Welcome to DU! The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards. Join the community: Create a free account Support DU (and get rid of ads!): Become a Star Member Latest Breaking News General Discussion The DU Lounge All Forums Issue Forums Culture Forums Alliance Forums Region Forums Support Forums Help & Search

sheshe2

(83,708 posts)
Tue Jan 17, 2017, 07:18 PM Jan 2017

Read the letter the FBI sent MLK to try to convince him to kill himself

When the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his "I Have a Dream" speech before huge crowds on the National Mall in August 1963, the FBI took notice.

"We must mark him now, if we have not done so before, as the most dangerous Negro of the future in this Nation from the standpoint of communism, the Negro and national security," FBI Domestic Intelligence Chief William Sullivan wrote in a memo two days later.

A massive surveillance operation on King was quickly approved, and FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover became increasingly fixated on proving that King had communist ties and discrediting him generally.

The surveillance failed to show that King was a communist, but it did result in many tapes of extramarital sexual liaisons by King. So the next year, Sullivan sent the following unsigned letter to King's home. An unredacted version of it was only recently unearthed by Yale historian Beverly Gage, and published in the New York Times in November 2014:




More: http://www.vox.com/xpress/2014/11/12/7204453/martin-luther-king-fbi-letter

___________________________________________

Dear God. I never read this before.

4 replies = new reply since forum marked as read
Highlight: NoneDon't highlight anything 5 newestHighlight 5 most recent replies
Read the letter the FBI sent MLK to try to convince him to kill himself (Original Post) sheshe2 Jan 2017 OP
It's bonkers, isn't it? Starry Messenger Jan 2017 #1
No Shit! sheshe2 Jan 2017 #2
I just watched the show All the Way about LBJ last night starring Brian Cranston meadowlark5 Jan 2017 #3
I will check it out, thanks. sheshe2 Jan 2017 #4

meadowlark5

(2,795 posts)
3. I just watched the show All the Way about LBJ last night starring Brian Cranston
Tue Jan 17, 2017, 07:23 PM
Jan 2017

That letter writing scene was in the show. Pretty amazing.

Show was good, btw.

Latest Discussions»Alliance Forums»African American»Read the letter the FBI s...