Malcolm X Debates Bayard Rustin (1960)

Here in the WBAI studios there is a Bayard Rustin, executive secretary of the war resistance league and Malcolm X, minister of the Temple of Islam of Muhammad in New York. Both of you, gentlemen, are working in your own way for the welfare of the American Negro. I would like to ask you if you could describe the purposes of your individual organizations and tell us something about the philosophies inherent in them Mr. I am happy to be here today to represent the Honorable Elijah. Muhammad to his audience and, as you know, Mr. Muhammad is the spiritual leader of the fastest growing group of Muslims in the Western Hemisphere and is perhaps probably the biggest draw card among the so-called black masses, more than any other so-called leader black today in proof that a year ago in Washington DC he appeared at the Uline Arena and made 10,000 and in New York at the Saint Nicholas Arena last year he made 10,000 and this year I think he made another between 10 and 15,000 in Chicago he took out uh fifteen thousand and I quote these things just to show you that as a man, no matter what people agree or disagree with him, they have to admit that the masters of the so-called blacks are interested.

Listening to what he has to say, probably in the last two years he has become the most talked about and written about black man in America and even today I would say it is one of the most controversial countries. because he is having such miraculous success in making his show popular with the so-called black masses and if you ask me what it is, I can best tell you what it is because of what he is credited with doing in Time magazine last year. An article about Mr. Muhammad noted that he has successfully eliminated alcohol use among his followers, which is one of the things that has destroyed our people here in America as a race.

He has successfully eliminated drug addiction, excessive blasphemy. profanities that actually arise from lack of self-respect. He has successfully eliminated theft and crime among his followers. Time magazine also noted that Mr. Muhammad has succeeded in eliminating adultery, fornication and prostitution and making the black man respect his wife something that has been characteristically absent among our men and Time magazine also noted that among Muslims who follow the honorable Elijah Muhammad juvenile crime has been eliminated in uh in the news and the US world report about a couple of months later in 59 they noted that Mr. Mohammed was successful in making the so-called black see the importance of an economic program that, in fact, when you think about what Time magazine said, they were giving him credit for being probably one of the greatest moral reformers who ever lived. he appeared among the so-called blacks here in America yet and when you relate what the US news and World Report magazine said about his success in getting the so-called blacks to set up shops and factories and farms.

The farms to feed us grow. food for us, factories to make things for us, and places of business to create jobs for ourselves. The goal behind this particular phase of Mr. Muhammad's program is to make the so-called Negro financially independent to prevent him from having to embarrass the white man. by demanding that the white man give him a job when he actually can, Mr. Muhammad feels that our people can come together and pool our resources and talents and all that and create jobs for ourselves and lastly, I would like to say that, uh what the honorable Elijah Muhammad is teaching that is not what we have been accused of of nationalism, nationalism and the difference between being a Muslim and a nationalist.

Nationalism is the political approach or a political solution to the problems faced by so-called blacks in the United States. the black the objective of the black nationalists is the same as the objective of the Muslims uh the Muslims and the black nationalists have no differences in the objective we are aiming towards the same objective but the difference is in the method they are uh uh yes method the nationalists blacks in which it is based on a political solution to the problems faced by the so-called black. We, as Muslims, believe that the only solution to our problem is a religious approach and that is why we emphasize the importance of a moral Reformation as a rule. black nationalists will not tell you about God or any religion or any kind of moral elevation of moral values, while the Muslim emphasizes first on raising the moral standard of the so-called black and by doing this it automatically gives him A lens tends to give him more dignity and self-respect and elevates his thinking to the point where he begins to think in terms of doing something for himself rather than sitting around and begging someone else to share with him what he has. accumulated for themselves, so I would like to emphasize that Mr.

Muhammad is not a politician, he does not believe that politics is the solution to the so-called black problem, he says that the main ingredient involved in our solution will be God, God himself. He has to intervene in this, especially since the so-called black problem was so unique. His problem is different from the problem of the so-called black in the United States. It is perhaps different from the problem of any black people anywhere in the world. This Earth since the beginning of time and that is why our entire approach is a religious approach, we believe that everything that every condition that the black man was in today was predestined and prophesied and we believe that we are living in the fulfillment of that prophecy. today we believe that our being here in America is in terms of biblical prophecy, we believe that the slave masters' oppression of us is in line with biblical prophecy and we believe that all the problems that slave masters are having on this Earth today throughout the world is in line with the fulfillment of biblical prophecy and we also believe that the presence of Mr.

Muhammad in America among the so-called blacks and his reasons for teaching what he is teaching exactly as he is teaching it is all in line with the fulfillment of biblical prophecy, so one thing I would like to emphasize is that our program is strictly a religious program, our solution is a religious solution, it is not political, but Mr. creation of a black state in the United States? uh, yes, well, I answer you like this: it involves the creation of a black state for the black man, if not in the United States, then somewhere on this Earth, if not somewhere abroad, then right here in the United States , but mainly it involves the acquisition of some land that the black man can call his own here or somewhere else if the powers that be don't want him here then they should make it possible for him to be somewhere else if they don't want him to be somewhere else they should make it possible It may be here, it has some political characteristics, so any religion, if by politics you mean the freedom and rights of the black man, any religion that does not take into account that particular ingredient that involves the freedom of the black man It is the wrong religion, but politics as such is not the solution, but the divine solution would have to have that particular ingredient.

You can call it politics if you want, but I wouldn't call it bread and salt. It has salt, salt is one of the ingredients, yeast is one of the ingredients, flour is one of the ingredients and the general problem of the so-called black in the United States is not a political problem as such, it is an economic problem, it is a social problem. . A mental problem is a moral problem and it is a spiritual problem, so we need a solution that does not deal only with politics. Why is it good for a man to be politically free and at the same time be economically dependent? about the man who gave him the so-called political independence why he is still a slave, so we feel that since all these ingredients are involved, only God himself can give a solution that will solve the whole matter and this is the solution we feel .

The honorable Elijah Muhammad is teaching among the so-called Negroes here in America, Mr. Ruston, we heard from you. I'm very happy to be here and particularly eager for Malcolm X and I to clarify some of these questions that he has raised in my mind. I would like to express very simply what I believe and feel. I believe that the vast majority of black people, the black people of this country, do not look for anything from anyone; They seek to become full citizens, their ancestors worked hard. in this country and contributed greatly to it, America does not belong to any particular people because of the racial color of the greens, people have come from many parts of the world to build it and, in my opinion, the vast majority of black they take as a key word and the large number of black leaders the term integrate which means that they rightly or wrongly choose to become an integral part of the United States I think we should work politically to the extent possible but I also think that and through the courts but I believe that at this moment we have reached that point where justice and freedom for black people will be achieved largely because they, with a sense of dignity and pride, organize to demand to become an integral part of all institutions and , therefore, things like that.

As the Montgomerys protest the student sit-in movement and the effort some of us are making now regarding the election, where we honestly don't feel that any of the major political parties can solve the problem as they are constructed now. those things through direct action that we believe will divide the existing political parties will bring about a political realignment in which freedom and justice can be achieved for all people, including black people. This is not a unique position, and certainly, while controversial, it is not all that controversial. that Malcolm It seems to me that the logic of your position is really to say to black people or black people in this country: "we should migrate and settle somewhere in Africa is a state in which men are free to follow a particular religious ideal because it seems to me that, ultimately, this is where we have to leave I I I I I don't see how this escapes the logic of your position, you say that perhaps a State is installed here and, on the other hand, your attitude is that if they don't want you, so you don't want to be where you're not wanted, so why isn't the logic of your position to get to the heart of the matter and take Garvey's position and urge blacks to go back to Africa, well Mr.

Reston, the number? one when he talks about us, striving here to become full citizens or, as they say, first class citizens, number one, the majority of black leaders o The so-called black leaders have gotten the black masses to think in terms of second class citizenship, something that does not exist. We, who follow the honorable Elijah Muhammad, regard a man as either a citizen or a non-citizen. he is not a citizen by degrees, he is a citizen or he is not a citizen and as long as the black man in the United States is not recognized as a first class citizen, we do not feel like citizens at all, no other people in the United States are placed in a category of citizenship second class, people can come here from Hungary, which is a communist country, and be incorporated or integrated into the American way of life overnight, they don't have to come as third class, second class or any other type of class. uh citizen, the only man who is placed in this category is this so-called black man who has sat down and begged the white man to accept him as an integral part of his particular political setup and all that, now we feel that if after a hundred years since Lincoln issued the so-called Emancipation Proclamation, if the black man here is still not recognized as a first-class citizen, which means free, then we don't feel that what Lincoln did actually freed the so-called black in the first place. freedom in its full sense of the word, an example if you have a unique problem in the sense that if the black man in Nigeria, for example, strives against his oppressor to obtain his freedom, once he obtains it, the oppressor he leaves, but the black one. the man in Nigeria is already home he has his own country if the black man in India is fighting against his oppressor for freedom once his oppressor or the colonizer gives him that freedom the colonizer leads the oppressor leaves but the slave or The ex -the slave is already at home, this is him now, everything is very good but you are not answering my question.

I'm answering your question well uh if the black man in Kenya in the same way if he is if he uh He rebels against the British his British oppressor and gets freedom from him, then the oppressor leaves now. The black man's position in America is unique in the sense that he begs or demands freedom, but once he obtains this so-called freedom, he is still 9,000 miles away from what he can do. Call home, so you have a problem that is different from the problems of other doctors all over the Earth who have been fighting for freedom and, um, uh, we are there, you can use the passive approach, which is, uh, sit or sit or rebelthat way, uh, when in India, like Gandhi, they had three hundred or four hundred million black people fighting against a couple of hundred thousand white oppressors, then the passivity, the passivity worked because all they had to do is stop sitting, It's like an elephant sitting on a mouse or something but here they are the majority in the oppressor is the minority here in America you have black the black man is the minority and when you scream call yourself sitting on the white man all he has to do is let you sit, he can get someone else to run his Factory or whatever else he wants to do except sit there and use this so-called passive approach, we don't think it works because we don't find any parallel, we don't find, for example, anyone who is They are encouraged to seek freedom in a passive manner other than that of the so-called Negro here in America.

Many of the white people who pose as liberals and act as advisors to black people tell them to be passive, be peaceful and turn the other cheek, but these same white people who uh, I encourage the so-called black person to use passive rebuke. uh I have never advocated a passive approach to freeing any white group of people who are in slavery from the yoke of slavery when they talk about the uh white people in Eastern Europe who are under the yoke, the Russian yoke, they don't tell them to be passive in their resistance, they give them ammunition, they give them weapons, they make heroes of the Hungarian freedom fighters, they make them great heroes, but when it comes to a black man.

Whether in Asia, Africa or the United States, if you become militant in your resistance against oppression, you are immediately classified as a bigot, but if you are a white man or a group of white people or someone in a white country who is trying to get rid of of the bandage. The propagandists label him as a hero and they label the dark people who are trying to resist this oppression, either no matter what kind of resistance it is, they label them as phonetics, as racists, as extremists or as rebels, so what does he do? ? it makes the black man in America who would like to fight for his freedom or take a militant, uncompromising stance, it makes him reluctant or afraid to take that stance for fear of placing himself in this particular category and I would like to say this. and also an answer to your question that it is not the so-called this type of movement and that type of movement in America that is causing the white man to give an inch and that is all he is giving is an inch, it is the pressure that the white man is under today from the outside world.

He is not telling you and me that we could integrate into your particular educational or economic system 10 years from now. He doesn't promise it this year, you know, in 10 years or 20. years from now or even 50 years from now because he loves us, but he will tell you every day when you hear some of these political speeches, they are, they are, they are , they are, in some way, catering to you and me, uh. Just because they are in a position where they are forced to try to impress and gain the friendship or sympathy of the African nations that are gaining their independence, the white man today poses as the leader of the so-called free world and the only one .

The way he can be accepted as the leader of the so-called free world is to be accepted by the majority of the people of this Earth, most of whom are non-white and measure him by how he treats non-white people. people here in the United States and to impress them he stands up and talks about that old talk about integration that is hypocrisy, not because he is going to integrate you and me because we will still be begging in 100 years, but to impress our brothers in Africa and Asia and I don't think I'm going to be successful at this now.

Am I to understand that what you are saying is that you are really opposed to integration because you do not believe it is meaningful and cannot work? So, back to my question, you said a lot about nonviolence, something we should address, and you've hinted at a certain amount of economic stuff, but first I have to get your basic position clear in my mind, otherwise I don't think The rest of the discussion may be significant, you have to answer me clearly the question of whether what should ultimately be considered a logical position is to leave the United States if for the next 200 years blacks are not going to be citizens according to its definition, why?

So is it logical for Mr. your leader to say, let's find that piece of territory somewhere and go to it because either he's advocating the continuation of slavery or if that's not logical because he says he can't get it by methods? What I am defending, which is the slow integration process. Now I want to know where you stand on this because I can't see other things clearly unless I see this. I'll try to make it as clear as possible by integrating. We believe that integration is hypocrisy if you were to use the word Brotherhood. That's another thing.

We do not believe in integration, but we do believe in the integration of the Brotherhood, but do you believe that the Brotherhood is possible here? If at any time, sir, you have to. pass a law that will make the white man accept you into his society that's not the Brotherhood that's hypocrisy if a man points a gun at you so you can put your arm around me and pretend you love me that's not the Brotherhood that's hypocrisy and if the United States they if this country has to pass laws so that white people accept us in their educational system and it has to pass laws so that white people accept us in their neighborhoods in better housing than what that is, uh That is, the government is pointing a gun at the white man and making him pretend that he wants you and me to sit next to him.

That's hypocrisy. The government is forcing the white man in America to become a race of hypocrites now, yes the white man. without any law you would accept the black man in your school you would accept the black man in your neighborhood you would accept the black men in your social system economic system and political system without laws having to be passed then we would go for that we would say that that is Brotherhood, that is voluntarily what is going to happen why your common sense tells you sir that is not going to happen so if you cannot do this through the constitutional methods of going to court to have laws that I call integration and if you cannot do it by spirit that you call Brotherhood, so what do you see as the future for black people here and why should they stay?

Sir, the future for the black man in America, as the Honorable Elijah Muhammad taught us, as he can be seen in any intelligent person. A person can see that the white man is simply not going to share his wealth with his former slave or share his house with his former slave or share his feelings with his former slave if the slave continues to pressure him, sooner or later there will be a confrontation if the white man, the slave master, does not want the former slave in his house, so he has to let that slave go by himself and find a house for him now, Mr.

Muhammad, the Honorable Elijah Muhammad, our leader and teacher, teach us. This is that God has taught him that the only solution for the slave and the slave master is separation. Ah, so you believe in separation. We absolutely believe in separation. We believe that separation is divine right now. If there is going to be a divine separation. You guys are logical, are you saying we should take over, say an area of ​​the United States that is predominantly black and send more and more in until we control it or are you being logical by saying let's get out of you?

I think they're both logical uh uh, it's logical when you find out that you can't get along with a man in peace to set up home somewhere else now when we say that when the Honorable Elijah Muhammad teaches us that God has declared that the black man in America must have some land of its own that means it must have some land of its own uh the land doesn't have to be uh in Asia the land doesn't have to be in Africa the land doesn't have to be In Canada, the land can be anywhere and, If it is here in the United States, since, as you say, we have been such good workers and faithful citizens, I prefer to say Faithful Servants, right?, it is that we have not received any payment for our work, it would only be fair if the Master, If your intention is good, since you know that you are not going to achieve this integration, the best thing you can do is let us have some of these states and we can enter these states instead.

By begging him to live next to him, we can go to these states and set up farms and feed our own people, set up factories to make clothing and other public services for our own people, so that businesses where we can create jobs for our own people and this will prevent us from having to beg him for what he has created for his people. In other words, the Daily News correctly uses the movement's description of him as an apartheid movement. They compared it to South Africa, where they say white people should be. in one place the blacks in another it seems to me that what you say is more or less the same no sir we do not believe that the Daily News is qualified to classify us as anything or compare us with any South African philosophy uh because, first of all, the people from South Africa are some people who left Europe and went to Africa, a continent that is not theirs, and they took it away from the blacks to whom it belonged, and now they are there defending white supremacy, which is a false Doctrine, they are defending the black inferiority, which is another false Doctrine, and they are basing their entire governmental system on the continued existence of one country, a portion of, they stay on a continent that they do not belong to and they also rule over some people that they have no authority over.

We, who follow the honorable Elijah Muhammad, advocate a peaceful existence here in this country, which we believe is as much ours as the white man is not his. because he took it from the Indians and he can't oppose us because he brought us here we didn't come here alone we didn't come here voluntarily he chained us up and brought us here and then he worked us for nothing for 310 years without paying us a day's work. Now I would like to point this out, Mr. Ruston, if he has a hundred people working for you for nothing for a week, he should make a profit if he has a million.

People who work for you for nothing for a year make you rich. So when you have millions of black people that you can work for nothing for 310 years, you can easily see why America became the richest and most powerful country on Earth faster than any other. country in history, but here you have 20 million black people today whose parents worked for 310 years for nothing, what do they have in return for them? Not only did his parents work 310 years for nothing like an animal, but his parents were also the most faithful. soldiers that the master had what payment they have received and today they are not asking for much, they are not asking for what someone else would ask for instead of asking for something that is real, they are asking their Master to let them occupy. one of the rooms in his house or one of the rooms with him in his house now he is looking for something that America gave to the black man here half of this country they would not give us anything they worked our mothers and fathers for 310 years without pay , the Senate, Congress and the Supreme Court of the United States considered it necessary to allocate funds to reimburse billions of dollars to the Indians for the lands that were taken from them three or four hundred years ago and if this generation of whites were recognized a debt owed by previous generations of whites to previous generations of Indians, then this same generation of whites must also recognize the debts owed by previous generations of whites to you and to my ancestors, and if they, yes, yes, own courts uh uh they decree that they should pay the Indian today for what was done to previous generations of Indians don't you think that God is fairer than the American judicial system and if the American judicial system says that the Indians should be paid, what Do you think God would say that the United States should pay 20 million black people who worked here for free for 310 years?

Okay, so what you're really saying is that you believe that a certain section of the United States should be handed over and because black people have worked and deserve it and that that should be their territory that this is their solution to the problem the only solution is separation separation not integration now that we have it clear I think we can go back and build on that to ask you some other questions now: how do you see the black man now? I am all for ending drugs, alcohol, bad language and things like that. This is all doing good, but whether you like it or not, this is not an answer to the ultimate problem you now face given the fact that Moses kept the children of Israel in the wilderness for 40 years to end their slavery. mentality and to build a new leadership I also had to know exactly where I was going to take them I had to have a piece of land now you want a piece of land here don't you?

Isn't there some inconsistency with your economy? Politics then in this sense because it seems to me that what you are saying is that black people should own theirapparently he has learned that independence is something relative, it will not be. It would be easy for Africa to be completely itself, as no other continent has been so swept by foreign influence. Islam extends not only across its summit but deep into the South, to the lower reaches of the Belgian Congo. Northern Nigeria is so rigidly. Muslims like Saudi Arabia and Guinea political gatherings stop at dusk when everyone leaves, takes off their shoes, and makes vows toward Mecca.

Now let me tell you, my friend, so that this is historically clear in an illustration throughout West Africa. find the best art objects from which Picasso and others developed cubism and the modern eye, that is true of The Carving throughout West Africa during the 17th and 18th centuries of figures with faces and hands, if they had really spread , we could not have had those artistic figures because as you should know that Mohammedans are not allowed to create figures on their art objects, sir, and it was the subsequent diffusion that was partly due to the destruction of these art objects.

Now this is a historical fact and I think we should move on. not becauseThere is one more point that I think should be made clear when you talked about Muslims who follow the honorable Elijah Muhammad not being true Muslims as such, but simply using that label to camouflage their continued Christianity. I didn't say camouflage, I said. which was a reaction against I don't think camouflage is not exactly what I mean yes in Sunday's New York Times in an article called Islam is advancing in West Africa says concerned Christian Christians are concerned about achievements uh uh Legos Nigeria Christian missionaries say they are concerned about the spread of Islam in West Africa and they should be because it is spreading.

They include the bishop of Lagos, a Nigerian, and a Roman Catholic clergyman who has been in West Africa for many years, the Catholic secretary said. Christianity here is superficial, it's just that some Africans we baptized now go to the mosque and observe Ramadan, the Muslim month of purification. Final quote: A British civil servant with 11 years of service in Nigeria suggested that Christianity was considered the white man's religion and was rejected as contrary. To African personalities, an American who works for a philanthropic foundation here said Islam is spreading like wildfire. It offers Africans a simple Creed with a few simple principles. a predominantly Muslim nation is true and let you know here that even the black man in Africa when he accepts Islam does not abandon all these other customs overnight, but still he accepts Islam and bears witness that there is no more God than Allah and Muhammad. the Apostle of Allah and is giving him unity and militancy that he did not have before.

All I want to say is that the article points out that these people go to both Christianity and mass, but it points out that when you convert to Islam, your reaction in Africa is no different than the black man's reaction here in America, They are both the same reaction. I wonder if you could ask a question here, Mr. Rustin. Uh, progress on your terms, does that imply? a greater sense of racial identity I think it's very important to have a great sense of racial identity because I think it's pretty impossible for people to strive creatively if they don't truly believe in themselves.

I think that now dignity comes first. This for me is doubly important precisely because believing in integration and not having been told where to go, I see nothing more logical than staying here and fighting for the rights also for moral principles that I uphold but put aside for the moment. Right now I see no way for black people to fight except through nonviolence and a dedication to strategic nonviolence as, in a sense, a matter of principle now, therefore, if you're going to be able to fight with nonviolence To a certain extent you have to have affection for the people who mistreat you.

No affection for another is possible without a great sense of dignity in oneself and therefore the Dignity of the Black for me is not something that is on the sidelines, it is essential. The people who fight in Montgomery were able to fight and integrate into their buses for a simple reason ten years earlier they would not have been able to do it because they did not believe in themselves when they believed in themselves so they could be socially affectionate with the opposition while at the same time being extremely militant and walking and being willing to sacrifice themselves.

I think this is the most important thing and therefore I would agree with Malcolm and importantly, we can certainly agree here, thank you, and you know I was very happy, Mr. Reston, to hear you say that dignity is the most important thing. The Honorable Elijah Muhammad absolutely emphasizes to us the importance of dignity, but you cannot have it. dignity and dignity means having great self-respect, true, you cannot have great respect, but that is what you have no knowledge of and when you ask a white man his nationality, for example, and he says German, immediately connects with a German nation.

German flag in the past, a German culture, if he says he's English, he's connected to England and he's connected to a culture now, if you ask a black man in America and he says black, right there you're putting in a term that he cares more. I despise it more than any word that exists in Webster's Dictionary today. The Honorable Elijah Muhammad teaches us that the black man in America is not despised because he is black, he is despised because he is called and black, a black man can come. here, from Africa, he is not a black man, he is African, he has a culture, he is a black man from Africa who can put on his long flowing robes and have his head wrapped and walk through Alabama or Mississippi and not suffer the same abuse. and barriers and traps that you and I would encounter here in America dressed as a white man speaking as a white man with the white man's religion and with the false conception of history that the white man has washed our face with. brain and at the same time. at the same time calling us by the white man's name now what Mr.

Muhammad is saying is this instead of spending all our time uh uh complaining about the white man for the way he has treated us or for depriving us of what we What we must do is To obtain some dignity that we cannot have without having a knowledge of ourselves, we must have some kind of cultural knowledge in our environment so that we can know what our parents did and what our four parents did so that we can hire God to our four fathers. and if you do not have an ivory God, a great God like your parents, you cannot consider yourself very high, you take a man who has been taught that his father used to pull a plow and his mother was a servant, as the master who can.

He can't uh uh look at his parents, but when you send him back past the time when his father was pulling a plow and back past the time when his mother was a servant to the white man, back to the time when he lived on the banks of the Nile in palaces at the same time that the white man lived in the caves of Europe and history will confirm it or at a time when he wore silk in the East and in Africa in Asia at a time when the white man whom he admires so much today did not know what his clothes were at a time when he cooked and seasoned his food, when at the same time the white man whom he idolizes and adores today did not know what he cooked.

The meal was then when you come back and discover what a great history the black man had, how his four fathers were the ones who designed the pyramids and how the head or face of the Sphinx in Africa, which is one of the oldest statues in this Tierra is not a European but a black man. He begins to look back and sees that his people were someone. He immediately starts to get rid of this inferior attitude and starts looking at himself and then stops abusing himself. stop getting drunk stop trying to uh Escape uh from the environment or the conditions you find yourself in by turning to drugs or alcohol start I completely agree and right now I'm working on the god Empire precisely because I think this is important is very important but now let me ask you another question because I want to clarify your position on the Jewish question where you come from where your group comes from in this question because I'm just telling you what I don't want to tell you what I've heard tell me anything you heard and I'll tell you.

I will clarify well. I'm given to understand that your position is, particularly in Harlem, that the Jews dominate, that's one of the reasons why the blacks were so depressed is that the Jews are exploiting it and that the Jews are exploiting the attempt to exploit to the Arab world and cause difficulties in the Middle East. I would like to know if this is a misunderstanding I have. I must say we only have a few more minutes yes sir uh yes sir read what the honorable Elijah Muhammad has written and he has written a lot. I don't think I can find an article where I have ever singled out the Jew as an exploiter of the black man. talks about the period of the exploiters, it doesn't break it down in terms of French, English, Jews or Germans, it talks about the exploiter and sometimes the man most guilty of exploitation will think that you are pointing the finger at him and publishing propaganda that you are against of this or that you are against the fact that we do not distinguish between exploitation and exploitation now, what do you mean when you say that the man who is the most exploitative will publish propaganda?

I say that normally when you find a man propagandizing against Muslims, usually that man feels that the finger is being pointed at him, but in other words, you think that many Jews feel that way. I do not know, but I say that I cannot find anything that the Honorable Elijah Muhammad has written or said that at any time we will label the Jew as an exploiter, no sir, but his label speaks of the exploitation, oppression and deception that is has been used against black people. of America now the man who is guilty lets whoever is guilty wear that shoe but he has never made a distinction between a Frenchman again I say or a Jew or a German or whatever the exploiter is the exploiter I don't care what kind of label you give him and he cannot avoid it.

Thank you very much Mr. Bayard Rustin and Mr. Malcolm X, thank you Mr. Donald, thank you.