King, July 3, 1964, MLK(CSC).

  “unusual punishment”: Miller, King, 189; NYT, June 10, 1964.

  “complete breakdown”: King and Hayling to LBJ, June 1, 1964, King Name File, LBJ.

  King in jail: Hayling interview, BOHC; Vivian interview with Oates, Aug. 16, 1978; Williams interview with Oates; Lincoln, 215.

  “Tonight”: Kunstler, 298–300; Watters, 289–90.

  “Martin Luther Coon”: Lee interview with Oates.

  “get the hell” and “so calm”: Williams interview with Oates; Swann interview with Oates, Aug. 4, 1978; Selby, 88.

  “eerie cry,” “mob scene,” “see the wounds”: Kunstler, 298–303; NYT, June 20, 1964; Swann interview with Oates; Hayling interview, BOHC.

  “had it” and “I’m reluctant”: Selby, 285–86; Walker interview, BOHC; King’s draft statement, SCLC.

  “first step” and “good faith”: King’s statement, June 17, 1964, MLK(CSC); also Lewis, King, 244.

  “toughest nut,” “most lawless,” “Once he recognized”: Gibson interview, BOHC; W and M, 163; Hayling interview, BOHC.

  “Let us close” and “last vestiges”: copy LBJ speech, July 2, 1964, and White House Diary and Diary Backup, July 2, 1964, LBJ.

  “never have,” “What more,” “white people”: PI, 70.

  WCW sales, foreign rights, and reviews: see the pertinent documents and clippings in JD and MLK(CSC).

  “Hoss to a mule”: Lincoln, 225.

  “present situation”: press release, July 20, 1964, and Farmer interview, LBJ; Kearns, Johnson, 192–93.

  “utterly unresponsive” and “shallow rhetoric”: King’s statement, July 30, 1964, MLK(CSC); King’s statement, July 27, 1964, SCLC.

  “solemnly pledge”: King, “Of Riots and Wrongs Against the Jews,” SCLC New
sletter (July–Aug., 1964). 11.

  “warn SNCC”: Watters, 136–37.

  “job to do”: PI, 71; also DeWolf and Gibson interviews, BOHC.

  “carried with me” and “Our staff”: PI, 78; King’s column in New York Amsterdam News, Aug. 29, 1964; Lincoln, 224–25; Abernathy interview with Oates.

  “strong undertow”: Lewis, King, 248. See also SCLC Newsletter (July–Aug., 1964), 1, 5; Carson, In Struggle, 111–29.

  “call me” to “think they started”: Wachtel interview with Oates; Walker interview, BOHC; Lee interview with Oates; also Rustin, Line, 116–17; Watters, 136–37.

  “People were bitter”: Lewis interview, BOHC.

  “spiritual capital”: Demaris, Director, 207; Howell, 16.

  “will be faced”: PI, 71, 72; King, “Negroes Are Not Moving Too Fast,” Saturday Evening Post (Nov. 7, 1964), 8, 10.

  Democratic convention: King’s statements before the Democratic party’s platform committee, Aug. 22, 1964, and before the credentials committee in defense of the MFDP, same date, SCLC.

  “heavy price”: quoted in Forman, Black Revolutionaries, 392–93; also Rustin interview and Joseph L. Rauh interview with Page Mulhollan, July 30, Aug. 1 and 8, 1964, LBJ.

  against Goldwater: King’s position papers and press releases, July, 1964, MLK(CSC); King’s column in the New York Amsterdam News, Aug. 1, 1964; PI, 77–78; Young and Rustin interviews, LBJ; King, “Negroes,” Saturday Evening Post, 10; King, “Let Justice Roll Down,” Nation (Mar. 15, 1965), 271.

  “those who assail”: undated newspaper clipping (circa Sept. 22, 1964), MLK(BU).

  “carry your bags,” “very humble,” “consider this”: Wachtel interview with Oates; PI, 78; King’s statement, Oct. 14, 1964, MLK(CSC), published in Christian Century (Oct. 28, 1964), 1324; also King’s exclusive statement to the Associated Negro Press, Nov., 1964, and statement of Dec. 17, 1964, MLK(CSC).

  “scraping,” “Communist influence,” “last person”: Time (Oct. 23, 1964), 27; Demaris, Director, 200.

  “Negro leaders” and “manifestations”: Christian Century (Oct. 28, 1964), 1324; McGill’s column, Boston Globe, Oct. 18, 1964, clipping in MLK(BU).

  “notorious liar,” “appalled,” “faltered”: King’s statements, SCLC; U.S. News & World Report (Nov. 30, 1964), 56, 58; Newsweek (Dec. 7, 1964), 22. “I don’t know what everybody got so upset about,” Hoover later told Katzenbach about his “liar” charge. “All I said was God’s honest truth.” Navasky, Kennedy Justice, 153.

  “old and senile” and “pressure groups”: Garrow, FBI, 124; U.S. News & World Report (Dec. 7, 1964), 45.

  “this story” to “Don’t forget it”: Farmer interview, LBJ. For Roy Wilkins and the FBI, see Garrow, FBI, 128.

  FBI crusade: Washington Star, June 20, 1969; FAR, 573–74; HSCAH, VI, 235–26; SSCFR, 143, 146, 158–60; SSCH, VI, 210; Sidey, “L.B.J.,” Time (Feb. 10, 1975), 16; Demaris, Director, 196, 199, 322; Navasky, Kennedy Justice, 137–38; Sanford J. Ungar, FBI (Boston, 1976), 284–87; Washington Post, June 11, 1969; Nation (Oct. 27, 1969); Raines, 367–70; Jack Anderson (with George Clifford), The Anderson Papers (New York, 1973), 196–97; Clark interview, LBJ; Sullivan, Bureau, 142–143; Garrow, FBI, 125–26.

  New York meeting: Wachtel interview with Oates; Kenneth Clark quoted in Schlesinger, Robert Kennedy, 364–65.

  Hoover summit: HSCAH, VI, 167–76; also SSCFR, 163–68; YPI, 75; Washington Post, Dec. 2 and 5, 1964; NYT, Dec. 2, 1964; Sullivan, Bureau, 140; Demaris, Director, 200; Garrow, FBI, 130.

  “a circus”: Rustin interview with Oates.

  “built by exploitation”: Coretta King, 8; also Ebony (Mar., 1965), 38; Wachtel interview with Oates.

  “Wait a minute”: Lincoln, 197.

  “Congo civil war”: King’s press conference, Dec. 9, 1964, MLK(CSC); NYT, Dec. 10, 1964.

  “quite a time” and Nobel acceptance speech: Coretta King, 11–12; Time (Dec. 18, 1964), 21–22; King’s acceptance statement, Dec. 10, 1964, MLK(CSC); Ebony (Mar., 1965), 38.

  “past several days”: recorded on King: Speeches and Sermons (cassette); Ebony (Mar., 1965), 38; Coretta King, 16–17.

  LBJ meeting: see King’s comments in Washington Post, Feb. 6, 1968; also White House Diary and Diary Backup, Dec. 18, 1964, LBJ.

  PART SEVEN: AIN’T GONNA LET NOBODY TURN ME AROUND

  voting statistics: Lawson, Black Ballots, 284; Garrow, Selma, 19, 29–30.

  “Our experience” and “Demonstrations”: King, “Selma—the Shame and the Promise: the Negroes’ Fight for Voting Rights and Human Dignity,” IUD Agenda (Mar., 1965), 18, 21; King, “Justice,” Nation, 270; also King, “Civil Rights no. 1—the Right to Vote,” NYT Mag. (Mar. 14, 1965), 26; Stony Cooks’s address, MLK Annual Institute for Nonviolence, Aug. 3, 1978, Atlanta, Ga.

  Selma background: King, “Selma,” IUD Agenda, 18–21; NYT, March 14, 16, and 22, 1965; Fager, Selma, 3–21, 41; Marie Foster interview with Oates, June 8, 1977; Garrow, Selma, 31–35.

  “had a Jim Clark,” “theater for an act,” “tell the people”: Lee interview with Oates; Cooks’s address, MLK Annual Institute for Nonviolence; Schulke, King, 131; also Vivian interview with Oates; Williams interview with Oates; Foster interview with Oates; Time (Mar. 19, 1965), 23; Raines, 425; King, “Behind the Selma March,” Saturday Review (Apr. 3. 1965), 57. Garrow, Selma, 223–25, also stresses the role of provocation in King’s projected campaign, though Garrow deemphasizes its idealistic component.

  “arrests should continue” and “Ralph, I thought”: Nation (Feb. 15, 1965), 154; Raines, 464; Abernathy interview with Oates; Coretta King, 253.

  “unreal air”: Zinn, SNCC: the New Abolitionists (Boston, 1964), 147.

  King’s first Selma visit: Fager, Selma, 8–11; NYT, Jan. 3, 1965; Williams interview with Oates; John Lewis interview, BOHC; Raines, 214.

  “King, look into your heart”: Garrow, FBI, 125–26. Some of the language in the letter was clearly Hoover’s. Cf “what a grim farce” to Hoover’s notation, “what a farce,” on the FBI report that no irregularities could be found in King’s tax returns (ibid., 114).

  “What does he think,” “much of it unintelligible,” “bunch of guys,” “toward the end”: Howell, 17–18; NYT, Mar. 9, 1975; Raines, 428; Lee interview with Oates.

  “out to break me” and “warning from God”: Garrow, FBI, 134; also Howell, 17–18; Wachtel interview with Oates.

  “wild sexual activity”: Young interview, LBJ; Howell, 17–18; Raines, 430.

  King’s suffering and determination: Wachtel inteview with Oates, Sept. 20, 1978, and Oct. 7, 1981; SSCFR, 159; Howell, 19–20; YPI, 75; Lee interview with Oates.

  “all life,” “Golden Record Club,” “Well, J. Edgar”: Navasky, Kennedy Justice, 150; Raines, 427–28, 430, 454; Rustin interview, LBJ; Young, “Remembering King,” in Obst, Sixties, 232; HSCAH, 1, 23.

  informant Jim Harrison: Garrow, FBI, 173–203.

  “King’s private life” and “couldn’t care less”: Rustin interview, LBJ; Arthur L. Murtagh quoted in NYT, Mar. 9, 1975.

  “arouse the federal government,” “every goddamn one,” “out of control”: King’s speech, Jan. 19, 1965, MLK(CSC); W and M, 166; NYT, Jan. 19, 1965; Raines, 198–99; Fager, Selma, 31–32.

  “got a movement,” “ain’t nobody scared,” “Don’t do it,” “just what they want”: Fager, Selma, 33–40, 103; Nation (Feb. 15, 1965), 154; Foster interview with Oates; King’s statement, Jan. 20, 1965, MLK(CSC).

  “doohickey”: Fager, Selma, 44–46.

  “no dinner,” “covert contacts,” “our good reputation,” “honor”: Raines, 411–15; NYT, Mar. 9, 1975; HSCAH, VI, 102–3; Life (Feb. 12, 1965), 4; Mays, Born, 271–72; Allen, Mayor, 96–99.

  “what time” and “significant evening”: Allen, Mayor, 96–99; Life (Feb. 12, 1965), 33; Mays, Born, 272–73; NYT, Jan. 29, 1965.

  “will go down”: Mrs. Jackson interview with Oates, June 8, 1977; Lee interview with Oates; Atlanta Constitution, Jan. 14, 1978. />
  “get down” and “really put something”: Williams interview with Oates; Raines, 204–5; Sheyann Webb and Rachel West Nelson (as told to Frank Sikora), Selma, Lord, Selma: Girlhood Memories of the Civil-Rights Days (University, Ala., 1980), 18, 47.

  “Negroes could vote”: NYT, Feb. 1 and 2, 1965; Fager, Selma, 47–51.

  “tell Dr. King”: Fager, Selma, 56–58; Coretta King, 256; Lincoln, 211.

  “madness of those days” and victim of violence: Parks, Born Black, 55; King, “The Nightmare of Violence,” Feb. 26, 1965, and King to Mrs. Malcolm X, same date, MLK(CSC).

  King’s instructions: MLK(CSC).

  King’s meeting with LBJ: Wachtel interview with Oates, Oct. 18, 1978; Lee C. White Memoranda for the President, Feb. 8 and 9, 1965, King Name File, LBJ; White House Diary and Diary Backup, Feb. 9, 1965, ibid.; White to the President, July 23, 1965, ibid.; King, “Selma,” IUD Agenda, 21; W and M, 167.

  “wanted to march”: Fager, Selma, 64–68; Pat Watters, “Why the Negro Children March,” NYT Mag. (Mar. 21, 1965), 29.

  Vivian incident: Vivian interview with Oates. Fager, Selma, 69–71, and other accounts erroneously claim that it was Clark who hit Vivian in the mouth.

  “finest tactician”: Nation (Feb. 15, 1965), 154.

  “heart attack” and “No, sir”: Fager, Selma, 68–69; NYT, Mar. 16, 1965; Watters, “Negro Children March,” NYT Mag., 118–19.

  “intimidation”: King, “Justice,” Nation, 270; also NYT, Mar. 3, 1965; Fager, Selma, 31.

  “on the sidelines”: King’s eulogy, Feb. 26, 1965, MLK(CSC); NYT, Mar. 4, 1965; Jack Mendelsohn, The Martyrs (New York, 1965), 133–52.

  “can’t promise”: Time (Mar. 19, 1965), 23; NYT, Mar. 4, 1965; Fager, Selma, 81, 86; Selby, 79.

  “whatever means” and Baker’s reaction: NYT, Mar. 9, 1965; Fager, Selma, 86–90; Raines, 201–2.

  Behind the Sunday march: King, “Behind the Selma March,” Saturday Review (Apr. 3, 1965), 17; Williams interview with Oates; Lee interview with Oates; Vivian interview with Oates; Abernathy interview with Oates; Lewis interviews in BOHC and in Selby give a somewhat different version of why King wasn’t in Selma on Sunday.