Malcolm X (78 page)

What has been established is that around the time Malcolm returned from Africa in May 1964, two members of the Newark mosque began planning how to carry out his murder, almost certainly at the direct order of minister James Shabazz, whose control of the mosque necessitated his involvement. The older of the two members was mosque assistant secretary Benjamin X Thomas, a twenty-nine-year-old father of four employed at a Hackensack envelope manufacturing company. His younger partner was electronics plant employee Leon X Davis, of Paterson, New Jersey, about twenty years of age. Both men were active in the Fruit of Islam. Probably while driving Ben’s black Chrysler, the two men spotted young Talmadge Hayer, another Newark mosque member in his early twenties, on a street in downtown Paterson. They invited Hayer into the car, and drove around for a while. Ben and Leon fished for Hayer's attitudes about Malcolm and his split from the NOI. Within weeks Hayer became the third member committed to participating in the murder. “I had a bit of love and admiration for the Honorable Elijah Muhammad,” he later wrote, “and I just felt that like this is something that I have to stand up for.”

In short order, two more NOI members joined the Newark conspiracy. Willie X Bradley was twenty-six years old, tall, dark in complexion, and heavyset, with a history of violence. Wilbur X McKinley, by contrast, was over thirty-five years old, thin, and like three other men in the conspiracy, only about five feet, nine inches tall. The proprietor of a small construction business, Wilbur X had worked at the Newark mosque.

While beatings like the one carried out against Leon Ameer in Boston had become disturbingly common for the Nation, executions of members or dissidents remained extremely rare. Yet as the Nation seemed to flounder in the wake of Malcolm’s defection, brutal disciplinary measures were taken with greater frequency. In the Bronx in late 1964, for example, NOI member Benjamin Brown started his own “Universal Peace” mosque, which featured a large photograph of Muhammad in its storefront window. Since Brown had not requested the prior approval of Mosque No. 7 or the Chicago headquarters, his actions were judged insurrectionary. In the early evening of January 6, 1965, three Muslims dropped by Brown’s mosque, complained about the display of Muhammad’s portrait, and departed. Several hours later, as Brown left the mosque, he was killed by a shot in the back by a .22 caliber rifle. The NYPD investigated the death and arrested three men, all NOI members, two of them Mosque No. 7 lieutenants: Thomas 15X Johnson and Norman 3X Butler. The police found a .22 caliber Winchester repeating rifle in Johnson’s home. It had been fired once, then jammed. Butler and Johnson were subsequently bailed out of jail, but police were convinced that both men were involved in Brown’s shooting, because they were well-known “enforcers.”

Thomas 15X presented a curious case in the Nation’s crusade to poison its members’ opinions. Malcolm’s driver for years, Johnson had abandoned his boss during the schism with the Nation. However, at first, he had not shared the obsession to destroy Malcolm that had infected other FOI members. When in December 1963 Malcolm had been silenced, Johnson stated that like all mosque members he was surprised, but had assumed that the minister soon would be reinstated. Yet after Malcolm established the MMI and OAAU, Johnson firmly sided with the Nation against him. Thomas 15X's hardening of purpose began with the Queens court hearing over the disputed ownership of the Shabazz home. “Malcolm wasn’t just a minister; he was top minister,” Johnson stated, going on to explain that, because of his status, NOI members had agreed to purchase a house for him and his family. “But if you leave, you can’t have that house. We bought you a brand-new car and everything. . . . As long as you are correct, you’ve got that.”

Johnson claimed that the order to assassinate Malcolm came directly from national secretary John Ali, who while visiting New York City gathered Mosque No. 7’s lieutenants separately from Captain Joseph and gave a series of reasons why Malcolm had to die. In the more than four decades that have passed, however, nothing has emerged that could definitively prove or disprove Johnson’s claim of Ali’s involvement. Johnson had great difficulty accepting some of the national secretary’s reasoning, and noted that “the other lieutenants didn’t [buy Ali’s arguments] either.” Several weeks later new instructions came down from Chicago: “Elijah Muhammad sent specific orders. He said, ‘Don’t touch [Malcolm].’” Consequently Johnson and his crew beat up and harassed Malcolm’s people, but no active plan was set in motion to murder him. Johnson claimed, “I used to see Malcolm every day in the Theresa Hotel.” Malcolm would walk over and say, “How you doing?” That his intended victim maintained a degree of civility impressed Johnson.

By the fall of 1964, though, as the rage against Malcolm infected every part of the Nation, Johnson was finally persuaded that Malcolm had to be killed. He received instructions with four other lieutenants “that we had to go to Philly. He was speaking over there . . . and we were supposed to hit him then.” The crew drove to Malcolm’s lecture site (probably on December 26), but Malcolm had anticipated such an assault. “He sent a brother out that sort of favored him.” The would-be assassins chased after the decoy, and Malcolm escaped. Johnson may have also participated in at least one other failed attempt to assassinate Malcolm in Philadelphia. Had he been present at the Audubon Ballroom on February 21, 1965, Thomas would have eagerly participated in the assassination. The fact that he was absent that afternoon, but was subsequently sentenced to life imprisonment for the crime, raises profound questions about both U.S. law enforcement and the courts.

During the final weeks of Malcolm’s life, there were two topics that preoccupied his followers. First, the obvious political, ideological, and religious changes Malcolm was experiencing disoriented both his critics and supporters. His evolution seemed to keep unfolding toward tolerance and pluralism along racial and religious lines. In Rochester on February 19, Malcolm had told his audience, “I believe in one God, and I believe that God had one religion. . . . God taught all of the prophets the same religion. . . . Moses, Jesus, Muhammad, or some of the others. . . . They all had one doctrine and that doctrine was designed to give clarification of humanity.” This, along with his increasing statements about not judging men by the color of their skin, produced deep concern among followers who clung to the belief that Malcolm’s new pronouncements were merely cosmetic changes designed to increase his public appeal. Some die-hards like James 67X simply refused to believe that their boss had changed. Betty, for her own reasons, took the same position. But in the Harlem audience that had loyally turned out for Audubon rallies, there was tremendous uneasiness.

After Betty publicly accused Lynne Shifflett of sleeping with Malcolm, Shifflett resigned from her position as general secretary of the OAAU in late 1964. Weeks later, after Malcolm returned home from Africa, he replaced Shifflett with another articulate, intelligent black woman, Sara Mitchell, the young woman from the
New Yorker
who had written him in June. Although Mitchell shared some of Shifflett’s middle-class views about politics, at heart she was a progressive black nationalist who viewed Malcolm from that vantage point. Describing Malcolm’s 1965 activities years later, for instance, Mitchell argued that “underlying [his] efforts was his still unfulfilled and paramount ambition: the redemption of the ‘disgraced’ manhood of the American Blackman. That was the spur piercing him; it would not let him stop or even rest.” To Mitchell, the two new organizations Malcolm had established performed distinctly different functions. Muslim Mosque, Inc. “was set up to encourage study and consideration of a religious alternative” while the Organization of Afro-American Unity had been designed “for eventual correlation and unification of varied aspects of the black struggle.” She recognized the limitations of both groups, lacking resources and permanent, full-time staff. “Consequently,” she recalled, “deadlines were not met and postponements were inevitable. During the lagging interim, dissatisfied fingers shook in his face from all directions.”

Mitchell could sense that broad elements of the black nationalist community outside the Nation were displeased with Malcolm’s new orientation. Many African Americans had “experienced discreet self-pride” when Malcolm had promoted “black supremacy,” but as his change progressed “they were disappointed and annoyed; for he was no longer providing the bold, caustic, chastising voice.” She also thought that Malcolm’s preoccupation with lecturing at elite universities had a negative effect among sectors of the black dispossessed. “Grassroots black people began wondering if his participation on Ivy League type forums meant that 'their' Malcolm was abandoning them for the ‘good life’ and higher stakes.” From an organizational standpoint, Mitchell found this effect highly problematic. Virtually alone within Malcolm’s inner administrative circle, Mitchell worried that her leader's ideological leaps in new directions alienated many old core supporters, while not converting enough new followers. As a result, “isolation and loneliness were prices paid for his radical pioneering.”

James 67X was relieved to be rid of Lynne Shifflett and quickly found a much better working relationship with Mitchell. But the tensions and disaffections that Mitchell described created an atmosphere of uncertainty that benefited opportunists like Charles 37X Kenyatta. During December and part of January, after Malcolm had discovered his involvement with Betty, Kenyatta had disappeared from MMI and OAAU events. On January 24 he finally showed up at an OAAU rally, voicing complaints. He bitterly announced to several members that he was now “finished” with both the MMI and the OAAU. He hinted that James was responsible for financial irregularities. The “best way to get money is to go out and work for it,” Charles advised.

Yet the worries over Malcolm’s positions were trumped by fears about his safety. By early 1965 most of Malcolm’s closest associates believed that without a change of course he would soon be dead, and they grew preoccupied with exploring ways to save their leader's life. They knew that various African governments had offered him positions; Ethiopia had been willing to grant sanctuary; the Saudis would have permitted both him and his family to live in the kingdom as guests of the state. The entire African-American expatriate community in Ghana urged him to bring Betty and the children to Accra. Even Malcolm’s celebrity friends had offered their summer homes and second houses, where the family could live in anonymity. A nervous Ruby Dee had even suggested hiding Malcolm behind a secret wall in her home, a plan vetoed by her husband, Ossie Davis.

On Friday, February 19, Maya Angelou arrived from Ghana, ready to volunteer for the OAAU's staff. She had heard about the firebombing and was so shaken that she phoned Malcolm while still at JFK airport. “They almost caught me,” he admitted to her. Malcolm offered to pick up Angelou at the airport, but she informed him that she planned to travel straight to San Francisco to see her family first. However, when she returned home, her mother cautioned her not to work with that “rabble-rouser.” “If you feel you have to do that—work for no money—go back to Martin Luther King,” her mother advised.

Although most Malcolmites thought the Nation of Islam was actively conspiring to kill their leader, many also suspected the U.S. government as being behind the murder attempts. “We all knew what was happening to black people, and [Malcolm] always talked about the government being involved in the problems we were having,” Herman Ferguson recalled. Malcolm supposedly had been worried that “the CIA was out to kill him” when he was abroad, and his rejection at French customs made him further suspect government meddling in his affairs. Ferguson felt that during the final weeks OAAU members did too little to protect Malcolm: “We didn’t pick up on the signs that we should have picked up on. . . . Like cannon fodder, people sat around and talked about the danger that Malcolm was in. It was just like, ‘The brother should be more careful.’ ” Several OAAU members had places in Manhattan that Malcolm could use as safe houses to spend the night. There was some discussion about assigning him drivers, but nothing was done about it. The drift toward disaster continued.

It is difficult to know what Malcolm may have contemplated as he pondered the likelihood of impending murder. For decades after the assassination, James 67X struggled privately with the question of whether his leader truly wanted to die. He had lived for over a year with death threats coming from the Nation, and in his final days he seemed of two minds, partly accepting of what he believed to be his fate and partly wishing or hoping that the problems might disappear and allow him to go back to a normal life. In his last week, he spent much of his time away from his family, so as not to put them in danger. He also appears to have traveled around without bodyguards, though he had long had either James 67X or Reuben X accompanying him wherever he went. He communicated infrequently, and sometimes it was impossible for MMI and OAAU members to reach him with information. As the world closed in on him, Malcolm, always an extremely private individual, kept his own counsel. He fought desperately to shield others’ doubts and fears.