A Voice for Independence

Who would have thought that in the year 1963 a black man, Malcolm X, would be interviewed by a panel of white men, Chicago journalists Jim Hurlut, Len O’Connor, Floyd Kalber and Charles McCuen, on a national platform arguing among other things elements of white supremacy, racial tension and historicity of slavery in America? At the time of the interview Malcolm X was currently a member of the Nation of Islam, a religious order from which his newly adopted name originated. In the interview, if it can still be called that, Len O’Connor attempts to uncover Malcolm X’s true identity, an effort which provided sufficient room for a short history lesson of black heritage, or the lack of it, in America through the eyes of a colored lens. It is through the initial interaction of X and O’Connor where the tinge of racial tension is first exposed. Nearly, ten minutes into the examination, O’Connor rhetorically charges X of taking a very moderate position of independence without having any hatred for the whites, using X’s reaction to a recent plane wreck highlighted in a news article to guide the prodding. Implications surrounding the charge of O’Connor are manifest in his further questioning stating that X expressed great gratification for the occurrence of the tragedy. There is a wealth of examples in this interview to account for a swelling distrust blacks share for white supremacy, a generic term used here to describe contentious race relations, societal prejudice and acts of segregation condoned by the federal and state governing agencies of the day. The full interview shadows a voice of liberty which promotes the establishment of racial dignity through freedom, justice and equality for blacks in the United States. The ‘City Desk,’ or the program responsible for hosting the thirty minute interview, provided a platform for this voice of liberty to be heard, a voice which was as reticent then as it was nearly two-hundred years prior.

Turning towards another influential leader, revolutionary and controversial orator who espoused the tenants of liberty and equality inherent in the God-given rights of man, we will find Patrick Henry. No attempts will be made here to reconcile seeming differences between these two pivotal characters in American history, rather an attempt will be made to establish a common theme shared by them, a theme which can be articulated in the spoken and written word of both men. We shall find what is common between Henry and X is found in any revolutionary; a composed and dynamic countenance and controversial rhetoric that are not without consignment to a moral, religious or ethical code. So often perceived by his countrymen as slanderous and contemptuous, noticeable features which are typically construed as criticism of the reigning governmental agency the plight of a revolutionary hinges on some degree of treason. American history has already cast a seemingly unpretentious light on these two leaders and there remains a stunning irony that binds them together which I hope will be recognized without the stigma of social or ethnic bias.

Patrick Henry is revered mostly for his famous words, ‘Give me liberty or give me death!’ delivered in a speech at St. John’s Church in Richmond on March 23, 1775. However, our attention will be drawn another direction earlier in his career. In May, 1765 Henry was elected to the Colonial Assembly in Williamsburg known as the House of Burgesses where he gave the ‘Stamp Act’ speech just ten days after inauguration at the spirited age of twenty-nine. Inexperienced and unacquainted with the form of the House and the members who comprised it,[1] Henry propositioned four Resolutions and Three Conclusions against the Stamp Act which resolved that only colonial assemblies had the right to impose taxes on its constituents which could not be asserted by any other governing body. Viewed as a declaration of economic independence from British Parliament, the Resolutions were received with open scrutiny and disfavor. Incidentally, Benjamin Franklin notoriously aligned himself with the Stamp Act who was at the time a colonial agent in London. In order to provide scope to the controversy we should detail the need for its implementation.

The Stamp Act, recognized as an internal tax, was a method used to augment the cost of the first colonial American war which lasted roughly nine years. The protective agency of British Parliament secured their colonial interests by defeating their opponents overseas in The French and Indian War (1754-1763). With this tremendous effort followed a tremendous debt and Great Britain was searching for a legitimate method for a pecuniary harvest. Until a more palpable measure was found, Parliament found it necessary for the American colonies to oblige. The Stamp Act was met with considerable disapproval by the colonies although it was not the first to be enforced. The Sugar Act, deemed an external tax, was implemented the previous year. Colonial America, operating under British Parliament’s authority, became intimately aware of the implications that surrounded a governing agency capable of fitting them with a progressive economic burden styled in the Stamp Act.

By this time, Patrick Henry’s Resolutions against the Stamp Act was viewed as a treasonous act by a fair portion of his colleagues. The colony of Virginia refused to print the Resolutions in their media. On the day of its delivery, Henry submitted five Resolutions that were met with outrage and violent debate. Henry did not withdraw cowardly from the riotous excursion, for the next day he approached the platform in the House of Burgesses with unyielding resolve and issued an open challenge to his colleagues which culminated in the sore but famous declaration, ‘Caesar had his Brutus, Charles the First his Cromwell; and George the Third…may he profit by their example. If this be treason, make the most of it!’

We have, by all accounts, a fair and accurate portrayal of a controversial orator at work and an all-American revolutionary at play. Patrick Henry, who was initially dismissed for his unseasoned conjectures and misalignment to favorable party rule within the House of Burgesses, wound up initiating a policy that colonial America would embrace. This adoption inevitably spawned a war for economic independence, the Revolutionary War, the results for which our infancy as a new nation was formed.

Although our nation had eventually won a war for independence and sovereignty from economic subjugation in 1776, she failed to liberate herself from human slavery, a racial inequality that would harbor civil unrest. Nearly two centuries later our nation was met with another radical revolutionary, only this time he fought for racial independence echoing the same doctrines of freedom through justice and liberty from social tyranny. But wait, that war was already fought and won in 1865 with the blood of our brothers in our own nation. With the acceptance of the Emancipation Proclamation on September 22, 1862 by Abraham Lincoln human slavery was declared unlawful. From this conjecture we must begin to open both eyes to the historical account which spans an entire century in America. From 1865 to 1965 with the aid of any encyclopedia we can surmise what happens to a nation that was dividedly stripped of its subjugating and lawful enterprise. If anyone looks beyond the glorious transparency of the Proclamation, one will witness a brutal struggle between two races, a sectarian class conflict limiting exclusivity towards anyone who was not a white man, (even white women were lawfully considered second-class citizens) legislative subjugation of blacks, (the Jim Crow Laws) Lynching or the putrid stain of injustice secured by the bloody hands of a mob and segregation, all of which lead inevitably to a conclusion that can be summed up in the form of a question: Was the Emancipation Proclamation used more effectively as a tool to provide racial independence or as divisive creature to secure a more perfect union?

By reviewing a series of debates and interviews we can identify the platform from which Malcolm X operates. As a controversial and provocative orator, X regards legislative reform as ineffective, citing the abuse of governing bodies as credit to this legal impotence. For X, what discrimination his people have suffered crosses over political, economic and social boundaries thereby keeping them in an endless cycle of abject class subjugation and racial poverty. Without the aid of any political influence he abandons any hope of seeking refuge in a system that is overwhelmingly racist, yet he is not disheartened. Malcolm X reaches for a power tool that is most effective to acquire justice.

On March 17, 1963, using the words of ‘Attorney General Robert Kennedy,’ Malcolm X dutifully maintains, ‘that the number one domestic problem in America is the race problem, that it is almost impossible to solve it, that it is almost impossible to give justice to Negroes.’[2] In another interview at UC Berkeley, October 11, 1963 continues to correct inflammatory and pervasive accusations associated with the religious and moral code for which he is consigned: The Nation of Islam (NOI). X responds by deflecting the allegations with a noxious flurry of sobering facts citing incidents of ‘juvenile murder,’ ‘domestic church bombings,’ ‘lynching’ and initiation ‘of aggressive acts of violence,’ to be a pattern of exercises that does not, nor has it ever existed in the behavior of Muslims who follow the messenger of Allah: Elijah Muhammad. X continues to identify a glaring misconception of hypocrisy prevalent in his day; pointing out that the party responsible for over four-hundred years of violence and oppression of a peculiar race in America has been and continues to be the same. What becomes interesting in the ensuing dialogue is X’s manner in which he claims the rights of men. ‘We are within our religious rights to retaliate in self-defense to the maximum degree of our ability’ therein ‘reserving the right to defend ourselves.’ X uses the phrase expressly as Patrick Henry, or any other ‘Founding Father’ will have used it denoting its God-given quality. An inalienable right to them was a natural right to X; the manner in which they claimed them was tangible but no less effective.

What burdened the peoples of these two revolutionaries is oppression by an over-riding governing agency. For Henry this oppression restricted political freedom and the initial means of overcoming this was to employ his legislative authority. For X, this oppression existed generally as inequality stemming from societal prejudice and the most effective means of combating it as an influential leader was to become an ideologue of freedom. Both persons were met with enormous resistance, yet they exercised their intellectual authority as an aggregate to incite social and political reform.

In conclusion, the area covered in this article could almost be considered a disservice to the incredible effort applied by both men as it is ill replete with evidence necessary to properly expose their true historical significance; leaving their valiant heroism to suffer near exploitation. At the very least my hope is that one will envision the invaluable sacrifice which has been made by both persons for a cause greater than themselves. A dynamic posture coupled with their controversial yet powerful oration impacted a message which could not be ignored even by those who failed to align themselves with the principles of independence espoused by these American revolutionaries.

---

[1] A message written backside on Patrick Henry’s copy of the Stamp Act, furnished by William Wirt Henry

[2] City Desk, March 17, 1963, interview of Malcolm X