DID THE NYPD LET MALCOLM X DIE?

When I first saw Columbia University historian Manning Marable on TV, saying that the NYPD and the FBI failed to protect Malcolm X and perhaps even allowed his assassination to take place, I didn't believe it.

I thought it was impossible. But this morning, I listened to another scholar, who has also written a book on Malcolm X. The more facts I hear, the more I think it is possible that the police withdrew their officers, on purpose, the day Malcolm was killed.

Malcolm X was a terrifying figure to many white Americans. So the cops may have thought Malcolm didn't deserve protection. As for the FBI, that other scholar, Michael Eric Dyson, said today (April 5, 2011) on the Madeleine Brand show that the FBI refused to warn Martin Luther King Jr. when they heard credible threats on his life. So it is conceivable that both law enforcement agencies turned a blind eye when Malcolm was in danger.

The white establishment viewed both these black leaders as threats to society. It was dangerous for black leaders to speak out. It was dangerous to be a liberal in those days.

I was a newspaper editor and reporter in the 1960s and was one of the few white supporters of Malcolm X. I thought he was a great leader and a straight shooter, and that America needed his voice. He was as important to civil rights and to the maturity of America as Martin Luther King Jr., I thought.

When I was a young man, all my heroes were murdered: President Kennedy, his brother Bobby, MLK, and Malcolm X. Only the good die young, it seemed to me. I thought all these killings were national tragedies.

Now I look forward to reading both those books, by Dyson and Marable. I think the country should know more about Malcolm X. 

© Copyright 2011, Roger R. Angle