Cooler but still well above normal this week

MPR News helps you turn down the noise and build shared understanding. Turn up your support for this public resource and keep trusted journalism accessible to all. 

Turn Up Your Support

It's a biting piece of criticism aimed at Malcolm X that for decades was attributed to Martin Luther King Jr. But a new biography of King suggests history books about these two men may need to be rewritten — because King never actually said the words.

King never said he felt "Malcolm has done himself and our people a great disservice," author Jonathan Eig told NPR, despite that famous quote appearing in a 1965 interview with Alex Haley, for “Playboy” magazine. 

"This is really important," Eig said, "because we've been teaching kids this quote from the ‘Playboy

The words King and Malcolm X said about each other are vital to understanding the relationship between two leaders who took different approaches to confronting systemic and deadly racism in America. Their rivalry was played up during their lives and in the years that followed, despite their overlapping goals.

"I would say they were engaged in an awkward dance, but they were listening to the same music," Eig said.

Biographer calls it 'journalistic malpractice'

Eig says he realized the interview's original transcript didn't contain the widely cited quote as he was reading through archives at Duke University while researching his book, “

,” which comes out on Tuesday. His discovery was recently reported by 

It's "journalistic malpractice," Eig said, to misrepresent what King thought about Malcolm X in this way. 

"There's more to it," Eig said, "but what King actually said was that he disagreed with some of Malcolm's views, maybe with many of them — but that he was aware that his way wasn't the only way. And it sounded like he was much more open to exploring that relationship than the “Playboy” interview made it out to be."

whether he feels Haley or his editors were responsible for the inconsistencies.

"I feel pretty strongly that it's Haley who made this change, because it happens early in the process," after an audio tape recording of the interview was transcribed but before Haley submitted a draft to “Playboy.”

While journalists sometimes edit quotes to clarify an interview subject's remarks, it's a delicate task — and it does not

entail adding language out of whole cloth.

"We don't know for sure that Haley typed that draft, but we do know that his byline was on the story," Eig said. For drastic changes like the ones he found, Eig said, "I can't believe that Haley would have signed off on that without having seen it. I think either way, it's journalistic malpractice." 

Eig's interview with NPR's Steve Inskeep will air Tuesday on Morning Edition.

The "disservice" quote about Malcolm X spread far beyond the pages of “Playboy.” It's included in “The Autobiography Of Martin Luther King, Jr.,” which was assembled from King's words by historian Clayborne Carson.

When asked for comment about the discrepancy, Carson told NPR, "I'm certainly troubled by Haley's apparently unethical decision to distort King's statement about Malcolm X."

It was likely, Carson added, that King's feelings toward Malcolm X had softened by early 1965. 

It's the latest question about Haley's writings; others have included accusations that he plagiarized portions of his seminal 1976 work, “Roots: The Saga of an American Family.” Haley 

In the interview published weeks before Malcolm X was assassinated, 

In the original transcript, King's line about "fiery" oratory wasn't directed specifically at Malcolm X. It came slightly earlier in the interview, in reply to a broader question from Haley

asking King to give his "opinion of Negro extremists who advocate armed violence and sabotage."

Haley then asked about Malcolm X — and in a major discrepancy, the word "disservice" isn't part of King's answer, according to the records:

“Playboy” published Haley's interview with King in its January 1965 issue. On Feb. 21 of that year, Malcolm X was assassinated. His death came as signs of a potential thaw between the two civil rights leaders emerged.

"Malcolm X used King as a foil [and] tried to provoke his audiences by mocking King as a chicken, as an Uncle Tom, even," Eig said. "And it played well for his audiences because it made him seem like

the more threatening. It also scared white people, which, you know, I think Malcolm wanted to do." 

King acknowledged his rival's taunts and their disagreements over nonviolence. But he also said he could understand that a man whose life was shaped by despair, hate and violence would refuse to integrate himself into a racist social order. 

On Feb. 5, 1965, Malcolm X visited Selma, Ala., meeting with Coretta Scott King while her husband was being held in jail.

"He spoke at length to my wife Coretta for about his personal struggles and expressed an interest in working more closely with the nonviolent movement, but he was not yet able to renounce violence and overcome the bitterness which life invested in him," 

It was Malcolm X's intelligence and drive, King said, that allowed him to shape himself and turn away from an early life of crime.

"It was a testimony to Malcolm's personal depth and integrity that he could not become an underworld czar, but turned again and again to religion for meaning and destiny. Malcolm was still turning and growing at the time of his brutal and meaningless assassination."

His death, King said, "was an unfortunate tragedy." 

History

Social Issues

Conversations around race and racial justice

Bill Chappell

Author

A critical quote about Malcolm X that has been attributed to King has been taught for decades. But King didn't say the words that appeared in an article by Alex Haley, says biographer Jonathan Eig.

New biography of Martin Luther King Jr. undercuts a widely cited quote about Malcolm X

Go Deeper.

Like this?

News you can use in your inbox