OPEN MIND Special: Race Relations in Crisis 6/12/63 – 11/13/92

Malcolm X: If there are many…there are many Whites who are trying to do this, why isn’t more being done about it?

Morrison: Well…

Malcolm X: What you’re saying in essence, is that the government is responsible for, for segregation. That the government is subsidizing segregation. That the government is, is the one that’s actually instigating and carrying out this segregation that the politicians profess to be against.

Morrison: Well…once, more should be done about it. Of course I will readily grant that. But…and the second point, I think that the, the Federal government is aiding and abetting the continuance of segregation in the South, if it persists in, in making financial subsidies from public funds available to states which defy the courts of the land. And which refuse to implement the ruling of the United States Supreme Court in 1954. I, I also want to point out as strongly as possible that the…that successive, traditionally, successive Federal administrations have failed to tackle the problem of using coercive action, and I, I use that term in its constitutional context, against the segregationist Southern governments. And they have done it for political reasons.

Malcolm X: All of the segregationist southern governments are Democrats. You have a, a Democratic administration sitting in Washington, DC…

Morrison: Oh, whoever practices it, they are doing wrong…

Malcolm X: But the point is, how can the Kennedy brothers, who are Democrats and supposedly the…some of the strongest politicians in this country, with political power…How is it that they cannot get their segregationist party members to go along with their program if the program of the segregationists differs from the program of the Whites who are in power in Washington, DC?

Morrison: Well, I…

Malcolm X: There’s one…

Morrison: I don’t think they should try very hard.

Malcolm X: I…

Morrison: And there’s obviously…there’s a fundamental conflict…

Malcolm X: They have to be in cahoots with each other.

Morrison: …of policy, philosophy and ideology between the, the Democrats outside of the South and the Democrats in the South.

Malcolm X: The Democrats in the North never condemn and disassociate themselves from the Democrats in the South. It is the Democrats in the south who defect from the power structure.

Morrison: I wish to make one correction there. That was done in 1948 by President Harry Truman, who, who challenged the segregationist South and introduced and advocated a civil rights program which resulted in the secession from the Democratic Party, it was a temporary secession, mind you. But nevertheless it was a secession…

Malcolm X: And was the civil rights program passed?

Morrison: No, it wasn’t.

Farmer: Yes, I’d like to point out that I, I don’t think that the Deep South states can be persuaded or convinced by reasoning or by logic to de-segregate, to end segregation. It has to be, as Alan Morrison indicated, by using coercive means. Either economic coercion, or political coercion, or what-have-you, or the type of coercion that we are using in the streets now. And I don’t care whether this is done by a Democratic Administration or a Republican Administration. I don’t think either one of them would be able to persuade or to convince Mississippi and Alabama…

Malcolm X: Why, say…

Farmer: …to de-segregate.

Malcolm X: …Mr. Farmer, why say “the Deep South” when Englewood is not in the Deep South? New Rochelle is not in the Deep South. Chicago is not in the Deep South. And, by your own admission, we have a…there, there is as much segregation practiced in the North as in the South, but it’s done in a more subtle way. And the mistake that is made by many of our people who are in this so-called Civil Rights struggle…I have to say “so-called civil Rights struggle” is they always make a distinction between North and South. You don’t find the Black man in the South…let him catch as much hell, as the Black man in the North. Only difference is the Black man in the South knows where it is, and the Black man in the North is being tricked every day by White liberals, who grin in his face and pretend to be his friend, but at the same time is practicing segregation just as much as the, as the White man in the South is practicing it.

Farmer: Well, I don’t know…

Walker: I don’t think I could accept that altogether, Malcolm, because you live in the North predominantly, and I don’t think you could speak for the experience…I or we as Southerners have. I think the Negro catches hell all over the country, being a Negro. And I think we have said, from our movement, I’m speaking of Jim and the posture that Alan Morrison and I represent…that we say it is a national dilemma, which has to be grappled with. It has different forms. I think in the South it’s not only emotional and psychological, but it’s also physical. And I don’t know whether you can put a slide rule on it to measure it, it’s just a problem all over the nation and we’re on the threshold, I trust, with really grappling with it for the first time.

Malcolm X: In the South you’re dealing with the wolf who lets you know where you stand…in the North we’re dealing with a fox who grins in our face and makes us think that we’re getting some kind of freedom, or that we’re in a different place.

Walker: You are…

Farmer: Let me say I don’t think it’s a fruitful discussion as to whether the thing is worse in the South, or worse in the North. It’s bad as anything both places…all over the country. And it doesn’t matter the shape that it takes one place or another. Now, we are in the streets in the North…in Englewood, in California, in New York…just as we’re in the streets in the South…

Malcolm X: And then what has been accomplished?

Farmer: What has been accomplished? What is being accomplished. Look at Philadelphia. Negroes are now being employed…

Malcolm X: All Negroes got a job…

Farmer: Yes, and we’re…

Malcolm X: …Negroes in, in Philadelphia…

Farmer: Now let me tell you, Minister Malcolm, that we have gotten jobs for Negroes in Safeways grocery stores, in Krogers grocery stores, in department stores, in Sealtest Dairies, in concern after concern, and not four…

Malcolm X: Mr. Farmer…

Farmer: …not forty…

Malcolm X: …whenever you have…

Farmer: …but they number in the hundreds…

Malcolm X: Whenever you have thousands of Negroes demonstrating for jobs, as was demonstrated beautifully…

Farmer: Yes.

Malcolm X: …in Philadelphia and then the leadership settled for four jobs…I can’t see where that’s progress.

Farmer: Now, let me tell you, in our campaign against a leading dairy in New York, we did not settle for four jobs. We did not settle for forty jobs…

Malcolm X: The…

Farmer: …now, wait…

Malcolm X: …the demonstrations in Philadelphia…settled for four jobs…

Farmer: …I’m not speaking of the Philadelphia demonstration, I’m speaking of the dairy that we had a boycott against. We had more than forty jobs already, and many more coming…now we’re after not the token employment. We’re after full employment. I’d like to say a further word on the employment question, Mr. Moderator, if I may.

Heffner: Please do.

Farmer: I think it’s no longer adequate for an employer to say that “I don’t discriminate, merely because I accept qualified applications and employ the best qualified of the persons who have applied”. And it just so happens, accidentally, no Negroes who are qualified, have applied. Now we’re insisting that we see some Negroes there, working. We’re insisting that there be some dark faces working in those factories, those shops and those offices. I think that it is impossible for the rear wheels of an automobile to catch up with the front wheels of an automobile while they’re going at the same speed. It is necessary for there to be a new push. We say to the employer now that he has a responsibility not only to employ the best qualified person who applies, but to seek qualified negroes, and if they are not qualified for the specific job to help train them, and to admit them to all of these apprenticeship training classes. We say the same thing to the trade unions, because we’ve got to break out of this box where the Negro is at the bottom of the economic totem pole. This is what we’re trying to do…it’s not confined to Mississippi, Mr. X.

Heffner: Well, of course, this does raise the question…the one point you just made Mr. Farmer, as to whether there is not now a search for more than equality. Whether there isn’t an effort now to make up, as if one could, for the hundreds of years during which the Negro has suffered outrages within in our country.

Farmer: I think we’ve got to try. I think that the nation owes us a debt on this.

Heffner: Well, you say…

Farmer: And the nation must pay that debt.

Walker: We have…

Heffner: May I…may I just…may I just pursue it, and exercise…

Walker: Yes.

Heffner: …some prerogative here. You say “the nation owes a debt”…

Farmer: Yes.

Heffner: …to the Negro community. Is it a debt that can be paid within the context of what it is you basically want…the concept of equality?

Farmer: Well, I…

Morrison: I’d like to answer that…

Farmer: What we’re trying to achieve is equality. And we cannot achieve equality while the Negro remains at the bottom…frozen at the bottom of the economic ladder. Now the statistics are rather cruel, and the statistics show that the gap between the average income for Negroes in this country and the average income for Whites has not closed. In other words, it is fantastic to do as Governor Wallace has done in Alabama, and compare the Negroes’ standard of living in this country with the standard of living in Africa, or Europe, or Canada. The only fair comparison is with the standard of living in the rest of America. And the gap has not closed. It did close a bit during World War II, but that, as you know, was because of temporary employment in wartime industries. When the war was over, those jobs were lopped off. In the past 15 years the gap has widened slightly. Which means that if we are to achieve equality, we’ve got to find some way for the back wheels of the car to catch up to the front wheels of the car without a collision.

Malcolm X: Well it means…

Heffner: Let’s, let’s, let’s…go ahead, Malcolm X.

Malcolm X: It means that the only time the Black man in this country has made any progress was when…in war time, when the White man has his back to the wall, then he lets the Black man come forward a little bit. And as soon as the war is over, he tells the Black man “get back off me now”. And I think, Sir, with all due respect to you and the others who are here, when you sit and analyze the problem as it actually is, and see the hypocrisy that has been practiced by Whites when they talk this love talk and equality talk, sooner or later you’ll be able to see that since we don’t make any progress, only during wartime, it’ll take another war for the Black man to take any more steps in the right direction.

Farmer: Minister Malcolm…

Malcolm X: And then…no, I didn’t cut you off when you spoke there for 15 minutes…

Farmer: You tried…

Malcolm X: Moderator wouldn’t let me.

Farmer: (Laughter)

Malcolm X: When you…when you see the, the, the grip, or the economic rut that our people are in, and as you point out, and he points out the union excludes us from them to keep us out, and if the union, the union doesn’t do it, management does it. We are caught in the grip between union, management….or I should say a conspiracy between the union, the management and the government to keep us at the bottom of the economic ladder, the bottom of the housing ladder, the bottom of the educational ladder, and after experiencing that in a country for a hundred years, I don’t see how you could have any hope or confidence that this same race that has been doing it is not going to continue to do it, only in a different way, with more 20th century, or up to date or shrewd methods today than they had to use in the past.

Walker: We…

Farmer: You say that progress is achieved only in war time…

Malcolm X: It has always been achieved by our people in war time…

Farmer: Alright. Now you say that…we’re in a war now. We’re in a war now. The war is being waged in the streets of Birmingham, the streets of Greensboro, the streets of Danville, Virginia…

Malcolm X: That’s not war…

Farmer: Now, wait a minute…

Malcolm X: No…

Farmer: This is the war…

Malcolm X: It’s not the war…

Farmer: This is the war…

Malcolm X: It’s the result of the war…America is at war…

Heffner: Let’s, let’s…let’s…

Farmer: Let me pursue the point…this is the revolutionary war. The revolutionary war was not finished at all. The revolutionary war, 1776, provided independence and freedom in a sense for some Americans, but excluded Black Americans. This is revolutionary war, Part II, so take those beautiful words of the Declaration of Independence, of the Preamble to the Constitution, and make them a reality for Black people, as well as White. Now we are waging that war. If you don’t like this war, that’s all right.

Malcolm X: Now, wait a minute…

Farmer: But don’t deny that it is a war.

Heffner: Malcolm X, may I…may I interrupt at this point, and just ask Mr. Walker, who is champing at the bit over here, for his comment.

Walker: Yeah, I wanted to buttress what Jim was saying about employment. I think the Philadelphia instance is one instance. In Atlanta we have what we call “Operation Breadbasket”, where we’re dealing with one consumer industry, the bread industry, and in less than three and a half months, using the technique that Jim described of buying where we can get jobs on a proportionate basis, we created for the Negro community $400,000 in new jobs. And this means that a man who was a delivery man and was making $40.00 a week, now has a job as a bread salesman, and makes $115.00, $125.00 a week. He has four children…if he had stayed as a delivery man those four kids would not have had an opportunity at college and emancipating themselves educationally. Now they have a chance at college. And when you add $400,000 to the income of the Negro community, in any city, from just one industry then it seems to me, that this is a legitimate and reasonable result for the kind of techniques and methods that we use.

Heffner: May I…I…

Walker: …And there is a catalog of ills which you recite, which we…which we would agree with that it is a fair commentary. I would like to know what, what alternative do you propose as against what we just…

Heffner: That’s, that’s a fair enough question. Let’s wait for a break to get the answer. Malcolm X, I’m sure that you’ll want to reply to Mr. Walker’s question.

Malcolm X: Yes, the Honorable Elijah Mohammed teaches us that after 400 years in this country, a country to which we’ve contributed our free labor, sweat, blood…we’ve given out lives to make it, or help make it what it is. And today because the White man says that it’s time now for us to get integration or what he calls freedom, and many of the so-called Negroes who take him seriously and believe that what he says is…he means it, they try and take advantage of it, and they end up getting beaten with police clubs, or fire hoses, or having dogs sicced upon them, simply because they believe what the White man says, that he intends for us to have freedom, justice and equality. So, Mr. Mohammed says in the face of all of this, since we see that we just don’t get justice here, and by justice I mean economic security, political security, social security and so forth…the best solution is for the White man to allow the 2 million Black people in this country to go back to our own home…those who want to. Go back to our own home and to our own people. And that the government itself should give us everything we need to go back to our own home and start life anew in our own land, among our own people. And then if the government doesn’t want to do that, since we…they don’t want us to leave and they want us to stay here with them, we don’t get along together. Then Mr. Mohammed says that that solution is to separate part of the country here, and give us a place to ourselves, where we can then go and set up our own agricultural system, our own economic system and try and do something to provide food, clothing and shelter and the things that our people need in order to, to live. In other words, give us a chance to solve our own problems, among ourselves, on some land of our own instead of continually trying to force us into White society, where the White society knows we’re absolutely not wanted, and a White society which knows it will never accept its ex-slave on the same level with itself as something equal with itself.

Heffner: Well, of course, this kind of separatism harks back, I think, to something that Mr. Farmer said before, that I’d like to pick up, too. It isn’t…Mr. Farmer said, I suspect, he would not want equated with that separatism, but you were…you said something before about the rear wheels of the car not being able to catch up with the front wheels. And you’re hinting here, that…at something more or less, I think it might be legitimate to say there would be some who would say “was something less” than equality. If you’re saying that there must be something compensatory now.

Farmer: Yes…

Heffner: The indebtedness of centuries.

Farmer: Well, I think that the analogy that I used has a bearing upon separatism only in the sense that the back wheels are separate from the front wheels of a car. Needless to say I’m not in favor of splitting the car down the middle, or one-tenth and nine-tenths, and moving the back wheels someplace else. I don’t think that they’ll get along. I don’t think that they’ll be motivated by the motor…

Heffner: Well, what are you…what are you asking for?

Farmer: I am asking for compensatory, preferential hiring. I think that it is essential for the salvation of this nation. Now, a study was conducted by the President’s Commission of Economic Advisors, which came out with some very interesting, and I think, significant figures. It indicated that the Gross National Product of the whole nation suffers to the tune of $13 billion dollars a year because of discrimination in employment against Negroes. To put it another way, if the training and skills and qualifications of Negro citizens, as they are now, were fully utilized in employment, $13 billion dollars a year would be added to the national economy, Now if, in addition to that training, the skills and the education of Negroes in this country was brought up to the level of that of Whites and then their new skills and training and education utilized in employment to the full, $17 billion dollars a year would be added to the national economy. I say that to say that I think that it is in the interest of the nation and its welfare now to adopt a policy of compensatory treatment because of the discrimination of a hundred years…discrimination in education, in training and in employment. Otherwise we will not break this vicious cycle.

Heffner: Mr. Morrison?

Morrison: Well, this principle of compensatory, preferential treatment for Negro Americans is relatively new and it results from the findings, as Mr. Farmer has outlined, of American social scientists and exhaustive research conducted by a Negro leadership organization such as the National Urban League. We have discovered that the treatment accorded the Negro in American life has imposed monumental, massive disabilities which cannot be corrected overnight, nor can, can they be straightened out simply by granting, either by executive order or by legislation, equality of opportunity. Now equality of opportunity used to be the phrase used…

Farmer: Ummm-mmmm.

Morrison: But it is not enough. Equality has to be…the word “equality” has to be broadened, it has to be deepened, and, and it has to apply to the, the tragic circumstances which White America has created for the Negro population. The Negro population is educationally disadvantaged, it’s vocationally disadvantaged, and in every other sense it, it has handicaps which cannot be altered or corrected without compensatory treatment. This means that the Negro has to be given more than equal consideration. The, the American society, federal government, state governments have to inaugurate policies and consistently apply them which take into consideration the historical deprivation of equal rights…the right to education and economic growth of Negro people. Otherwise the Negro will be traveling at a tremendous disadvantage. He’s got to catch up, and he has to be assisted to catch up because this is what our society, and let’s face it, what White people have done to Negro people in this country. And something has to be done dramatically to make up for the gap. And the gap is widening, incidentally. We used to say that the Negro “condition” was improving and rising. But we now know that the condition of the Negro population ten years ago was actually better than it is now. In other words, the gap in income, the gap in education is growing and it has to be closed.

Heffner: In a sense…

Walker: This is exactly why we say in our Operation Breadbasket when we go to a consumer industry, that we want 14 or 18 new jobs created for Negroes…that we won’t accept it when they say, “Well, can you find us somebody”. We say “No, the burden is on you, you find them, or else we will have to tell our people that we cannot, in good conscience patronize your product”.

Heffner: Of course it seems to me…if, if I may suggest this, that the word “compensatory” is, is a strange one. Compensation…can, can the Negro possibly be compensated for the hundreds of years of deprivation?

Farmer: No.

Walker: Never.

Farmer: …the terminology. I don’t care what you call it, a rose by any other name smells just as sweet.

Heffner: Well…Mr. Farmer…

Farmer: You can call it…but the President has called it, incidentally…he’s called it
“positive, affirmative action”. The President stepped off of a plane once and this was early in his Administration, and looked, I believe at one of the armed guards that was standing there, and noticed that there were no Negroes. He didn’t ask “well, now how many qualified Negroes have applied, and were they as highly qualified as the other people who applied?” He called the officer and said, “I don’t see any Negroes here in the group”. The officer said, “Well, Mr. President, no Negroes have applied”. The President, as reported by the press, said to him, “Go out and find some”. Now we’ve been receiving special treatment for 300 to 400 years here. We’ve been receiving special treatment of a negative nature. Now we’re asking for the kind of special treatment that is positive and affirmative.

Heffner: How will that special treatment be manifested in other areas? In housing and in education, for instance?

Morrison: May I say one thing about that…housing…

Heffner: Yes, please.

Morrison: I meant to have said it earlier, but I, I think this principle of compensatory treatment should also apply to any action taken by the Federal government in, in, in trying to achieve equality of opportunity or access to the national housing market. Now this is one of my major criticisms of President Kennedy’s Executive Order on Housing. It, it’s, it applies only to housing to be built from the date of the, of the order, and, and future federally financed housing. Whereas to give the Negro people of this country a fair break, and really a chance to, to get into housing and to get out of ghettoes, he should have included all housing that had been constructed with public funds…retro…all Federally financed houses should have been included. But he didn’t, and this is what is frequently happening. When the Negro makes a gain, the gain starts as of now.

Malcolm X: Because…

Heffner: But isn’t it something else…

Malcolm X: Because the Negro didn’t make the gain. See, as long as someone is giving you something, he can always take it back. And this is the mistake where…this is where our people are making the mistake. We are sitting, waiting for Whites…

Morrison: Nobody…

Malcolm X: …I don’t mean it in that sense, either in court or out of court. We’ve been sitting and waiting for “The Man” to give us some concessions. Now whenever you ask the…if you’re asking the White power structure for jobs, that’s only a temporary solution. If you ask the White power structure for housing, that’s a temporary solution. As Mr. Farmer said where the Negro used to ask for equality, now he’s asking for more…he’s asking for more than equality. Well, likewise, if they give us more than equality, ten years from now we’re going to be asking for more than that because the problem has still not gotten a real solution.

Farmer: Mr. Moderator…

Malcolm X: …just one moment, let me finish what I’m going to say. As long as we accept a temporary solution, the problem will go unsolved. It will be solved for you and me, right now, but not for our children. If the Black nations in Africa, most of which have less, a less number of educated Africans than the, then exist among Black people in this country, yet they can establish their own independent nations and try and do…create a future for their people. Then Mr. Mohammed says, here in America, there are enough Black people who profess to be educated and when all of this…with all this talk about equality with the White man, if we’re equal with the White man, why can’t we separate from him and set up our own government, and grow for ourselves, and solve our own problems?

Heffner: Mr. Farmer…

Farmer: One quick question…

Heffner: Mr. Farmer…if we can, if we can stick, for a moment to this notion of compensatory action…I, I really think that we ought to work on this one for a moment because it still seems to me, and it probably does seem to a number of people, to have within it the germs of the seeds of disaster itself. That’s why I go back to the question of housing and education. Let’s, let’s, let’s pick education…how does one bring about compensatory action in education?

Farmer: Well…

Heffner: By having better schools for young Negro children than for White children…

Farmer: This is…

Heffner: …if we are talking about integration?

Farmer: …It’s very simple. By providing…by providing remedial training and reading, and in arithmetic, and by providing the best of teachers to these schools which have deprived children in them…

Heffner: By now…when you say “deprived children”…

Farmer: Yes.

Heffner: …you’re not limiting this to Negro children alone.

Farmer: Of course, a larger percentage of Negro kids are deprived than whites. And therefore, I think a larger percentage of the most skilled teachers are required in that section.

Heffner: Alright…now, I, I grant that. And the question, the question I’m still trying to iron out, and I think Mr. Farmer has for me, is this question as to whether the, the compensation for discrimination and the lack of equality is to be another kind of discrimination, or another kind of inequality. And I think you answer that in the negative when you say that in the schools that you would establish for the previously underprivileged, or the underprivileged, would include schools for children not just Negroes, but Puerto Ricans and other underprivileged persons. Am I correct in that assumption?

Farmer: Yes, I think you’re right there. We…I would not limit our employment demands to Negroes. I would include Puerto Ricans and other minorities throughout our country which have been similarly discriminated against, though not for so long a period of time as Negroes.

Malcolm X: Puerto Ricans weren’t enslaved. This is a problem that stems from slavery…

Walker: Now…

Malcolm X: …and this compensation…yes sir…this compensation is coming to people who were enslaved by the White man for 400 years. The Puerto Ricans don’t even fit into this picture. They are…

Farmer: They do fit into it.

Malcolm X: What did you gain in Birmingham…

Farmer: Now, wait a minute…let me tell you what we’ve gained in North Carolina…

Malcolm X: What’d you gain in Birmingham?

Farmer: Let me tell you what we’ve gained there. He can answer that. This was his campaign, in Birmingham. Ask me about our campaign…

Malcolm X: What’d you gain in North Carolina?

Farmer: Let me tell you what we’ve gained. We’ve gained jobs, we’ve gained open employment. In Greensboro, North Carolina the, one of the officials of the city who was in charge of employment has announced that here-in-after all city employment will be on a merit basis, and there’ll be no discrimination. A committee has been set up whereby grievances of individuals who feel that they’ve been discriminated against because of race will be dealt with. We are represented on that committee. In six cities in North Carolina the theaters have de-segregated. Places that serve the public in five cities have de-segregated, and the whole state is becoming an open state…now, wait a minute…
Malcolm X: No.

Farmer: They do fit into it.

Malcolm X: The problem is a Negro problem. They’re not lynching Puerto Ricans.

Farmer: If a dark skinned Puerto Rican went down to Mississippi…

Malcolm X: As long as he…

Farmer: …he would be lynched, too.

Malcolm X: …could speak Spanish, he wouldn’t be lynched.

Farmer: No. No, they don’t…

Malcolm X: …Negro here. As long as he can speak Spanish or some other language, or if he ties his head up with a, with a turban or something, he can go anywhere in Mississippi, or in your home…that he desires.

Farmer: You’re not aware of the face, are you, that African students have been arrested in our demonstrations in the South…

Malcolm X: When they’ve been…

Farmer: They speak French…

Malcolm X: …when they have been mistaken for the so-called Negro in America, they’ve been arrested.

Farmer: What I’m saying is that many Puerto Ricans are mistaken for Negroes…

Malcolm X: As long as…

Farmer: I do not think discrimination stems only from slavery…

Heffner: Let me…let me turn to Mr. Walker.

Walker: Ah, I…you say that Mr. Farmer’s idea of compensatory treatment of the Negro has portents of disaster. It does have portents of disaster for the system from which the Negro community is suffering. And over against that, I don’t think Malcolm X’s analogy of the nations in Africa that…and Asia that are freeing themselves…you have there, on the one hand, a black or brown majority, whereas the Negro community in America is a Black or Brown minority. And I don’t think the analogy quite holds water. And this is why we…

Malcolm X: But your whole philosophy comes out of India…this non-violent thing is based upon 400 million Indians doing passive sit-down on a hundred thousand Whites and you…

Walker: You have…

Malcolm X: …you use that, while in this country you’re still a minority, yet you’re going to use tactics that were used by a, a dark majority in another land.

Farmer: I think that shows how little you know about non-violence.

Walker: Not altogether…

Farmer: Because Gandhi began his campaign among the Indians in South Africa who are a minority…

Malcolm X: And they’re still in, in…and they’re still a minority, and they still have the problem, but Gandhi…

Farmer: Only…

Malcolm X: Gandhi’s fame came from having gotten freedom for the people of India from the English. And, and he used non-violent methods, which means you have a great big dark elephant-type creature sitting down on the little white mouse. But here in America you have a little Black mouse trying to pull a sit-down, non-violent tactic…

Farmer: Let me, let me pursue this, Mr. Chairman.

Heffner: Go ahead, just for a minute and then I’ll exercise non-violent methods to enforce a break. Just go ahead.

Farmer: Non-violence is more effective when you have large numbers of people. That is what we’ve found out in Birmingham, it’s what we found out all over North Carolina…

Malcolm X: Is it a gain to go to a theater for a man who hasn’t got a job?

Farmer: It’s a gain to get a job. It’s a gain to get a job and it’s jobs that we’re providing. Now it’s a gain, also, to go to the theater, it’s a gain because it’s not the theater so much…it’s not the cup of coffee at the lunch counter. It’s the dignity that a person achieves. Is it a gain to have a business over on the other side of the tracks to which you can go, but when you walk downtown you’re discriminated against and cannot go there?