WEBVTT - The Pride and The Power 0:00:03.960 --> 0:00:07.640 It's May nineteen sixty three. The eyes of the world 0:00:07.720 --> 0:00:12.440 are on Birmingham, Alabama. Hundreds of Birmingham's black residents, including 0:00:12.480 --> 0:00:15.640 scores of teenagers, pour into the streets in their church 0:00:15.720 --> 0:00:20.200 clothes on a warm Sunday afternoon. Birmingham's police chief, Eugene 0:00:20.280 --> 0:00:24.440 Bull Connor, watches the scene unfold. Connor is a burly 0:00:24.480 --> 0:00:27.640 white man in his mid sixties, slipped back, gray hair, 0:00:28.120 --> 0:00:31.000 horn rimmed glasses. He looks a lot like the warden 0:00:31.000 --> 0:00:35.560 from the Shawshank Redemption. In recent days, the frustrated Connor 0:00:35.640 --> 0:00:38.520 has turned to police dogs and fire hoses to put 0:00:38.560 --> 0:00:41.720 down the stream of protesters, and he has drawn national 0:00:41.720 --> 0:00:45.960 attention to himself and his city in the process. The 0:00:46.000 --> 0:00:49.000 marchers are given one more chance to turn around and disperse. 0:00:49.560 --> 0:00:53.440 They refuse. The angry Connor whirls and shouts to his men, 0:00:54.080 --> 0:00:58.000 damn it, turn on the hoses. Many protesters take to 0:00:58.040 --> 0:01:01.560 their knees, prepared to stand a ground peacefully against the 0:01:01.560 --> 0:01:04.920 coming onslaught. But what happened next is not what you 0:01:05.000 --> 0:01:07.120 think or what you may have seen in the black 0:01:07.160 --> 0:01:11.120 and white photos of protesters, dogs and fire hoses. What 0:01:11.240 --> 0:01:14.800 happened next surprised even the man behind the protests in Birmingham, 0:01:14.880 --> 0:01:18.600 Martin Luther King Jr. What happened next, or the dogs 0:01:18.600 --> 0:01:22.399 that didn't bark, the fire hoses that didn't spread. What 0:01:22.480 --> 0:01:25.760 happened next was what Dr King called the pride and 0:01:25.800 --> 0:01:38.520 the power of nonviolence. We are so jess in ay. 0:01:40.160 --> 0:01:47.160 We have to find, we have to ruy, we got 0:01:47.319 --> 0:01:55.360 to love the bo we got to all it up. 0:01:56.400 --> 0:02:01.560 We I'm Sean brass Well. Then this is The Thread. 0:02:02.080 --> 0:02:04.640 Each season we unravel the stories behind some of the 0:02:04.640 --> 0:02:08.600 most important lives and events in history to discover, essentially 0:02:08.960 --> 0:02:11.840 how one thing leads to another. To do so, we 0:02:11.880 --> 0:02:14.680 travel back through history, one story at a time to 0:02:14.800 --> 0:02:18.400 explore the origins of an important event, an iconic figure, 0:02:18.919 --> 0:02:22.960 or a big idea. This year marks the fiftieth anniversary 0:02:22.960 --> 0:02:25.600 of the death of the iconic civil rights leader Dr 0:02:25.680 --> 0:02:29.040 Martin Luther King Jr. And so in season three of 0:02:29.040 --> 0:02:32.720 The Thread, we explore the origins of a revolutionary idea, 0:02:33.080 --> 0:02:35.839 one very near and dear to the heart of Doctor King, 0:02:36.480 --> 0:02:41.080 the principle of nonviolent resistance, the counterintuitive notion that the 0:02:41.080 --> 0:02:43.919 best way to reform your enemies is to love them. 0:02:44.400 --> 0:02:48.400 The best way to counter their blows is to absorb them. 0:02:48.600 --> 0:02:52.400 King established the use of mass, nonviolent protest on American soil, 0:02:52.880 --> 0:02:55.360 but it did not begin with him. We'll take you 0:02:55.400 --> 0:02:58.160 on a journey through the minds of some remarkable individuals 0:02:58.360 --> 0:03:01.200 and across the globe this season on the Thread, we 0:03:01.320 --> 0:03:04.880 find out how a single powerful idea can spread and 0:03:05.000 --> 0:03:12.640 remake the world. When Martin Luther King Jr. Was fourteen 0:03:12.720 --> 0:03:16.400 years old, he had a formative experience aboard a segregated bus. 0:03:17.040 --> 0:03:18.880 King and his high school teacher were on their way 0:03:18.919 --> 0:03:22.240 back to Atlanta from an oratory contest in southern Georgia. 0:03:22.840 --> 0:03:24.639 They were asked to give up their seats when two 0:03:24.639 --> 0:03:28.760 white passengers boarded the bus. The teenage King stood and 0:03:28.840 --> 0:03:31.640 stewed for hours at the back of the bus. He 0:03:31.720 --> 0:03:34.560 later recalled quote, it was the angriest I have ever 0:03:34.600 --> 0:03:43.080 been in my life. Twelve years later, a forty two 0:03:43.160 --> 0:03:46.640 year old seamstress found herself in a similar situation, but 0:03:46.760 --> 0:03:49.800 his history has well told. Rosa Parks refused to give 0:03:49.840 --> 0:03:52.520 up her seat, and his fate would have it. The 0:03:52.560 --> 0:03:55.760 now twenty six year old doctor King had just accepted 0:03:55.760 --> 0:03:58.320 a job as a minister in the city where Parks 0:03:58.360 --> 0:04:03.000 took her famous ride Montgomery, Alabama. Mrs Rose of Parks 0:04:03.080 --> 0:04:06.440 was arrested and taken down to jail, taken from the 0:04:06.480 --> 0:04:09.680 bus just because she refused to give up a seat. 0:04:10.280 --> 0:04:13.280 That is the young King addressing reporters about the events 0:04:13.360 --> 0:04:16.599 unfolding in Montgomery. A boycott of the city's buses was 0:04:16.680 --> 0:04:20.359 proposed four days after Parks was arrested. This is David 0:04:20.360 --> 0:04:23.880 Garrow King, biographer and the Pulitzer Prize winning author of 0:04:23.960 --> 0:04:29.200 Bearing the Cross. That's when Dr King debuted as the 0:04:29.320 --> 0:04:35.040 lead spokesperson for this new citywide bus boycott effort. You 0:04:35.200 --> 0:04:39.279 have been moved that a second the resolution the red 0:04:39.400 --> 0:04:42.560 will be received a dollar. Are you read about a 0:04:42.680 --> 0:04:47.279 question all in fable that had been known by standing 0:04:47.320 --> 0:04:52.400 on your feet? King and his wife Kreta woke up 0:04:52.400 --> 0:04:55.040 early on the first day of the boycott. They watched 0:04:55.040 --> 0:04:57.120 the bus stott near their house from the front window 0:04:57.480 --> 0:05:01.279 and looked on in amazement as bus after by passed by. 0:05:01.520 --> 0:05:04.520 Most of the buses contained not a single black passenger. 0:05:06.120 --> 0:05:11.480 Grant was the day that we started a bust protest 0:05:13.240 --> 0:05:19.440 which literally electrified the nation. And that was a day 0:05:19.680 --> 0:05:22.800 when we decided that we were not going to take 0:05:23.800 --> 0:05:29.080 segregated buses any longer. King saw a powerful social movement 0:05:29.160 --> 0:05:33.599 come together before his eyes. Well several weeks now were 0:05:33.760 --> 0:05:38.599 the Nigro citizens of Montgomery have been involved in a 0:05:38.680 --> 0:05:44.680 non violent protest against the injustices which we have experienced 0:05:44.720 --> 0:05:51.000 on the buses a number of years. Soon the boycott 0:05:51.040 --> 0:05:54.560 went from weeks to months, and Montgomery's white community started 0:05:54.560 --> 0:05:58.919 to press back. This is historian John Demilio, So imagine 0:05:59.120 --> 0:06:05.159 a protest like this developing in Alabama in n segregation 0:06:05.560 --> 0:06:13.279 is the rule. Um, white supremacists have no reluctance to 0:06:13.520 --> 0:06:18.280 use violence to keep African Americans in line. Uh. They 0:06:18.400 --> 0:06:22.000 lynch people, they shoot people, They're willing to burn houses. 0:06:22.279 --> 0:06:25.400 They will do anything that they have to do. King 0:06:25.520 --> 0:06:29.720 quickly became a primary target for that violence. David Garrow again. 0:06:30.000 --> 0:06:34.760 Doctor King gradually becomes a more and more visible figure 0:06:35.800 --> 0:06:42.960 in local Montgomery news coverage. Not long thereafter, Uh, there's 0:06:42.960 --> 0:06:48.599 a small bomb that's detonated on the porch of his 0:06:48.680 --> 0:06:54.240 home when he's out at a rally. It breaks some windows. Uh, 0:06:54.440 --> 0:06:57.760 No one fortunately is injured. An angry crowd had gathered 0:06:57.800 --> 0:07:01.120 outside Dr King's home by the time here back. They 0:07:01.200 --> 0:07:05.360 refused to obey police instructions to disperse, King stepped onto 0:07:05.360 --> 0:07:09.159 the front porch. He asked them not to retaliate. Then, 0:07:09.400 --> 0:07:11.800 referring to the people who had nearly killed his wife 0:07:11.800 --> 0:07:15.040 and child an hour before, King told the crowd quote, 0:07:15.560 --> 0:07:18.440 I want you to love our enemies. Be good to them, 0:07:19.040 --> 0:07:21.920 love them, and let them know you love them. And 0:07:22.000 --> 0:07:26.040 you can see in his remarks that evening how his 0:07:26.320 --> 0:07:31.400 fundamental Christian belief in a in an ethnic and doctrine 0:07:31.520 --> 0:07:36.280 of love, even love for one's enemies, uh is at 0:07:36.320 --> 0:07:41.320 the very core of his being. Finally, Montgomery City leaders 0:07:41.320 --> 0:07:44.720 agreed to the protesters demands after a community of more 0:07:44.760 --> 0:07:47.960 than fifty thousand people had protested for three hundred and 0:07:48.000 --> 0:07:52.200 eighty two days. Montgomery's buses would never be segregated again, 0:07:52.800 --> 0:07:55.760 and King and his allies had launched a powerful new 0:07:55.800 --> 0:08:05.360 form of protests in America. Nonviolent resistance give passive resistance 0:08:05.840 --> 0:08:12.400 means just passively accepting violence and justice. If it means 0:08:12.400 --> 0:08:16.640 cowardice and stagnant passivity, then that is a difference. Because 0:08:17.240 --> 0:08:22.440 non violent resistance that there is resist it is dynamically active. 0:08:23.280 --> 0:08:27.720 Governments think it's a dangerous idea. It's a cherished notion 0:08:27.840 --> 0:08:31.000 of government that they have an exclusive right to violence. 0:08:31.400 --> 0:08:34.800 This is Mark Kurlansky, author of non Violence, The History 0:08:34.840 --> 0:08:39.560 of a Dangerous idea. If your opponents are violent, uh, 0:08:39.679 --> 0:08:43.640 and you're violent, you're playing to their strong suit. Whereas 0:08:43.679 --> 0:08:46.800 if you're non violent, you're they don't really know what 0:08:46.880 --> 0:08:51.240 to do. Uh. And that's what happened with the civil 0:08:51.320 --> 0:08:56.080 rights movement. King's non violent approach transformed that movement. Before 0:08:56.080 --> 0:08:58.760 the Montgomery bus boycott, the U s Civil rights movement 0:08:58.800 --> 0:09:01.400 was based in the North, with organizations like the Inn 0:09:01.440 --> 0:09:04.920 Double A c P, which won the landmark school desegregation 0:09:04.960 --> 0:09:09.199 decision Brown Versus Board of Education a year after the boycott. 0:09:09.440 --> 0:09:12.760 King and several other Southern black ministers and activists formed 0:09:12.800 --> 0:09:17.320 the Southern Christian Leadership Conference or SCLC in nineteen fifty seven, 0:09:17.840 --> 0:09:19.880 and that's when the center of the civil rights movement 0:09:19.920 --> 0:09:22.280 began to shift to the South, and so the black 0:09:22.320 --> 0:09:25.360 religious leaders like King, who waged a new war of 0:09:25.440 --> 0:09:30.680 non violence. David Garrow. The lesson of Montgomery was that 0:09:31.000 --> 0:09:38.360 local black communities, just ordinary residents citizens could take meaningful 0:09:38.520 --> 0:09:45.480 action on their own against racial segregation without waiting for 0:09:45.880 --> 0:09:51.480 leadership from new York City. Dr King was a unique 0:09:51.520 --> 0:09:59.040 personality because he was a conflict resolver. He acted as 0:09:59.080 --> 0:10:03.520 a lubricant and a persuader to get people to compromise 0:10:03.600 --> 0:10:07.400 and do things in keeping with his tradition of the 0:10:07.440 --> 0:10:11.560 non violent techniques. This is Timothy Jenkins, a civil rights 0:10:11.600 --> 0:10:14.160 leader who helped organize students, sit ins and other non 0:10:14.320 --> 0:10:17.839 violent protests during the nineteen sixties, and he was an 0:10:17.880 --> 0:10:22.640 advocate of techniques of persuasion that did not revolve around 0:10:22.760 --> 0:10:27.760 force or arms or threats, and that led to I 0:10:27.800 --> 0:10:32.280 think a unique character to this movement as opposed to 0:10:32.360 --> 0:10:35.760 normal political movements, because it was not a test of 0:10:35.880 --> 0:10:39.439 power and the test of authority. It was a test 0:10:39.520 --> 0:10:42.079 of moral suasion. But it was a test that did 0:10:42.120 --> 0:10:46.800 not always work. John Demilio again. Dr King had been 0:10:47.480 --> 0:10:52.440 in supporting protests in Albany, Georgia in nineteen sixty two 0:10:52.480 --> 0:10:55.240 for much of the year and it was a very 0:10:55.320 --> 0:11:01.760 frustrating experience, um in part because the sheriff in Albany, 0:11:01.840 --> 0:11:08.600 Georgia had the foresight not to respond to these protests 0:11:08.640 --> 0:11:13.600 with violence, and so the protests didn't capture headlines. The 0:11:13.640 --> 0:11:16.640 Southern non violence campaign stalled by the end of nineteen 0:11:16.679 --> 0:11:20.720 sixty two. In many ways, non violent protests depends upon 0:11:20.880 --> 0:11:24.360 violence from those in authority to succeed, and King knew 0:11:24.400 --> 0:11:27.880 that the movement needed a confrontation to regain the nation's attention. 0:11:28.520 --> 0:11:33.840 Mark Kurlansky. He realized that, you know, resisting non violently 0:11:34.480 --> 0:11:39.560 would only work if people saw you doing it, which 0:11:39.559 --> 0:11:43.360 is how King and the SCLC came to be in Birmingham, Alabama, 0:11:43.720 --> 0:11:47.280 the most segregated city in America in early nineteen sixty three. 0:11:47.920 --> 0:11:53.560 Birmingham has one of the most brutal white sheriffs in 0:11:53.640 --> 0:11:57.040 the South, John Demilio. Again he went by the name 0:11:57.080 --> 0:12:00.360 of Bull Connor, which tells you something about out how 0:12:00.400 --> 0:12:04.680 people perceived him. He was as determined and fierce as 0:12:04.679 --> 0:12:07.920 a bull. Here the animated Connor in a white shirt 0:12:07.920 --> 0:12:12.079 and black tie defends his actions in Birmingham. You can 0:12:12.160 --> 0:12:15.480 never with the boy if you don't keep you and 0:12:15.600 --> 0:12:19.520 him separated. I found out out bleming him. You've got 0:12:19.600 --> 0:12:25.080 to keep your white and a black separn King and 0:12:25.120 --> 0:12:27.520 local black leaders were banking on the fact that Connor 0:12:27.520 --> 0:12:30.800 would take any means necessary to ensure that Birmingham's races 0:12:30.840 --> 0:12:35.160 remained separate. The demonstrations began during Easter Week nineteen sixty. 0:12:35.960 --> 0:12:38.440 About fifty supporters turned out for the first march on 0:12:38.520 --> 0:12:41.640 Good Friday. After four and a half blocks, the marchers, 0:12:42.000 --> 0:12:45.800 including King, were met by Connor's officers, placed under arrest, 0:12:45.960 --> 0:12:48.880 and taken to the city jail. For the next few weeks, 0:12:48.960 --> 0:12:52.720 the demonstrations did not have their intended effect David Garrow. 0:12:53.200 --> 0:13:00.000 Initially in Birmingham, King and SCLC had a good degree 0:13:00.080 --> 0:13:06.680 of trouble in recruiting Black community members to participate in protests. 0:13:07.120 --> 0:13:10.880 Connor and the Birmingham police remained restrained, avoiding the media 0:13:10.880 --> 0:13:14.679 attention that King counted on. So a new tactic was adopted. 0:13:15.200 --> 0:13:18.959 Leaflets are circulated in Birmingham's black high schools urging students 0:13:18.960 --> 0:13:23.120 to join the next demonstration in Birmingham. They decide to 0:13:23.240 --> 0:13:28.320 mobilize young people, not young adults, not college students, but 0:13:28.600 --> 0:13:32.640 high school students and younger and that gets a lot 0:13:32.679 --> 0:13:36.720 of publicity and at a certain point Bull Connor and 0:13:36.800 --> 0:13:40.080 the police just lose it and they start beating people 0:13:40.600 --> 0:13:44.400 and arresting them on mass Police arrested more than five 0:13:44.840 --> 0:13:47.920 students in the first two days. The jails were full 0:13:48.040 --> 0:13:51.480 and Connor's patients was running thin. He unleashed the police 0:13:51.520 --> 0:13:54.640 dogs and ordered the fire hoses be turned on demonstrators. 0:13:55.320 --> 0:13:57.679 Water from the high powered hoses tore the clothes off 0:13:57.720 --> 0:14:01.920 some protesters backs for agraphers and television cameras captured the 0:14:01.920 --> 0:14:06.800 brutal attack. Images of police officers beating protesters, the teenagers 0:14:06.800 --> 0:14:10.360 getting slammed against walls by water, and if dogs snarling 0:14:10.400 --> 0:14:14.400 at young girls made headlines across the country. Many whites 0:14:14.720 --> 0:14:16.800 in the rest of the country, we're going about their 0:14:16.840 --> 0:14:19.800 lives not even noticing that this was going on in 0:14:19.840 --> 0:14:24.680 the South. Well, you couldn't not notice this, And so 0:14:25.240 --> 0:14:31.000 Birmingham really brings the civil rights struggle up to a 0:14:31.120 --> 0:14:39.680 new level of visibility. But perhaps the most remarkable part 0:14:39.720 --> 0:14:43.120 of the Birmingham story happened on that Sunday afternoon in 0:14:43.160 --> 0:14:50.000 early May where we started this episode. The protesters, many 0:14:50.040 --> 0:14:53.160 on their knees, braced themselves yet again for the Birmingham 0:14:53.200 --> 0:14:56.480 police to unleash the dogs and the fire hoses. Bull 0:14:56.560 --> 0:14:58.680 Connor himself gives the order for them to do so. 0:14:59.520 --> 0:15:04.640 Then for the next thirty seconds, something astonishing occurs. Connor's 0:15:04.640 --> 0:15:09.640 men do nothing. Slowly, the protesters stand up and continue 0:15:09.680 --> 0:15:13.560 forward with their march. Doctor King later described the scene. 0:15:14.600 --> 0:15:18.720 Connor's men as though hypnotized, fell back, their hoses sagging 0:15:18.800 --> 0:15:22.080 uselessly in their hands, while several hundred Negroes marched past 0:15:22.120 --> 0:15:26.080 them without further interference. It would prove to be a 0:15:26.120 --> 0:15:29.520 defining moment for the civil rights movement, and for King, 0:15:30.000 --> 0:15:32.920 it was an eye opening event. As he later wrote, 0:15:33.560 --> 0:15:37.120 I felt there for the first time the pride and 0:15:37.200 --> 0:15:51.920 the power of nonviolence. The nonviolent movement had taken the 0:15:51.920 --> 0:15:54.080 struggle to the heart of the Jim Crow South and 0:15:54.160 --> 0:15:57.880 to the forefront of the national consciousness. King was thrilled. 0:15:59.040 --> 0:16:03.680 The activity is which have taken place in Birmingham over 0:16:03.720 --> 0:16:11.000 the last few days, into my mind, marked a non 0:16:11.160 --> 0:16:16.160 violent movement coming of age. David Garrow again, the images 0:16:16.280 --> 0:16:21.160 and impact of Birmingham convinced both of the Kennedy brothers 0:16:21.160 --> 0:16:25.160 that they needed to finally move forward with a meaningful 0:16:25.280 --> 0:16:35.760 civil rights bill. That's the real tangible impact of Birmingham. 0:16:35.880 --> 0:16:38.760 Congress passes the most sweeping civil rights bill ever to 0:16:38.800 --> 0:16:41.960 be written into the law, and thus reaffirms the conception 0:16:42.000 --> 0:16:44.880 of equality for all men that began with Lincoln and 0:16:44.920 --> 0:16:47.720 the Civil War one hundred years ago. The summer of 0:16:47.800 --> 0:16:51.200 nineteen sixty three was a revolution, King later said, because 0:16:51.240 --> 0:16:54.000 it changed the face of America. By the time it 0:16:54.080 --> 0:16:57.640 was over, hundreds of lunch counters, hotels, parks, and other 0:16:57.680 --> 0:17:04.560 public places had been integrated. King and his nonviolent movement 0:17:04.600 --> 0:17:07.680 continued to win victories and historic legislation over the next 0:17:07.720 --> 0:17:11.280 few years, but not without cost. King led a march 0:17:11.359 --> 0:17:14.159 for voting rights in Alabama in nineteen sixty five that 0:17:14.280 --> 0:17:17.880 resulted in what was called Bloody Sunday. Armed police attacked 0:17:17.960 --> 0:17:20.480 King and other peaceful demonstrators as they walked across the 0:17:20.600 --> 0:17:24.600 Edmund Pettis Bridge in Selma, just like in Birmingham. Television 0:17:24.640 --> 0:17:27.760 carried the beatings to audiences across the country and the world. 0:17:28.400 --> 0:17:32.120 Mark Kurlanski again, you know it worked in a way 0:17:32.160 --> 0:17:35.359 that I don't think his opponents understood how well it worked, 0:17:35.440 --> 0:17:38.000 or they wouldn't have done things like the Pettis Bridge. 0:17:38.960 --> 0:17:41.960 You know, the power of people seeing that all over 0:17:42.000 --> 0:17:45.560 the world. King's non violent campaign was working, but he 0:17:45.680 --> 0:17:48.720 sensed that violence still bubbled just beneath the surface during 0:17:48.720 --> 0:17:51.720 the turbulent times. Here's King on Meet the Press in 0:17:51.800 --> 0:17:56.560 nineteen sixty five. Realism impel impelled me to admit, however, 0:17:56.680 --> 0:17:59.560 that when there is justice and the pursuit of justice, 0:18:00.080 --> 0:18:05.639 violence disappears. And where there is injustice and frustration, the 0:18:05.680 --> 0:18:11.000 potentialities for violence are great on those frustrations, and the 0:18:11.040 --> 0:18:14.320 potential for violence would grow with the nineteen sixties war 0:18:14.440 --> 0:18:18.280 on Up. Next, we dip into the shadows of history 0:18:18.440 --> 0:18:22.000 to meet the remarkable man who inspired Dr. King's non 0:18:22.119 --> 0:18:53.200 violent approach in the first place. Men, for years now 0:18:53.359 --> 0:18:58.360 have been talking about one piece. But now no longer 0:18:58.480 --> 0:19:02.440 can we just talk about it is no longer The 0:19:02.600 --> 0:19:07.399 choice between violence and non violence in this world is 0:19:07.520 --> 0:19:11.040 non violence on non existence. That is where we are 0:19:11.080 --> 0:19:24.440 to date. Good evening. Dr Martin Luther King, the apostle 0:19:24.520 --> 0:19:27.360 of non violence in the civil rights movement, has been 0:19:27.359 --> 0:19:30.960 shot to death in Memphis, Tennessee. Doctor King was standing 0:19:31.000 --> 0:19:34.200 on the balcony of his second floor hotel room tonight when, 0:19:34.320 --> 0:19:37.800 according to a companion, a shot was fired from across 0:19:37.840 --> 0:19:41.119 the street, and the friend's words, the bullet exploded in 0:19:41.240 --> 0:19:54.439 his face. Martin Luther King's legacy is inextricably tied to 0:19:54.480 --> 0:19:57.640 the non violent approach he championed, but the civil rights 0:19:57.720 --> 0:20:01.159 leader was not always opposed to violence. As a seminary student, 0:20:01.480 --> 0:20:05.520 he expressed skepticism about the virtues of pacifism and non violence. 0:20:06.119 --> 0:20:08.920 Even in the opening days of the Montgomery boycott, King 0:20:08.960 --> 0:20:12.639 had not yet found his non violent voice. Mark Kurlansky, 0:20:13.119 --> 0:20:16.720 it's kind of funny the way he's portrayed today, especially 0:20:16.720 --> 0:20:20.760 in schools, you know, as as just this kind of 0:20:20.880 --> 0:20:24.320 dreamy guy who's about peace and love. He was a 0:20:24.520 --> 0:20:31.440 very determined political activist who eventually embraced non violence because 0:20:31.480 --> 0:20:34.560 he became convinced that that would work. And one man 0:20:34.600 --> 0:20:37.359 above all others convinced King that it would work. But 0:20:37.480 --> 0:20:40.520 King would have to make some changes. First. Let's go 0:20:40.560 --> 0:20:45.080 back to Montgomery. It's February ninety. King's house has just 0:20:45.160 --> 0:20:50.520 been bombed David Garret. As the Montgomery bus boycott begins 0:20:50.600 --> 0:20:57.560 to achieve national news coverage, um civil rights supporters around 0:20:57.600 --> 0:21:02.240 the country begin asking them selves what they can do 0:21:02.480 --> 0:21:08.000 to assist the Montgomery protesters. One of those prominent northern 0:21:08.000 --> 0:21:10.480 activists was a forty three year old black Quaker from 0:21:10.480 --> 0:21:15.560 Pennsylvania named Bayard Rustin. A longtime advocate of nonviolent protest, 0:21:16.480 --> 0:21:18.840 Ruston was concerned by what he saw when he arrived 0:21:18.840 --> 0:21:22.160 in Montgomery. So at the beginning there in Montgomery, even 0:21:22.200 --> 0:21:26.080 though doctor King believed in a Christian doctrine of love, 0:21:27.280 --> 0:21:30.840 his interest in nonviolence was not such that he was 0:21:31.040 --> 0:21:37.520 prohibiting black community members from standing armed guard. After King's 0:21:37.560 --> 0:21:40.960 house was bombed, armed men kept guard out front each night. 0:21:41.680 --> 0:21:44.640 Byar Rustin came to King's home shortly after the bombing, 0:21:44.880 --> 0:21:50.560 but byed himself. Is is taken somewhat aback um when 0:21:50.600 --> 0:21:53.960 he sits down in a chair at doctor King's home 0:21:54.040 --> 0:21:57.840 and realizes there's a gun in it. King explained that 0:21:57.880 --> 0:22:00.680 they did not intend to use the firearms harm anyone 0:22:00.760 --> 0:22:04.480 unless they were violently attacked. This is Rustin biographer John 0:22:04.520 --> 0:22:09.000 Damelio again, and Rustin explains to him that if you 0:22:09.160 --> 0:22:15.640 want to be modeling non violence, you can't possess guns. 0:22:15.880 --> 0:22:21.439 You actually have to live out completely the philosophy of 0:22:21.520 --> 0:22:24.680 non violence. That was just the first lesson Rustin would 0:22:24.680 --> 0:22:27.800 provide to the young King. The weapons and armed guards 0:22:27.800 --> 0:22:33.920 were removed, and so Rustin becomes his tutor and instructor. 0:22:34.680 --> 0:22:38.600 And really within the space of a few weeks, it 0:22:38.760 --> 0:22:42.760 is not an exaggeration to say that in terms of 0:22:43.160 --> 0:22:48.760 the strategy, tactics, and philosophy of non violence. Buyard Rustin 0:22:48.920 --> 0:22:55.400 becomes Dr King's most trusted and closest advisor. The tall, 0:22:55.440 --> 0:22:59.399 cosmopolitan Quaker and the short, eloquent Baptist preacher made for 0:22:59.480 --> 0:23:01.280 quite a pair. It was to be one of the 0:23:01.280 --> 0:23:06.119 most productive relationships in American history. Rustin immediately recognized King's 0:23:06.200 --> 0:23:09.000 raw talent and potential as a leader, but knew he 0:23:09.080 --> 0:23:12.840 still had a long way to go. Doctor King justifiably 0:23:12.920 --> 0:23:18.640 has become such a heroic figure and so closely associated 0:23:18.800 --> 0:23:22.919 with non violence and a mass movement that most people 0:23:22.960 --> 0:23:27.480 don't realize that. At the time that Rustin meets him 0:23:27.680 --> 0:23:31.879 in the early stages of the boycott, Doctor King knows 0:23:32.000 --> 0:23:35.360 about non violence, but he has no training in it. 0:23:35.800 --> 0:23:40.560 He has no direct experience in the tactics and strategy 0:23:41.080 --> 0:23:45.080 of a non violent movement, and so, starting in Montgomery, 0:23:45.320 --> 0:23:49.320 Rustin and King had lengthy conversations about non violent principles, 0:23:49.480 --> 0:23:54.359 organizing tactics, and strategic thinking. Rustin even started ghostwriting some 0:23:54.440 --> 0:23:57.639 of King's speeches. King could not have had a better tutor. 0:23:58.160 --> 0:24:01.000 Many in the activist community considered Rusting, to be quote 0:24:01.359 --> 0:24:05.280 the American Gandhi. It was not hyperbole. Every fiber in 0:24:05.400 --> 0:24:08.440 Ruston's being was dedicated to the principles of non violence. 0:24:09.240 --> 0:24:13.960 Here's Buyer Drusted. I said to beget when you were 0:24:14.040 --> 0:24:18.159 not like what I am saying. Those people who think 0:24:18.920 --> 0:24:24.640 that we can use guns and knives against tanks and buzukas, 0:24:25.400 --> 0:24:32.760 they are an ignorant bunks. In the next episode, we 0:24:32.840 --> 0:24:36.879 learn more about King's mentor, Buyer Drusted, the remarkable individual 0:24:36.960 --> 0:24:40.560 responsible for the March on Washington that launched King's dream, 0:24:40.600 --> 0:24:43.040 a gay man banished behind the scenes of the civil 0:24:43.160 --> 0:24:45.879 rights drama, but who still managed to change the course 0:24:45.920 --> 0:24:53.199 of American history from its shadows. We are so in. 0:24:56.280 --> 0:25:05.920 We have to fi. We got to all the good. 0:25:09.280 --> 0:25:22.840 We've got to all it up. Well, we've got to cry. 0:25:25.359 --> 0:25:30.520 We have to cry. We've got to all the threat 0:25:30.560 --> 0:25:34.240 is produced by Libby Coleman, Robert Coulos, Sophia Perpetua, and 0:25:34.400 --> 0:25:38.840 me Sean Braswell. Chris Hoff engineered our show. This episode 0:25:38.880 --> 0:25:42.040 features the Montgomery Gospel Choir with a song called we 0:25:42.160 --> 0:25:45.280 Are Soldiers in the Army. To learn more about the Thread, 0:25:45.440 --> 0:25:48.600 visit AUSI dot com. Slash the thread all one word, 0:25:49.080 --> 0:25:51.919 and make sure to subscribe to the thread on Apple Podcasts, 0:25:52.160 --> 0:25:54.879 follow us on I Heart Radio, or listen wherever you 0:25:55.000 --> 0:25:58.000 get your podcasts. Check us out at ausi dot com 0:25:58.119 --> 0:26:01.480 or on Twitter and Facebook. If you love surprising, engaging 0:26:01.560 --> 0:26:05.040 stories from history, look no further than the flashback section 0:26:05.080 --> 0:26:10.200 of azzi dot com. That's ozy y dot com. We've 0:26:10.240 --> 0:26:18.719 got to all the blast Day got that up until