Mlk Vs Malcolm X Research Paper

For Freedom: A comparison of two great leaders who fought for their people in the Civil Rights Movement in the 1950s in the United States.

Martin Luther King Jr. (MLK) and Malcolm X (MX) are the best-known two for playing an important role in the movement for civil rights in the United States. The US civil rights movement happened mainly in the 1950s and 1960s, led by two great leaders, MLK and MX, for African American’s social justice and equal rights as whites under the law of the US (History.com Editors 2024). They both seemed to have been facing the same issue, but which had more influence on other people and in what way is a very important area for consideration. However, MLK had more influence than MX in the 1960s US civil rights movement,

MLK started his movement in 1955 by boycotting riding the Montgomery buses that other African Americans also chose not to ride, which led the United States Supreme Court to declare segregated buses illegal (Herweck 2011). Also, MX founded the Organization of Afro-American Unity, where he spotted racism and his philosophy in June 1964, which had a great influence among the Student Nonviolent Coordination Committee (SNCC) members (History.com Editors 2023). While they both devoted their lives to the movement, MX was more charismatic than MLK from the view that he was more of a realist, which means that he saw things the way they really are. Though he converted to Muslims, he said in his speech to keep the religion only in people's hearts and God for the moment because it hasn’t done anything good for people but caused an argument (John Fabiani 2015). He also said that racism is not just an American problem but a world problem, whereas MLK pointed out problems in the US. From analyzing MX’s speeches, his speeches are often from the victim's side. While MLK started to get citizenship as an American citizen, MX stated that he was an African American not an American, and he also said, “I see America through the eyes of the victim. I don’t see any American dream; I see an American nightmare” (1964). Thus, with these strong words, he gained great attention from

MLK said that nothing can be accomplished by violence but causes other problems, whereas MX stated that non-violent resistance is just defenseless, and they need violence to defend themselves. They both weren’t offensive, but they criticized each other’s thoughts as having a bad influence on their people. Also, there was a big protest march in Washington, D.C., where MLK was in charge. This march is really famous for the size of the scale in which about 250,000 people joined and also for one of the most well-known speeches by MLK, which is “I Have a Dream.” Unlike MX, MLK talked about his dreams for the future and future generations. Furthermore, MLK stated that they should love their enemies because hate does no good, but love is powerful (King 1961). Therefore, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for the civil rights movement, of which only two African Americans have gotten the award. He got the words, “The time has come to lay our weapons and armaments aside and listen to the message Martin Luther King has given us through the unarmed struggle he has waged on behalf of this race,” from Gunnar Jahn, chairman of the Norwegian Parliament. Thus, his efforts in non-violent resistance allowed him to be looked up to by other people of different nationalities (The San Bernardino County Sun 1964). Lastly, it is necessary to consider MLK and MX from the