Given his recent heart attack and chronic bronchial asthma, Muhammad could never have taken on the demands of traveling as Malcolm did. The frail sexagenarian’s deteriorating health led him to move to the drier climate of Phoenix, Arizona. Separated from the national headquarters, he empowered Raymond Sharrieff, John Ali, and his sons, Herbert and Elijah Jr., to run the daily operations in Chicago.
Muhammad’s physical decline and heightened sense of mortality led him to tighten his grip on the world around him. He carefully monitored his ministers, requiring them to record their weekly sermons and send tapes to Chicago, ensuring that they did not deviate from his message. He especially depended on Sharrieff and his network of temple informants to report any conflicts or subversive activity within the Nation.38
The more hostile attention the Muslims received from outsiders, the more paranoid Muhammad became. “He has tremendous faith in himself and Allah,” a minster told journalist William Worthy. “He trusts his subordinates to a degree, but essentially he thinks that no one is his friend. He alone is going to run the Nation of Islam and he is so strong right now that a split in the organization would be impossible at this time.”39
IN THE SPRING and winter of 1960, thousands of college students in dozens of cities settled on a new tactic for forcing change to the civil rights landscape: the sit-in. This nonviolent direct action movement was aimed at desegregating southern lunch counters. Yet the sit-in was of little use in the North, where black people could eat at any coffee shop or lunch counter. There, the blurred color line of de facto segregation, hardened by history and custom, created separate and unequal neighborhoods, poor public schools, dilapidated housing projects, and persistent unemployment. Trapped in a cycle of poverty, blacks lived as second-class citizens, fatigued by empty promises of a better life. “The mood of the Negro, particularly in New York City,” Louis Lomax asserted, “is very, very bitter. He is losing faith. The Negro on the streets of Harlem is tired of platitudes from white liberals.”40
On a mild Saturday afternoon in May 1960, about three months before Cassius Clay departed New York for the Rome Olympics, an estimated ten thousand Harlemites, standing shoulder to shoulder, attended an outdoor “freedom rally” at the intersection of West 125th Street and Seventh Avenue. The large assembly of people, most of whom were not Muslims, attested to Malcolm’s growing popularity as a political figure. Responding to the urban unrest, he offered a broad message of solidarity.
“As black people we must unite,” he insisted. He exhorted the masses to follow “fearless black leaders who will stand up and help the so-called American Negro get complete and immediate freedom.” While civil rights activists challenged segregation in the South, a temper of defiance swept through northern cities like an epidemic. Radicals tried to cure the disease by pressing for full citizenship, equal rights, and racial justice. Well before “Black Power” became a rallying cry, the belief in self-determination and racial pride blossomed as northern black activists fought for better jobs, quality education, and open housing.41
No one articulated black rage against American hypocrisy and the failures of democracy more strongly than Malcolm did. Despite his calls for unity, he could hardly resist criticizing civil rights leaders who advocated integration. Although he did not call anyone out by name, he made it clear that black people wanted “leaders who are not afraid to demand freedom, justice, and equality. . . . We do not want any more Uncle Toms.”42
Many admired Malcolm for his fearlessness. He was willing to debate anyone, anytime, anywhere. Malcolm debated the way Clay fought, swinging from the opening bell, hitting his opponent with hard cuts and fierce jabs. Unrestrained by the “conventional niceties of debate,” he played by his own rules, on his terms. He cultivated a combative style, bobbing and weaving, pivoting the conversation in the direction that he wanted. Malcolm was not interested in simply scoring points and landing a few punches. Decisions were not his goal. He swung for the knockout. Alex Haley recalled, “He would turn a radio or television program to his advantage in a way he credited to the boxing ring’s great Sugar Ray Robinson, who would dramatize a round’s last thirty seconds. Similarly, Malcolm would eye the big studio clock, and at the instant it showed thirty seconds to go, he’d pounce in and close the show with his own verbal barrage.”43