This month in “Dare to Believe” we are featuring two individuals who didn’t set out to be political activists, Pauli Murray and Malcolm Little.

Both made indelible contributions to the American Civil Rights Movement that many people haven’t read about in history books.

Murray, who was deeply connected to her Christian faith, believed in the importance of racial integration. Little chose to change his name, embrace the Nation of Islam, and advocate for Black nationalism. Malcolm X is a controversial choice, but he is credited with empowering Blacks to be proud of who they are and helping them reconnect with their African heritage.

Anna Pauline Murray (November 20, 1910 – July 1, 1985) was an American civil rights activist, legal scholar and theorist, and advocate. Later in life she became the first African American woman to be ordained as an Episcopal priest. Through her advocacy, she influenced the direction of the civil rights movement and expanded legal protection for gender equality.

Born into an unstable home situation in Baltimore, Maryland, Murray was sent to live with her maternal aunt in North Carolina. At 16, she left home to attend Hunter College in New York and graduated with a B.A. in English in 1933. In 1940, she was arrested for sitting in a whites-only section of a Virginia bus with a friend. The incident inspired her to enroll in law school at Howard University to become a civil rights lawyer. Murray was the only woman in her class. Despte exceptional grades, she was denied the opportunity to do post-graduate work at Harvard University because of her gender.

She coined the term “Jane Crow” laws to call attention to rules/laws that specifically discriminated against women. After earning her master’s degree in law at the University of California, Berkley, she became the first African American to receive a Doctor of Juridical Science degree from Yale Law School.

Murray argued for civil rights and women’s rights. In the 1950s, NAACP chief council and future Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall hailed Murray’s book, States’ Laws on Race and Color, the “bible” of the civil rights movement. President Kennedy appointed Murray to serve on the 1961-1963 Presidential Commission on the Status of Women.

Murray criticized leaders of the civil rights movement for sexism after no women were invited to make speeches or be part of the delegation of leaders who went to the White House during the 1963 March on Washington.

In 1966, she became the co-founder for NOW, the National Organization for Women. Ruth Bader Ginsberg named Murray as co-author of the ACLU brief in the 1971 Supreme Court case Reed v. Reed to honor Murray’s groundbreaking work on gender discrimination. The court’s decision held that administrators of estates cannot be named in a way that discriminates between sexes because the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment prohibits differential treatment based on sex.

In addition to her legal work, Murray held positions at the Ghana School of Law, Brandeis University, and Benedict College.

In 1973, she left academia to become more involved in activities at her church. In 1977, she became an ordained priest in the Episcopal Church. In addition to her books about the legal system, Murray wrote two autobiographies and published an anthology of poems.

While Murray was championing the rights of women, she waged a secret battle with her own gender identity. Before transsexuality was identified, there were no words to express what she was feeling. There were no preferred pronouns.

Her teen marriage ended in annulment after a few weeks. According to Murray, she realized she did not want a sexual relationship with a man. She briefly considered the possibility she might be asexual, but went on to have loving physical relationships with two women during the course of her life.

Works  by Pauli Murray:

Law:

States’ Laws on Race and Color (1952) Pauli Murray - editor

The Constitution and Government of Ghana (1964) by Pauli Murray and Leslie Rubin

Poetry:

Dark Testament and Other Poems (1970)

Autobiographies:

Proud Shoes: The Story of an American Family (1956)

Song in a Weary Throat: An American Pilgrimage (1987) – reissued in 1989 as Pauli Murray: The Autobiography of a Black Activist, Feminist, Lawyer, Priest, and Poet

Sources for this article:

https://www.paulimurraycenter.com/who-is-pauli

Pauli Murray - Wikipedia

Image of Pauli Murray:

By Carolina Digital Library and Archives - Carolina Digital Library and Archives. "Murray, Pauli, 1910-1985." 5 July 2007. Online image. UNC University Library. Accessed 8 April 2011. http://dc.lib.unc.edu/cdm4/item_viewer.php?CISOROOT=/vir_museum&CISOPTR=431., CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=42140761

Malcolm Little (May 19, 1925-Febrauary 21, 1965) was known as Malcolm X. He was an American Muslim minister and human rights activist.

He was the fourth of seven children in his family. His father, Earl, was a lay Baptist speaker and a local leader of the Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA).

His parents were admirers of the Pan-activist Marcus Garvey. They raised all their children to self-reliant and proud of being Black.

The local branch of the KKK targeted Earl and his brothers because of their activism. Malcolm would later claim that four of Earl’s brothers were killed by White violence. After Earl died in a streetcar accident, his wife Louise suspected the Black Legion, a White Supremacist organization was responsible. The rumors haunted Malcolm for many years.

For a short time, Malcolm’s mother and one of his brothers became Seventh Day Adventists. After a failed relationship and an unplanned pregnancy. Louise suffered a nervous breakdown. Malcolm and his siblings ended up in foster care.

Malcolm excelled in junior high school and envisioned a career in law, but he quit high school after a White teacher told him there was no way boys (Blacks) like him could ever become lawyers. Malcolm decided the White world did not want and would not allow career-oriented Blacks to succeed.

Malcolm moved around the country doing odd jobs and committing petty theft. As his criminal activities increased, he and his associates began burglarizing the homes of wealthy Whites. In 1946, he was arrested and sentenced to eight to ten years in at Charlestown State Prison in Massachusetts, but was later transferred to Norfolk Prison Colony.

In prison, Malcolm became a voracious reader and  renewed his love of learning. After several of his siblings wrote to him about the Nation of Islam which preached Black self-reliance and the return of Blacks in America to their native Africa, Malcolm remained skeptical. As he learned more about NOI teachings, his attitude changed. He struggled with the idea that all Whites are devils, but his experiences with Whites had seldom been positive. The Christian religion had done little to advance racial equality, and this made him feel helpless. The idea that Blacks could and should be in control of their own lives and destinies was appealing, so he decided to embrace this new religion.

Malcolm began to correspond with Elijah Muhammed , the leader of the NOI. Muhammed counseled him to bow before God, renounce his past, and vow to never engage in destructive behavior again. Malcolm dropped his surname which he believed had been given to his ancestors by their enslavers and took “X” as his new surname.

The FBI opened a file on Malcolm X after he wrote President Truman a letter opposing the Korean War and identifying himself as a communist. Malcolm X was a powerful speaker and his strong commitment to the NOI’s teachings made him their perfect recruiter. He embraced antisemitism. His message of Black empowerment gave hope to many Blacks who were tired of waiting for the changes politicians promised in exchange for their votes, but seldom delivered.

Malcolm X met Betty Sanders at one of his lectures in 1955. In 1956, she joined the NOI and changed her name to Betty X. They married in 1958 and had six daughters.

In direct opposition to the teachings of Dr. Martin Luther, Jr. and the SCLC, the NOI forbade their members  from voting in elections and participating in the political process. Malcolm felt King’s ways were ineffective and weak. He wanted change now and felt the only way for Blacks to control their own destiny was to seize it by any means necessary and return to Africa. Until their return to Africa, they should establish separate Blacks-only colonies in America.

Malcolm X grew frustrated by the hypocrisy he began to see within the NOI. Violence was only causing more violence. Vilifying other religious groups was only creating resentment toward the NOI. After violent confrontations with police officers in Los Angeles, several Muslims were beaten and arrested. The NOI chose not to get involved. When Malcolm suggested the NOI should consider working with civil rights organizations, local Black politicians, and other religious groups, Elijah Muhammed blocked him. Malcolm was angry. He publicly exposed the wrong doings of several leaders, renounced the NOI, and embraced the Sunni Muslim faith. This earned him some powerful enemies within the NOI.

After leaving the NOI, Malcom X reversed his position on Blacks voting and participating in government. Though he may have begun to show signs of willingness to work with other civil rights organizations, his previous hateful rhetoric had caused irreparable harm.

In 1965 while waiting to address the OAAU in Manhattan, a man charged the stage with a sawed off shot gun shouting racial slurs and shooting Malcolm X in the chest. Two other men with semi-automatic handguns began shooting. Malcolm X was pronounced dead at Columbia Presbyterian Hospital shortly after his arrival. In all, he received 21 gunshot wounds to the chest, shoulder, arms, and legs including ten buckshot wounds from the shotgun blast.

Three members of the NOI were arrested and convicted. One of the men confessed to the murder, but he insisted the other two men who were arrested were innocent. He refused to name the men in the NOI who helped plan the assassination and his accomplices. The other men maintained their innocence during their imprisonment. In 2021, both men were exonerated after it was determined that the FBI and New York City Police Department withheld key evidence during the trial (one of the men died in 2009). Despite the new evidence, the case was not reopened and the other men responsible, if they are still alive, remain at large.

Selected Published Works About Malcolm X:

The Autobiography of Malcolm X (1965 – written with Alex Haley)

Malcolm X Speaks: Selected Speeches and Statements (1965) George Breitman, ed.

Malcolm X Talks to Young People (1965) Young Socialist Alliance

Two Speeches by Malcolm X (1965) Pathfinder Press

Malcolm X on Afro-American History (1967) Merit Publishers

The Speeches of Malcolm X at Harvard (1968) Morrow

By Any Means Necessary: Speeches, Interviews, and a Letter by Malcolm X (1970) George Breitman, ed.

The End of the White World Supremacy: Four Speeches by Malcolm X (1971) Benjamin Karim, ed.

The Last Speeches (1989) Bruce Perry, ed.

Malcolm X Talks to Young People: Speeches in the United States, Britain, and Africa (1991) Steve Clark, ed.

February 1965: The Final Speeches (1992) Steve Clark, ed.

The Diary of Malcolm X: 1964 (2013) Heb Boyd and Ilyasah Shabazz, ed.

Sources for this article:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malcolm_X

Image of Malcolm X in the Public Domain