Compare And Contrast Martin Luther King Jr And Malcolm X

Martin Luther King and Malcolm X, two major personalities from the early 1960s, believed strongly in the reformation of an imbalanced American Civil Rights system. Both leaders were advocates of Civil Rights reformation, and both held that African American citizens had an historic right to the same privileges and protections offered by the Constitution of the United States of America. King and Malcolm X saw segregation as a viral disease that had infected the nation and marginalized black communities. Their approach to curing this infection and strengthening the country was quite different, however. Malcolm X believed in the movement of black nationalism, while Martin Luther King advocated a policy of non-violence. Their respective beliefs

It was a much more subtle means of controlling black voting power, but it nevertheless existed. Additionally, Malcolm X considered the 310 years of slavery as free labor from which the United States profited. He also considers the inconsistency of black men serving in the military, giving their lives for the country and yet not receiving equal benefits as whites. In fact, Malcolm X suggests that the newest immigrant from Europe in considered more American than a Black individual that has lived in America for a hundred years. Color disqualifies him as American: “Those Honkies that just got off the boat, they're already Americans; Polacks are already Americans; the Italian refugees are already Americans. Everything... every blue-eyed thing, is already an American. And as long as you and I have been over here, we aren't Americans yet” (Malcolm X, 1964, p.

Malcolm X has a more macro-view of injustice, whereas King concentrates on segregation and specific areas. Early on in “Letter from Birmingham Jail, King describes the “unjust treatment”African Americans have experienced in the courts. King mentions that Birmingham is the most segregated city in the United States, along with being the site of the highest number of unsolved bombings of black churches and homes in the nation. Birmingham leaders also promised to remove the “humiliating racial signs” that were present in the city, designating sites where black people were allowed. This was not followed up in a proper manner; leaders circumvented their way around this issue. later in his Letter, he becomes more specific in his charges, citing lynching, police abuse, poverty, hotel segregation, and even the practice of omitting personal names (substituting with “nigger” and boy”) among the unjust practices of the city’s white population. (King, 1963, p. 3). King agrees with Malcolm X, on the notion that blacks must establish a clear identity.the black community is “ forever fighting a degenerating sense of "nobodiness” ( (King, 1963, p. 3). In Birmingham’s state of affairs in the early 1960s, blacks were considered more of a commodity than individuals. King quotes Martin Buber:” segregation substitutes an "I - it" relationship for the "I - thou" relationship and ends up