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By Root 1839 0

local leaders were expected to take off from work and make automobiles, drivers, and security personnel available. If his itinerary involved a locale with no NOI presence, he frequently traveled with one or more FOI security members. His secretary at the mosque handled his routine correspondence. It was this elaborate infrastructure that helped turn a prominent local leader into a national figure. The question Malcolm now confronted was, what would happen if all this was taken away? What financial resources could he provide for Betty and the children? He had virtually no savings, and no insurance. He had even arranged for his future book royalties to go to the Nation. His faith in the Nation of Islam had been complete and unquestioning, leaving him no fallback, no path of escape if it turned out to be misplaced.

It was this position of vulnerability that forced Malcolm to plead to Muhammad to allow him to be reinstated, in any capacity. In a notebook he kept during the last two weeks of January, he tried to work out his thoughts on the best way to present his case to Muhammad. “Had no bad motive. Had good intention,” he wrote.

Feeling innocent, have felt extremely persecuted. Have felt lied about. Unjustly and unnecessarily . . . forced to find some way to defend myself, to retaliate against those enemies without hurting you. . . . If I’m wrong in these feelings and conclusions, I’m at least being truthful and not hypocritical, chance to serve Allah and you . . .

As my last letter stated: 1. I believe in Our Savior, you and your program. 2. I know only what you taught me. 3. And am only what you have made me. 4. I have never exalted myself above you. 5. I have never acted independently. I made a serious mistake by not coming straight to you—and that mistake, led to my making others. I am sincerely sorry and pray to Allah for forgiveness, and I ask you to pray to Allah for my forgiveness. I cannot be an enemy to you without being an enemy to myself. I cannot speak against you without speaking against myself.

Between January and late February, he wrote Muhammad a series of letters requesting reinstatement, appealing to their close personal relationship and casting the Chicago leadership as jealous and bent on driving them apart. The “others,” he wrote, leaving no question as to whom he meant, desired the end of their partnership “because they know Allah has blessed me to be your best representative as well as your best defender. . . . The only ones there who may think against you are the ones that are not really with you themselves. This is a dangerous position to be in, because it only adds division upon division.” Few of these letters have survived; there is also a good chance that Muhammad never read them, because his access to correspondence with Nation officials was controlled by Ali and his aides.

Yet as his suspension persisted and Muhammad seemed unsympathetic, Malcolm eventually came to believe he had misjudged the situation. For all his difficulties with Chicago, he finally began to see that the real problem was not with John Ali or Raymond Sharrieff, but with Muhammad himself. In his diary, Malcolm drafted a four-item critique of Elijah Muhammad that had been suggested by Wallace: “1. John not to blame[,] you behind all John’s moves,” he wrote in his notebook. “2. You use John. 3. You not interested in Muslims, but self. 4. You use money to control all those around you.” Malcolm observed that he and Wallace shared extensive common ground in their complaints about the Nation’s leadership. Under the heading “Wallace’s analysis of [Mosque] No. 2,” Malcolm noted: “1. Chi[cago] officials scared and had changed (agreed). 2. Cold, impersonal, inconsiderate & hard on members (agreed). 3. Force & authority instead of instructions (agreed). 4. Protecting self, not you or the nation (agreed).” He complained to Wallace that under Joseph’s influence the FOI had been turned into an internal surveillance system. “Joseph had become a cop, and ceased being a bro (two-thirds a cop) same situation everywhere. Captains