Orders to Kill Read online

  On April 15, as Dr. King concluded his speech by calling on the government to “stop the bombing,” the crowd had grown to about 250,000 cheering and chanting partisans. When I put forward the notion of a King-Spock ticket, the assembled mass exploded as one in support. For many of us the end of that demonstration marked the first step in the establishment of a “new politics” in the United States.

  On April 23, 1967, as Martin and I rode together to Massachusetts to announce, with Ben Spock, the beginning of a grassroots organizing project called Vietnam Summer, a man whose name meant nothing to us at the time but whose life was to become inextricably intertwined with ours, was being helped into a bread box in the kitchen of the Missouri State Penitentiary in Jefferson City. The box was loaded onto a delivery truck that would take James Earl Ray through the gates to freedom.

  2

  Death of the New Politics: Summer 1967–Spring 1968

  THE NCNP CONVENTION ON LABOR DAY WEEKEND 1967 began with great enthusiasm and expectation. Many of us believed that nothing less than the nation’s rebirth was on the agenda. Dr. King’s rousing keynote address, calling for unity and action, brought forth an overwhelming response from the 5,000 delegates. It was the most political speech he would ever give.

  There was, however, an ominous presence. A small aggressive group had pressed each arriving black delegate into a self-styled Black Caucus. Dr. King’s safety was in danger from this group, which had threatened to take him hostage, so he had to depart quickly under guard as soon as he finished speaking.

  Torn by dissension, the convention descended into a fiasco; any chance of achieving a unified political movement was destroyed.

  More than a decade would pass before we would become aware of the extent of the government’s role in the disaster. And not until later than that would we realize that a coalition of private and public forces had orchestrated it.

  For example, we would learn that a CIA operation, named Operation CHAOS, had been put in place to enable the subversion of dissent and undermine such gatherings of dissenting citizens. Operation CHAOS involved the collection of information on private citizens and groups through the interception and reading of mail, and the placement of informants and covert operators in dissenting organizations. At the NCNP convention, the tactic used was to divide the black and white delegates using the so-called Black Caucus, which we thought at the time was a natural outgrowth of the legitimate Black Power movement.

  Black Caucus delegates voted en bloc and used outrageous techniques—provoking strident emotionalism; playing on white guilt, divisiveness, and intimidation; calling for the use of arms; and introducing blatantly anti-Semitic resolutions. Years later we learned that they were organized by the government and backed by federal funds, filtered through Chicago Mayor Richard Daley’s antipoverty organization, and that the members included individuals from one of Chicago’s most feared street gangs—the Blackstone Rangers.

  The convention became hopelessly embroiled in animosity and walkouts by some leading liberal sponsors of the New Politics movement itself. Some, like Martin Peretz (the Harvard instructor, who was one of the moving forces) felt personally betrayed, understandably so considering the amount of time and resources they had expended on the convention. We didn’t admit it at the time, but the NCNP died as a political force that weekend. Its focus permanently changed from national political activity to fragmented local political organizing efforts.

  The inevitable weakening of these disparate efforts made them easy marks for infiltration by groups of agents provocateurs. (One such organization, the Invaders, would emerge in Memphis. This group of twenty or so black men and women developed a series of programs designed to address local needs by providing services where none had previously existed. The Invaders were significant because of their proximity to Dr. King in the weeks leading up to his assassination. They were infiltrated by intelligence operatives and subjected to surveillance out of all proportion to any threat they might have posed to the Memphis power structure.)

  DR. KING AND I KEPT IN TOUCH AFTER THE CONVENTION. Though he was immensely disappointed by the Chicago catastrophe, he nevertheless increased his antiwar efforts. He also threw himself into the development of the Poor People’s Campaign, scheduled to assemble in Washington in the late spring of 1968. The first phase of this campaign would bring to Washington up to several hundred thousand blacks, Hispanics, American Indians, poor whites, and compatriot students and intellectuals from all over the country. A tent city would be set up and civil disobedience tactics would be taught and used, if necessary, to get the attention of the White House, Congress, and various government agencies.

  This combination of opposition to the war and a call for redistribution of the nation’s wealth served to increase King’s unpopularity with the government. It also antagonized segments of the black and white middle class as well as the black church. No doubt it confirmed the belief held by certain public and private forces that King was a serious threat to the very order and system of U.S. government. No one could predict what would happen when he led a massive wave of alienated citizens to take up residence in the nation’s capital.

  Those close to Dr. King noticed how the pace of his radicalization increased in the last year of his life. His analysis of the problems of American society had become much broader. His growing belief in the necessity of dissent against powerful special interests was, in fact, much like Jefferson’s assertion that ultimate power should always flow from the people, otherwise tyranny results.

  This perspective was driven home to me in the course of our last meeting. The last time I saw him alive was in Dean John Bennett’s study at Union Theological Seminary in New York City. It was March 1968, and Andrew Young, executive director of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and Ben Spock were also present. Spock was seeking Martin’s active support for draft resistance, since Martin believed that the war was tantamount to genocide by conscription. At this time Martin was becoming fully involved in a strike of sanitation workers in Memphis. He spoke about the necessity of empowering such urban blacks through nonviolent action.

  3

  Memphis: The Sanitation Workers’ Strike: February 1968–March 1968

  BEGINNING IN FEBRUARY 1968, Dr. King had received regular reports from his friend, Memphis clergyman James Lawson, pastor of Centenary Methodist Church, about the sanitation workers’ dispute in that city. Ninety percent of the thirteen hundred sanitation workers in Memphis were black. They had no organization, union or otherwise, to defend their interests and no effective means to air grievances or to seek redress. However, to most of the citizens of Memphis, black and white, a strike against the city was nothing less than rebellion.

  In a bitter and frustrating setback for the black community, Henry Loeb, who had been the mayor from 1960 to 1963, defeated incumbent William Ingram, who was regarded as friendly to black Memphians, in the mayoral election. Considering the new mayor’s history and reputation, there was no reason for black workers to hope that their working conditions or salaries might improve.

  The grievances were many. Salaries were at rock bottom, with no chance of increase. Men were often sent home arbitrarily, losing pay. Much of the equipment was antiquated and poorly maintained. In early 1968 two workers, thirty-five-year-old Echole Cole and twenty-nine-year-old Robert Walker, were literally swallowed up by a malfunctioning “garbage packer” truck. These trucks were over ten years old and in the process of being phased out. There was no workmen’s compensation and neither man had life insurance. The city gave each of the families a month’s pay and $500 toward funeral expenses. Mayor Loeb said that this was a moral but not a legal necessity. After the deaths of Cole and Walker, talk of a strike was widespread.

  Maynard Stiles, who was second-in-command at the Memphis Public Works Department, told me, years after the event, that T. O. Jones, the head of the local union, called him the night before the strike with what Stiles regarded as a very reasonable list of
demands. Stiles said that Jones wanted him to go along to the union meeting scheduled for that night and announce the city’s agreement with the terms. An elated Stiles called Loeb to advise him that a settlement was at hand on very reasonable terms. Loeb ordered him not to dignify any such meeting with his presence and insisted that no terms be accepted under any circumstances. The union meeting went ahead that evening without Stiles. The next day the strike was on.

  The national office of the Association of Federal, State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) sent in professional staff to handle the negotiations, which the mayor insisted on conducting in public, giving neither side any opportunity to change position. With no solution in sight, an interdenominational group of clergy intervened but made no progress.

  The deadlock led to a protest march on February 23, which got out of control in the face of heavy police provocation. Ultimately, the police used Mace on men, women, and children—marchers and bystanders alike. Afterward, a strike strategy committee was formed with the Rev. James Lawson as its chairman. Rev. Lawson had been one of the founders of the SCLC and had worked with the organization for a decade. Dr. King regarded him highly.

  Meanwhile, Dr. King was closing a leadership conference in Miami. While knowing that most of his audience disagreed with the Poor People’s Campaign, he insisted that the nation had to be awakened to the issues of poverty and hunger. The shantytown he planned to erect in Washington would ensure that the plight of the American poor would be foremost in the consciousness of the people of the nation, even the world.

  “We are Christian ministers and … we are God’s sanitation workers, working to clear up the snow of despair and poverty and hatred….” he told them.

  In Memphis, a city injunction against the strike intensified the black community’s support for the sanitation workers, and consumer boycotts and daily marches through the downtown area were organized. The director of the Memphis police and fire departments, Frank Holloman, who had agreed that he would allow the marches if they were peaceful, withdrew many of the visible, uniformed police. Holloman had been a special agent of the FBI for twenty-five years. For seven of those years (1952–1959), he had been in charge of director J. Edgar Hoover’s Washington office. In Memphis he had no support from the black leaders. Internally he relied heavily on his chief, J. C. MacDonald (who in 1968 was close to retirement), a group of seven assistant chiefs, Inspector Sam Evans who was in charge of all Special Services, and Lieutenant Eli H. Arkin of the police department’s intelligence bureau.

  THE GROWING INVOLVEMENT OF YOUNG BLACKS, particularly high school students who were being organized by the Invaders and their parallel organization, the Black Organizing Project (BOP), brought an increased volatility to the strike. During a boycott of local merchants, these young people harassed blacks who made purchases in downtown stores. The militants made themselves heard throughout the dispute, and various Invaders were arrested for disorderly conduct, for trying to persuade students to leave school, and for blocking traffic. In retrospect, the Invaders’ actions seem mild in comparison with those of other black power groups in other parts of the country.

  Community on the Move for Equality (COME), a coalition of labor and civil rights groups spearheaded by an Internal Committee of local clergy, which was now running the strike, sought national as well as local publicity, scheduling nationally prominent leaders to speak in Memphis in support of the workers. The local NAACP chapter asked Roy Wilkins to come; the local union sought to bring in longtime civil rights leader Bayard Rustin; and the Rev. Lawson raised the possibility of bringing Dr. King to Memphis. Wilkins and Rustin finally agreed to come on March 14.

  Lawson, who had been keeping Dr. King abreast of developments, approached him in late February when the civil rights leader was close to physical exhaustion. It was around this time that his doctor had ordered complete rest.

  AT FIRST KING HAD BEEN RELUCTANT to become directly involved. He had delivered speeches in Memphis but had never headed any civil rights activity there aside from leading the so-called “march against fear,” which was organized in response to the Mississippi shooting of James Meredith, the first black to enroll at the University of Mississippi. But even though some SCLC executive staff wanted to stay away from the strike, Dr. King came to see it as being directly relevant to the national campaign.

  What group could be more illustrative of the exploitation he sought to dramatize than these lowliest nonunion workers who daily took the garbage away from the city’s homes? King’s involvement was potentially a high-profile activity (though with some risks) that would lead naturally into the Washington Poor People’s Campaign. Because Memphis contained a small, militant, black organizing group (the Invaders) as well as the more conservative, southern black congregations, it was, in his view, a microcosm of the nation, with all of the attendant problems and obstacles to the development of a successful coalition. How could he turn his back on the real, current struggle of the Memphis sanitation workers?

  In early March the Rev. Lawson made the announcement that the city had been waiting for. The SCLC had transferred a March 18 staff meeting scheduled for Clarksdale, Mississippi, to Memphis, and on that evening Dr. King would address a gathering of strike supporters.

  4

  Enter Dr. King: March–April 3, 1968

  ALTHOUGH DR. KING had experienced problems and setbacks, particularly concerning his position against the war, no one approached his stature on the national scene as a spokesman for the black and poor of America. His involvement would inevitably focus national attention on the strike, its issues, and its nonviolent tactics.

  On March 18, the Mason Temple overflowed. Crowds sat on the floor, on the stairs, in the aisles and doorways; scores of others stood in the street. Dr. King entered through a side door, and a human wedge of burly volunteers swept him along to the podium. The sound of applause and stamping feet increased to a deafening roar. Reverend Ralph Abernathy, vice president of SCLC, told me it was one of the most moving welcomes he had ever seen.

  When King advocated a general work stoppage in Memphis, the Temple nearly burst into pandemonium. He sat down to tumultuous applause and then received a note, initialed by Andy Young and Ralph Abernathy, suggesting that he return to lead a march on the day of the work stoppage.

  Dr. King returned to the microphone and said that perhaps the Poor People’s Campaign could begin in Memphis. If the people wanted him to, he would lead such a march to city hall. The response was predictable. The date was set for March 22, four days later. Organizers began to spread the word that Dr. King would return to Memphis to lead a march on Friday from Clayborn Temple to city hall. Ten thousand marchers were expected.

  White apprehension rose. Hate literature was circulated throughout the city. Then, incredibly, on the day before the march, the city, whose average annual snowfall was only 5.6 inches, was buried by a blizzard that dumped 16.2 inches of snow, the second-largest snowfall ever recorded in Memphis. The city was virtually shut down and the march had to be postponed until Thursday, March 28. Early on the morning of the march, King left New York City for Memphis.

  Organizers began to intercept students on the way to school or even at the school gates, urging them to join the march. A confrontation between police and students at Hamilton High School resulted in a student being injured. Word spread that the police had killed a girl at the school, and the young people’s anger grew. It was not an auspicious start for Dr. King’s nonviolent march.

  The Memphis police department (MPD) was completely mobilized that morning, with over 300 officers supplemented by fifty sheriff’s deputies committed to the general march area. Emergency mobile TACT units run by Inspector Sam Evans were also standing by. Each unit consisted of twelve sheriff’s deputies and MPD officers, with three cars and four men to each car. This was the first use of a TACT squad in Memphis. Since there weren’t enough shotguns to go around, a number of officers carried their personal weapons.

  The police
were anxious. Riot training had been virtually nonexistent in Memphis, except for a special, elite group. Their own constantly circling helicopter only added to the uneasiness.

  Dr. King was late and the crowd became increasingly restless. Some leaders, such as the Rev. Samuel “Billy” Kyles, wanted to start the march without King, but Reverend Lawson insisted on waiting. For a long time Lawson had tried to involve Kyles in the strike support planning sessions but finally agreed with the others that it was a waste of time—for Kyles rarely, if ever, showed up; though he frequently attended the public meetings.

  Dr. King and Ralph Abernathy finally arrived at the march site just before 11:00 a.m., having been driven directly from the airport. They led the march, linking arms with local ministers, but signs of unrest were everywhere. Trouble began in short order as the line of march proceeded up Beale to Main. The sounds of glass breaking, isolated at first, got louder and more frequent. Youths ran alongside the line of march, ignoring the marshals’ instructions. Chaos descended, and Dr. King was persuaded to leave the area. A car was flagged down and he was taken to the Rivermont Hotel at the direction of the police, being escorted by motorcycle officer Lt. Marion Nichols. He was given lodging even though he had no reservation at that hotel (rooms having been reserved at the Peabody Hotel).

  After Dr. King had been spirited away, Lawson moved through the line of march with a bullhorn, urging everyone to return to the church where they had begun. As thousands began to turn around, the sounds of breaking glass continued. Youths darted from one store to another, shattering windows. Some began looting, but eyewitnesses maintain that they were followed by older, more experienced hands who quickly and efficiently took advantage of the window-breaking, entered the stores, and came away with goods. The police moved in behind the disorganized crowd and fired Mace and tear gas.