Despite the propaganda value of the Stokes murder, Muslim men in Boston resented the sales quotas, which were imposed under the guise of raising money for Stokes’s family. His cousin, Aubrey Barnette, would later claim that Ronald’s wife and baby never received a dime from the Muslims’ national or local treasuries. The Nation, he charged, was nothing more than a “money-grabbing scheme feeding on the frustrations and the ignorance of Negroes.” When Muhammad’s followers failed to bring in money, his lieutenants resorted “to terror, violence, and extortion.”43
As a secretary of the mosque, Barnette witnessed how Captain Clarence X and “his terror squad” intimidated Boston Muslims into buying more copies of Muhammad Speaks than they could sell. If Captain Clarence and his lieutenants could not collect money from the men, they took them for a ride to Franklin Park and taught them a painful lesson about financial obligations. When more than forty men quit the mosque, Elijah Muhammad Jr., Assistant Supreme Captain of the Fruit, visited Boston, reminding the faithful that “in the old days recalcitrant brothers were killed.” “And,” he warned, “the Messenger fulfills all.”44
Disillusioned with the Nation, Barnette left the mosque nearly two years later. But no Muslim ever really left the Nation. Captain Clarence made sure of that. One afternoon, when Barnette and another former Muslim drove past the mosque in Roxbury, a pink Cadillac cut them off. In broad daylight, Clarence and his squad dragged Barnette from the car, punching and stomping on him, fracturing his ankle, ribs, and vertebrae. “I believe,” he said later, “we were beaten as punishment for quitting and also as a warning to us to keep our mouths shut.”45
The fratricidal violence within the Nation usually occurred out of sight, far removed from anything Cassius Clay ever saw in the mosques that he visited. But tales of attacks against obstinate blacks terrified Muhammad’s followers. Although he refused to let the Fruit retaliate against whites, Muhammad approved corporal punishment against his own people. Such abuse alienated many members. In Harlem, a street corner speaker complained to Louis Lomax, “Those damn Muslims are too scared to do anything to the white man; all they do is talk and beat up on other niggers!”46
IN MID-AUGUST, after Elijah Muhammad delivered a sermon to a disappointingly small crowd in St. Louis, he attempted to tighten his hold on Malcolm. In a private meeting, Elijah told the increasingly disobedient minister that he disapproved of the way that he deviated from his message, talking publicly about politics and civil rights. In the following months, Muhammad reminded him not to make any more appearances on college campuses without receiving his permission. Before agreeing to let Malcolm speak anywhere, Muhammad wanted to “know exactly how” he would “carry out such a program in advance.”47
For a time, Malcolm decided that he should avoid the spotlight. He declined cover story requests from Life and Newsweek and turned down a television interview on Meet the Press. He also noticed that his name and picture disappeared from the pages of Muhammad Speaks after Herbert Muhammad replaced him as editor.48
Elijah resented all the attention focused on Malcolm, even though he had made him the Nation’s spokesman. He especially disliked the way that people lionized Malcolm for his intellectual superiority and rhetorical eloquence. Muhammad’s insecurities festered, fueling his paranoia over comparisons to the younger man, who claimed that he had learned everything from Elijah. But unlike Malcolm, Muhammad made grammatical errors in his speeches and stumbled over words he did not recognize. Lacking any formal education beyond the fourth grade, he struggled while reading aloud. His sermons rarely impressed or excited audiences the way that Malcolm’s did. “To be able to listen to Muhammad for any length of time,” one observer commented, “you had to be a believer, convinced in advance.”49
Muhammad worried that the controversies surrounding Malcolm’s public appearances would invite closer scrutiny from the government. On August 15, three days after the St. Louis rally, Congressman Francis E. Walter, chairman of the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), condemned the Black Muslims as a subversive group influenced by communists and announced that an investigation would begin soon.50