Latest / Gil I Am / Muhammad Ali Interview (1968)
Transcript
- 0:05Speaker 1: Net presents a conversation with Muhammad Ali with Bud Collins,
- 0:13Speaker 1: columnist with the Boston Globe.
- 0:20Speaker 2: Quite an athlete across from me. He used to be
- 0:23Speaker 2: named Cassius Marcellus Clay Jr.
- 0:26Speaker 3: And his business was price fighting.
- 0:28Speaker 2: As a fighter, he became, in my opinion and certainly
- 0:30Speaker 2: in his own, the greatest at the age of twenty five.
- 0:35Speaker 2: Now he calls himself Muhammad Ali, and he's unemployed as
- 0:39Speaker 2: a fighter. His title is gone, ripped away by various
- 0:41Speaker 2: boxing commissions. In the name of patriotism, He's been sentenced
- 0:45Speaker 2: to five years in prison for refusing induction into the
- 0:48Speaker 2: United States Army.
- 0:50Speaker 3: Eight years ago, he stood on a podium.
- 0:52Speaker 2: In Rome, an American flag blowing in the breeze, the
- 0:54Speaker 2: Star Spangled banner being played.
- 0:56Speaker 3: He was given a gold medal as an Olympic champion.
- 1:00Speaker 2: Thought, here's a kid with a bright future, and he
- 1:02Speaker 2: was known as the so called credit to his race.
- 1:05Speaker 2: He had talent in the ring, and he had maybe
- 1:08Speaker 2: more talent outside of it. He loved Bally, who he
- 1:10Speaker 2: loved putting on the nation with a great put on
- 1:12Speaker 2: that he was the greatest. He maybe was the greatest
- 1:15Speaker 2: poet since Robert Frost. At least he had more of
- 1:17Speaker 2: his poetry published, saying Archie Moore must go in for
- 1:21Speaker 2: things like that. But then the day after he became champion,
- 1:24Speaker 2: he turned off a lot of the country by revealing
- 1:27Speaker 2: that he was a convert to a religious sect known
- 1:30Speaker 2: popularly as the Black Muslims and formerly as the Nation
- 1:35Speaker 2: of Islam, and that antagonized a lot of the American people.
- 1:39Speaker 2: So now his principal role is as a Muslim minister.
- 1:42Speaker 2: He's had a varied career, an exciting, bizarre, celebrated career,
- 1:46Speaker 2: and now perhaps a discouraging career. Or is it discouraging
- 1:50Speaker 2: right now with this five year sentence.
- 1:53Speaker 4: What I'm doing now is more encouraging and I get
- 1:55Speaker 4: more out of it than box And boxing was only
- 1:58Speaker 4: for self. Uh, just beating up or one of my
- 2:03Speaker 4: brothers or somebody else's brother for money, possibly hurting 'em
- 2:07Speaker 4: for life, Uh, which I didn't intend to do, and
- 2:10Speaker 4: I'm lucky I never really did. But uh, I would say,
- 2:14Speaker 4: I'm having get more pleasure out of lecturing at the
- 2:17Speaker 4: various Muslim moss converting so called negroes.
- 2:21Speaker 3: You're a minister of the Muslim faith.
- 2:23Speaker 4: Yes, though honorably like your Muhammed, we preachers or his
- 2:27Speaker 4: teachings to aut American to our people.
- 2:29Speaker 5: And I enjoy this much better than boxing. Uh a far.
- 2:32Speaker 4: If I didn't, I would still be boxing. I chose
- 2:35Speaker 4: this over boxing.
- 2:36Speaker 3: What about jail? Uh your appealing is that correct?
- 2:39Speaker 5: Oh? Yes, uh jail that could come up.
- 2:42Speaker 4: And if I should lose appeal, then I'll uh have
- 2:45Speaker 4: to go to jail and uh I'll be out of
- 2:47Speaker 4: there in a few years.
- 2:48Speaker 2: Have you thought about jail what it might mean. Have
- 2:50Speaker 2: you talked about people who've been in jail five years?
- 2:53Speaker 4: Well, well, uh, we'll talk about the honorably like your
- 2:57Speaker 4: Muhammad that black people actually been in jail for four
- 3:00Speaker 4: hundred years we've been here in America. But uh, uh
- 3:03Speaker 4: I don't worry about jail. If uh I believe in
- 3:06Speaker 4: all law or believe in Elijah. Muhammad is the message
- 3:08Speaker 4: of God and and uh many uh great men have
- 3:12Speaker 4: to go to jail, and so uh I don't pay
- 3:16Speaker 4: no attention to it. The time comes, I'll just have
- 3:18Speaker 4: to go boys in Vietnam or.
- 3:20Speaker 5: Dying for what they believe.
- 3:22Speaker 4: And I can't get on them for dying for what
- 3:26Speaker 4: they believe. So I'll just have to and they dying
- 3:28Speaker 4: to free uh foreign people ten thousand miles away, So
- 3:32Speaker 4: I'll just have to suffer so that the so called
- 3:34Speaker 4: negroes uh could be free, so they could have idol
- 3:38Speaker 4: and the image they can look up too.
- 3:40Speaker 5: They didn't sell 'em out. They did.
- 3:41Speaker 3: You think you can do more for your people by
- 3:43Speaker 3: going to jail?
- 3:44Speaker 5: Oh, yes, sir.
- 3:45Speaker 2: Yeah, there's a report that your manager, Herbert Muhammad, advised
- 3:48Speaker 2: you to enter the army.
- 3:49Speaker 5: Is that true?
- 3:49Speaker 6: No?
- 3:50Speaker 4: No, no, sir, No, sir. He couldn't do nothing like that. No,
- 3:53Speaker 4: m Everything I'd do is of my own. He couldn't
- 3:56Speaker 4: advise me to go to the army. When did that
- 3:58Speaker 4: report come out?
- 3:58Speaker 3: That report was in a New York paper, but two
- 4:00Speaker 3: weeks ago.
- 4:00Speaker 4: No, I didn't. This is just rumors. They uh can't
- 4:03Speaker 4: believe that I'm this strong. They thought they would weaken
- 4:06Speaker 4: me and put fear in men by threatening to go
- 4:07Speaker 4: to jail and take.
- 4:08Speaker 5: Him earning power.
- 4:10Speaker 4: And uh, they won't let me work in America. The
- 4:12Speaker 4: government won't let me leave America where I can work.
- 4:15Speaker 4: And I'm getting strong on this shakes up a lot
- 4:17Speaker 4: of people to see them they're strong. It also makes
- 4:19Speaker 4: other so called negroes strong who uh facing the same problems.
- 4:23Speaker 4: And in this way, I think I can do for
- 4:26Speaker 4: more for my people. They've never had a big black
- 4:28Speaker 4: man that just stood up and identified with the struggle
- 4:31Speaker 4: of his people a thousand percent.
- 4:33Speaker 5: Once they can.
- 4:34Speaker 4: Get him a white girl, a blond, a bruin at
- 4:36Speaker 4: a a hundred thousand dollars home a show on Broadway.
- 4:39Speaker 4: Usually every Negro watching that show now will tell you
- 4:42Speaker 4: that you can't talk to 'em. They're too big to
- 4:44Speaker 4: be with their own people. They go marry other than
- 4:46Speaker 4: their own kind. And I'm so happy and proud to
- 4:48Speaker 4: become great in boxing, to become the greatest one that
- 4:52Speaker 4: ever lived, the great yes, sir, the greatest box that
- 4:55Speaker 4: ever lived. I'm the first one that they had to
- 4:57Speaker 4: take a title from. And the history of all the red,
- 4:59Speaker 4: wa white, and blue American title, I'm the first one
- 5:03Speaker 4: that they tried to make the world believe that wasn't
- 5:06Speaker 4: the champion and uh never uh, that never has been beaten.
- 5:11Speaker 5: They have.
- 5:12Speaker 2: What about this title now, Ali, can you if you're
- 5:14Speaker 2: in jail five years, can you come back and.
- 5:16Speaker 3: Be the champion?
- 5:17Speaker 4: Well, I don't know, I'm not really worrying about boxing.
- 5:20Speaker 4: The more I'm in sp the spiritual works that Elijah
- 5:23Speaker 4: Mohammad preachers preaching the word of all Ah God, I
- 5:26Speaker 4: forget about sports.
- 5:27Speaker 5: It's not in my blood. I don't eat ride steaks
- 5:29Speaker 5: no more. They make it vicious.
- 5:31Speaker 4: I just eat lamb now and fish or holy foods,
- 5:34Speaker 4: and uh this keeps me from being vicious feeling, and
- 5:38Speaker 4: I really don't miss it. I have nothing else to gain.
- 5:40Speaker 4: I beat the best German they had to offer, the
- 5:42Speaker 4: best that Canada, they had to offer England, the best
- 5:45Speaker 4: of the America had to offer. Two time United State
- 5:47Speaker 4: Golden Glove champion, AAU champion, twice Olympic gold medal winner,
- 5:51Speaker 4: defending the title nine times. Predicted the rounds all my opponents,
- 5:56Speaker 4: Uh wrote poems in poetic fashion, how they would fall
- 5:58Speaker 4: and n theres n I cannot go no farther in
- 6:02Speaker 4: sports and the first and another thing, I'd like to say,
- 6:05Speaker 4: I'm the onliest black man that black people can now
- 6:09Speaker 4: say have so champion, Uh like uh I would say Marsana,
- 6:13Speaker 4: that's undefeated and retired, or it's true ya. So Joe
- 6:17Speaker 4: Louis came back. He uh let the people down. He
- 6:20Speaker 4: got beaten and Sugar Ray was a Black pride and
- 6:23Speaker 4: they got him beat up.
- 6:25Speaker 5: But I'm the first one to think, yes.
- 6:28Speaker 3: Is there a conflict now?
- 6:29Speaker 2: You say, and but I certainly believe you won't have
- 6:32Speaker 2: been with you for long enough to know that you're
- 6:33Speaker 2: very sincere in your beliefs that you're a man of
- 6:36Speaker 2: God now a minister.
- 6:37Speaker 3: Is there a conflict between that and being.
- 6:40Speaker 5: A price fighting?
- 6:40Speaker 4: Well, yes, we uh don't believe in that sea. We
- 6:43Speaker 4: don't believe in sports, and uh, we're right. We don't
- 6:47Speaker 4: consider boxing then violent. It's just a sport. It's nothing
- 6:50Speaker 4: we not intention it's not to kill or we use
- 6:53Speaker 4: is a fist and they're paddy. We have referees, doctors
- 6:55Speaker 4: and judges the ringside. The intention is to beat the
- 6:58Speaker 4: man out on him. And I've been criticized for not
- 7:00Speaker 4: hurting me in and being criticized for carrying 'em because
- 7:03Speaker 4: I don't like to hurt nobody.
- 7:04Speaker 5: I showed all this in my fights.
- 7:06Speaker 4: But if I did fight again, the only reason would
- 7:08Speaker 4: be was to get out of debt. This is the
- 7:10Speaker 4: onliest way that I have to make the necessary money
- 7:12Speaker 4: to pay my draft lawyers, which I t two hundred
- 7:15Speaker 4: eighty thousand dollars. That Uh, spending.
- 7:17Speaker 2: Two hundred eighty thousand dollars for your appeals and your
- 7:20Speaker 2: trials and fighting.
- 7:21Speaker 4: For justice cost me that much and then other things
- 7:24Speaker 4: back all the morning to the wife. And I can't
- 7:26Speaker 4: pay nobody now because I'm not allowed to work and
- 7:29Speaker 4: out of the country. So if I did fight, it'll
- 7:31Speaker 4: be for those reasons. But just boxing itself, I could
- 7:34Speaker 4: box tomorrow if I wanted to. I could just go
- 7:36Speaker 4: to the gymnasium and box. But it's the money.
- 7:38Speaker 2: Three years ago, when we were coming on the way
- 7:40Speaker 2: from Boston and Big Red, your great bus with Bludini
- 7:43Speaker 2: Brown Well Otis five X was driving.
- 7:46Speaker 3: We had quite a gang.
- 7:47Speaker 2: You said, that's why he's getting the back of the bus,
- 7:49Speaker 2: which we did.
- 7:49Speaker 3: If you did, and uh, we had a lot of fun.
- 7:53Speaker 2: And the last fight, just even though you had all
- 7:55Speaker 2: this on your mind and all the pressure you were
- 7:57Speaker 2: with Boudini and you put on the Dracula masks with Soria,
- 8:00Speaker 2: one of your trainers.
- 8:02Speaker 3: And uh we we had a great time up there.
- 8:04Speaker 2: And and people who knew you, and you've had a
- 8:07Speaker 2: lot of criticism in the Prenceville people who lived with
- 8:09Speaker 2: you and knew you, uh knew what kind of person
- 8:11Speaker 2: you were, and you enjoyed being champion, the the people
- 8:14Speaker 2: being around you, and the notoriety and the celebrity.
- 8:17Speaker 3: You enjoyed that. Do you miss that now?
- 8:18Speaker 5: N Noh No.
- 8:20Speaker 4: As I said, I can't go to I can't go
- 8:22Speaker 4: no higher in boxing. There's no one I could beat
- 8:25Speaker 4: who could get me more praise and been a boxer.
- 8:29Speaker 4: I'm always around people. I'm still around people every day.
- 8:32Speaker 4: I'm around six of 'em traveling with me today. Every
- 8:36Speaker 4: city I go to, the people are waiting for me.
- 8:38Speaker 4: I just left the UH college here Mit Mit University.
- 8:44Speaker 3: They were well received. We have a b heredominantly white audience.
- 8:46Speaker 5: Yes, everywhere I go.
- 8:48Speaker 4: We was up at Farleigh Dickinson in New York c
- 8:50Speaker 4: W Post. I own a university, Conesius University and UH
- 8:55Speaker 4: Penn State and UH Margant State College.
- 8:59Speaker 5: And you like to be with people?
- 9:01Speaker 4: Oh yes, so, but me not boxing didn't take nothing
- 9:05Speaker 4: away from me as far as famous concern our people.
- 9:08Speaker 4: I can always hold my head, how I could always
- 9:10Speaker 4: put on a necktie, and I can talk most boxers, Uh,
- 9:13Speaker 4: you bring 'em on this show now, even the ones
- 9:15Speaker 4: fighting they couldn't talk like I'm talking.
- 9:17Speaker 5: Now, always talk like you. Yeah. So, uh, I have
- 9:19Speaker 5: s lot lots to fall back on.
- 9:21Speaker 4: So I can't just ask you a question and Loan,
- 9:24Speaker 4: I just can't miss boxing.
- 9:25Speaker 3: Do you remember Ali? That night when we were on
- 9:27Speaker 3: the bus, we were in you leave, Florida. We stopped
- 9:30Speaker 3: to get some food. It was a Jim Crow diner.
- 9:32Speaker 3: They threw boudini out and you didn't go in.
- 9:34Speaker 4: You s I told him not to go at first.
- 9:36Speaker 4: I told him not to go because U I can tell.
- 9:39Speaker 4: I went in first and the man said something, but
- 9:41Speaker 4: we don't serve negroes. I said, yes, sir, I'm sorry,
- 9:43Speaker 4: and I wanted cause we who are Muslims don't believe
- 9:45Speaker 4: in forcing our places.
- 9:47Speaker 5: Uh of self?
- 9:49Speaker 2: And you said to Padi that night you said you
- 9:51Speaker 2: were following Martin Luther King and people like that, and
- 9:53Speaker 2: you're wrong, did you not?
- 9:54Speaker 4: No, I don't remember saying that. And I did mention him.
- 9:57Speaker 4: I'm sure I didn't. Uh.
- 9:59Speaker 2: I said, I think you said something about that wasn't
- 10:02Speaker 2: the way to go about it?
- 10:03Speaker 5: Well, I said, if.
- 10:03Speaker 4: The man don't want you there and this is his restaurant,
- 10:06Speaker 4: and if he hates you that much to put you out,
- 10:09Speaker 4: to shoot his own white brother, to keep you out
- 10:11Speaker 4: as a possibility. That vanilla milkshake, You won't when he
- 10:14Speaker 4: go back to fix it, he could, you know, spit
- 10:16Speaker 4: in it. And I'm sure if somebody spitting the milkshake
- 10:18Speaker 4: and makes it up, you couldn't see it. And I
- 10:20Speaker 4: don't see why you. You have to be sick mentally
- 10:22Speaker 4: to want to force yourself into places where you're not wanting.
- 10:25Speaker 4: You see, the man hate you. You see they don't
- 10:26Speaker 4: want you down here. I want you to leave him alone.
- 10:29Speaker 4: We're going somewhere else. He said, No, I'm going in.
- 10:31Speaker 4: I'm American. I'm American. Are you going right to go?
- 10:35Speaker 6: I said, well, come on out, god bitch, I'll come
- 10:37Speaker 6: over with I'll won't. Five minutes later he came out
- 10:40Speaker 6: with nothing.
- 10:41Speaker 5: Your treat be like that, oh a man, I said,
- 10:44Speaker 5: I told you to lead the people alone.
- 10:45Speaker 4: They didn't, won't you? You just make yourself look like
- 10:47Speaker 4: a food. So we went on down the street and
- 10:48Speaker 4: another white man.
- 10:50Speaker 5: We could eat it, Georgia, right, you could eat it, yeah.
- 10:53Speaker 2: But tell us about the muslims now, as I said
- 10:55Speaker 2: today after you and you remember that very well, Sonny
- 10:58Speaker 2: listening the big old Bears you call him, sat in
- 11:00Speaker 2: his corner. Quick to you. You became champion of the world.
- 11:03Speaker 2: Everybody thought this was a refreshing young man.
- 11:05Speaker 5: I always wondered, what was his trainer talking about?
- 11:07Speaker 3: Ill?
- 11:07Speaker 4: Did you finish round this? You know what his training
- 11:09Speaker 4: was talking about? When this and southern stude, No, he said,
- 11:11Speaker 4: son and son and get up the bellroom. Sony said,
- 11:13Speaker 4: my mama didn't raise no food. I'm staying right here
- 11:15Speaker 4: on my stool.
- 11:16Speaker 3: You got that poetry still going.
- 11:19Speaker 5: What was she gonna say? O?
- 11:20Speaker 3: I was gonna say that the next day, Ali, when
- 11:22Speaker 3: everybody was saying the the stereotype.
- 11:25Speaker 2: Thing, here's a refreshing young man. We found out you
- 11:28Speaker 2: were a Muslim, and people got scared.
- 11:29Speaker 5: I got bad, Alisa, people.
- 11:31Speaker 3: Got scared and you got bad all of a sudden,
- 11:33Speaker 3: right over.
- 11:34Speaker 4: And I was a good boy when I was hollering
- 11:35Speaker 4: I am the greatest, I cannot be beat. I am pretty,
- 11:40Speaker 4: I'm the king. He was a good boy. But when
- 11:44Speaker 4: I said I'm a Muslim, my relations Islam? What's wrong
- 11:47Speaker 4: with that?
- 11:48Speaker 6: You have six hundred million Muslims on earth and Muslim
- 11:51Speaker 6: only me one who submits in.
- 11:52Speaker 5: Talent to the will of God Allah.
- 11:55Speaker 4: And Islam only means peace entire submission to God. And
- 12:00Speaker 4: we don't believe in forcing ourselves on You know, we
- 12:03Speaker 4: don't hate.
- 12:04Speaker 3: Why why is that grown up you supposed.
- 12:05Speaker 4: To propaganda to scare Negroes, to keep them from coming.
- 12:10Speaker 4: Because Negroes, by nature love their enemy. They pray for
- 12:12Speaker 4: those who use some. Negroes by nature don't hate nobody.
- 12:15Speaker 4: And so if they can make people think that we
- 12:17Speaker 4: a hate group, that are frightening them. But we don't
- 12:19Speaker 4: hate white people. We know white people, We know the
- 12:21Speaker 4: history of white people. For an example, if a tiger
- 12:23Speaker 4: broke in this room, now, I would beat you getting out.
- 12:26Speaker 4: If a rattlesnake broke in and I beat you getting
- 12:29Speaker 4: off of this stage.
- 12:30Speaker 6: I don't hate rattlesnakes. I don't hate tigers. I just
- 12:33Speaker 6: know I can't get along with them. After learning nature
- 12:36Speaker 6: the snake and the tiger, I don't want to try
- 12:38Speaker 6: to eat with him or sleep with him because I
- 12:40Speaker 6: know that he might bite me.
- 12:41Speaker 3: So now that you don't think along, I think that
- 12:44Speaker 3: was your point.
- 12:45Speaker 5: I know whites and blacks cannot get along.
- 12:49Speaker 4: This is nature. That's It's getting worse every day though.
- 12:51Speaker 4: The latest government fact finding committed just said that things
- 12:55Speaker 4: are becoming to be separate, just two societies black and white.
- 12:58Speaker 4: That's what we've been telling your separation, and now the
- 13:00Speaker 4: government amitst that that's coming. White women are got gun
- 13:03Speaker 4: clubs all over the countries, learn how to shoot the
- 13:05Speaker 4: black targets. Understand the making guns that are shoot through
- 13:08Speaker 4: brick walls just to get negroes.
- 13:10Speaker 5: And and and and the Do you believe that.
- 13:12Speaker 4: I know what I said Mayor Daily on Chicago. I
- 13:15Speaker 4: think somebody ordered the helicopters or something just with these
- 13:18Speaker 4: riots and rotating machine guns on 'em and all they
- 13:22Speaker 4: breeding dogs that just attack black people, all kind of
- 13:25Speaker 4: spray and missing banana slicking.
- 13:27Speaker 3: Well, what are you going to do now?
- 13:29Speaker 2: As one of the prominent black persons.
- 13:33Speaker 3: I can't civil wars people.
- 13:37Speaker 4: C can't be a leader, but I can tell 'em
- 13:39Speaker 4: about the leader. All I can tell them is to
- 13:41Speaker 4: drawing on to their own kind, except their own kind,
- 13:43Speaker 4: going on to the true religion, which is Islam, drawing
- 13:46Speaker 4: on to the Muslim teachings which is taught to us
- 13:49Speaker 4: a boy, the NABYLI like Obama on this black man
- 13:51Speaker 4: preaching the truth to black people. Clean up your own neighborhoods,
- 13:54Speaker 4: do something for yourself, quit begg beg to separate. Oh
- 13:58Speaker 4: you well, if number one UH, the Army Elijah Muhammad
- 14:01Speaker 4: and the religion of Islam has given me a beautiful name,
- 14:03Speaker 4: Muhammad Ali, which is connected me with UH.
- 14:06Speaker 6: Some UH fifty six moves some countries. I have fifty
- 14:08Speaker 6: six government invitations.
- 14:10Speaker 4: This is why Washington won't let me go to Japan
- 14:12Speaker 4: to fight, because they, the prostituting eternity s, came to
- 14:16Speaker 4: Houston and told the judge that if we let this
- 14:18Speaker 4: man leave, he might not come back because he had
- 14:21Speaker 4: six hundred million miles them brothers that were gladly making
- 14:24Speaker 4: him a mill, making him a millionaire fugitive. So this
- 14:27Speaker 4: is what it's done to me. Well, I used to
- 14:29Speaker 4: try to get love of whites and begged to be
- 14:32Speaker 4: with whites. Now I can go set with kings in Egypt, Lebanon, Syria, Pakistan, Indonesia,
- 14:37Speaker 4: Saudi Arabia. This has taught me a knowledge of myself.
- 14:41Speaker 4: UH taught me to love and respect my own people,
- 14:44Speaker 4: taught me to marry and my own women.
- 14:46Speaker 5: All great Negroes.
- 14:47Speaker 3: But you're obviously not uncomfortable with whites.
- 14:49Speaker 5: I don't know.
- 14:50Speaker 6: Oh, I'm no, I'm uncomfortable. Uh No, I'm comfortable. I'm
- 14:55Speaker 6: real comfortable with you. Of course, I know how far
- 14:58Speaker 6: to go with you. I'm not gonna go home with
- 15:00Speaker 6: you now. Don't flirt with your daughter. I'm not gonna
- 15:02Speaker 6: try to push you out of your suburb. I integrate
- 15:04Speaker 6: so far, see, we don't. That's why I like Governor Wallace.
- 15:07Speaker 6: He tells the truth about the Waller. Yes, sir, w
- 15:10Speaker 6: that truth he tells. We like he tells the truth.
- 15:13Speaker 5: You believe that I see him telling the truth.
- 15:16Speaker 2: You don't believe he's been a tough influence in this country,
- 15:18Speaker 2: and a bad influence.
- 15:19Speaker 5: Well, I don't believe it everything nobody say.
- 15:21Speaker 4: But I like what he say when he says that
- 15:23Speaker 4: negroes shouldn't force to force hisself in the white neighborhoods,
- 15:26Speaker 4: and white people shouldn't have to uh move out of
- 15:28Speaker 4: the neighborhoods just because one Negro comes, they don't wanna
- 15:31Speaker 4: sell the house to him.
- 15:31Speaker 5: He shouldn't.
- 15:32Speaker 4: And that makes sense if a person UH don't want
- 15:34Speaker 4: you not even gonna push yourself on him, and Wallace
- 15:37Speaker 4: is omitting that this ain't right, and let the people
- 15:39Speaker 4: do what they wanna do. They need local government where
- 15:41Speaker 4: they can decide what they wanna do in their own community.
- 15:43Speaker 4: They just don't make some northern so called liberal come
- 15:46Speaker 4: in and bust the neighborhood up and they all have
- 15:49Speaker 4: to pack up and go somewhere else and always be.
- 15:50Speaker 2: What would you say for your people? They're living in
- 15:52Speaker 2: deplorable conditions in Chicago. Now they're living in terrible conditions.
- 15:56Speaker 4: Oh, this is all over the world, living in terrible conditions.
- 15:58Speaker 4: This is why eleies you mohamma teachers, is that they
- 16:00Speaker 4: need some land of their own where they can produce
- 16:01Speaker 4: and build their own homes, schools, factories in hospitals. Since
- 16:04Speaker 4: they're suffering and been turned away from many whites, and
- 16:07Speaker 4: get some land. Since we help build America to be
- 16:09Speaker 4: fit to their rich estates on the planet f out
- 16:12Speaker 4: in all American waters, to help maintain an uphold of government,
- 16:14Speaker 4: why not should we have some of the land where
- 16:16Speaker 4: we can build and construct negroes or doctors. Negroes are lawyers, physicians, mechanics, plumbers, electricians.
- 16:23Speaker 4: Why not can we go somewhere now and build a
- 16:26Speaker 4: future for our children such as other people. Why should
- 16:28Speaker 4: we just remain beggars and employees? Why not can we go.
- 16:33Speaker 5: In a job.
- 16:34Speaker 3: But do you think that other words, you want some
- 16:36Speaker 3: land here in the United States down?
- 16:38Speaker 4: Elijah Muhammad teaches us that God taught him, not me,
- 16:41Speaker 4: that this land should be here or elsewhere, just like
- 16:44Speaker 4: all people. No people can be free and independent without land.
- 16:48Speaker 4: No people can be free if they can't feed themselves.
- 16:51Speaker 4: No people can be free if they don't clothe themselves.
- 16:54Speaker 4: Negroes are twenty two million people. Elijah Mohama teaches us,
- 16:57Speaker 4: we don't make shoe strings twenty two million people, and
- 16:59Speaker 4: don't have two factory twenty two million people. If you
- 17:02Speaker 4: white people close the grocery stores tomorrow, we would starve
- 17:04Speaker 4: to death.
- 17:05Speaker 3: But you have your own stares us.
- 17:07Speaker 5: Oh, he's the elies.
- 17:08Speaker 4: Your Mohammed's buying hundreds of thousands of acres of farm
- 17:11Speaker 4: land throughout the country, canning up and food and taking
- 17:14Speaker 4: it to supermarkets and his restaurants. He's building all over
- 17:17Speaker 4: the country. He's got his own college, his universities. He's
- 17:20Speaker 4: on radio worldwide, now national in America's on TV in Washington.
- 17:24Speaker 4: He spends two million newspapers a week called Mohammed spits.
- 17:28Speaker 4: And he's got mosque and temples all over the country.
- 17:30Speaker 4: And he is the black man for black people to follow.
- 17:33Speaker 4: He's not just asking for job. He's not dressing for
- 17:35Speaker 4: house in a white neighborhood.
- 17:36Speaker 5: This is nothing.
- 17:37Speaker 4: See negroes actually fighting for the quality with the white
- 17:39Speaker 4: men's dog. You might say, why, well, when they say
- 17:42Speaker 4: we won't open housing, they still not getting nothing.
- 17:44Speaker 6: The dog and got the dogs sleeps in the house
- 17:46Speaker 6: with white people and the bed many of 'em.
- 17:48Speaker 4: And negroes gonna ride on the best transportation up front
- 17:50Speaker 4: with the white people. The dogs do bedding net he
- 17:52Speaker 4: ride right in the front seat. I see 'em when
- 17:54Speaker 4: sunshine and dogs ride right in front seats car and
- 17:56Speaker 4: negroes they won't eat the white men restaurant and this
- 17:58Speaker 4: and that's still the dog eat at the same plate.
- 18:01Speaker 5: I see this.
- 18:01Speaker 4: So in reality, the negro's not fighting to be quality
- 18:04Speaker 4: with the white man. He's fighting to the quality of
- 18:06Speaker 4: the white man's dog. To be equal with the man.
- 18:08Speaker 4: He needs some airports, he needs some train stations, some
- 18:11Speaker 4: television company, some water plants. He need some farm and
- 18:15Speaker 4: not if he had some land of his own. Yes,
- 18:17Speaker 4: and if the white man gave him justice and repaid
- 18:20Speaker 4: him for building up this country and working three hundred years.
- 18:24Speaker 2: Camichael Ralph Brown say that the white man will not
- 18:27Speaker 2: do this, though if.
- 18:29Speaker 5: They have, I think I know, I'm good.
- 18:33Speaker 4: We would look like foods trying to be violent against
- 18:36Speaker 4: the most powerless military country on Earth. We would look
- 18:38Speaker 4: like bulls running down a railroad track head on into
- 18:40Speaker 4: a more locomotive train.
- 18:42Speaker 5: You might say, look at that brave bull.
- 18:43Speaker 4: But when that bull come head on with that train,
- 18:46Speaker 4: all he will have left as his monument is.
- 18:48Speaker 5: His blood and his flush on the track.
- 18:50Speaker 4: See, we can't be powerful against the man who makes
- 18:52Speaker 4: the bullets, who makes the guns. We look like fools
- 18:54Speaker 4: with a pop gun hiding on a roof, shooting the arm.
- 18:56Speaker 4: And if every Negro had a machine gun or tink
- 18:59Speaker 4: a bazooka years round, if ammunition and a good hideout,
- 19:02Speaker 4: we wouldn't have a chance because we don't control no food.
- 19:05Speaker 5: After two or three days, we would be hungry. For
- 19:09Speaker 5: us to be.
- 19:10Speaker 4: Violent against America, we would have to have superior weapons
- 19:12Speaker 4: than America, and we don't have the factories in all
- 19:15Speaker 4: the earth to dig the material to manufacture the weapons.
- 19:18Speaker 4: And if we would get the weapons, we would have
- 19:19Speaker 4: to get them from you. And I'm sure you are
- 19:21Speaker 4: not going to give negroes weaps to.
- 19:24Speaker 5: Shoot you with.
- 19:24Speaker 4: So I'm not here to talk. So I don't agree
- 19:26Speaker 4: with Stokey. I don't agree with rap Brown. I don't
- 19:28Speaker 4: agreeve with Martin the late Martin Luther King. We're all
- 19:30Speaker 4: black people who are fighting for freedom, just in quality.
- 19:33Speaker 4: Everybody have their approach. There's a war going on in Vietnam.
- 19:36Speaker 4: One man fights from the air, one man fights from
- 19:38Speaker 4: the land. One man fights from on top of the water.
- 19:40Speaker 4: One man fights in the submarine under the water. One
- 19:43Speaker 4: man comes from he's a secret serviceman our spot. They're
- 19:46Speaker 4: all fighting the same common in him as they say,
- 19:48Speaker 4: the North Vietnase and people, but they have different approaches.
- 19:52Speaker 4: Negroes have different approaches for that freedom. One man believe
- 19:55Speaker 4: in integrate and one day we'll all be white, he say,
- 19:57Speaker 4: look like white people that have two hundred years believe
- 20:00Speaker 4: the education and politics will solve it. One believes shooting
- 20:03Speaker 4: and looting and burning up the country of SOLVIEGT. One
- 20:05Speaker 4: man believe integration of sovereign and we believe separation somewhere
- 20:08Speaker 4: to ourselves are solvegn So we're not here to talk
- 20:10Speaker 4: about these fellas. The same dog that bit them bit
- 20:13Speaker 4: me and biting me. But we just don't agree with
- 20:15Speaker 4: that approach to the freedom. But we all are for
- 20:18Speaker 4: them if they are sincere in their way, and one
- 20:21Speaker 4: day we hope that they will all soon recognize the
- 20:23Speaker 4: true leady Elijah Muhammad and will all soon be moving.
- 20:27Speaker 2: What do you think will happen he Elijah Muhammad is
- 20:30Speaker 2: a very old man.
- 20:31Speaker 3: One day he must die.
- 20:32Speaker 5: He will die one day.
- 20:33Speaker 3: What do you think will happen to your group?
- 20:35Speaker 4: Well, when he died, we will be in We will
- 20:38Speaker 4: be in in heaven, we'll be in the here after
- 20:40Speaker 4: on earth, America will be destroyed and this will all
- 20:45Speaker 4: be over. The negroes with America will go down with
- 20:47Speaker 4: America and all our gods.
- 20:50Speaker 6: Uh.
- 20:50Speaker 4: When he dies, we will be free. We His work
- 20:53Speaker 4: will be over, and we have a fierce just around
- 20:56Speaker 4: the corner. We don't have a lot of more years
- 20:58Speaker 4: in America.
- 20:59Speaker 3: Tell us about and.
- 21:00Speaker 4: Uh, I was like to say that Moses died to
- 21:03Speaker 4: nor die. A lot died, all of God's prophets died,
- 21:06Speaker 4: but they accomplish their missions. And Mohammed a prophet, he's
- 21:11Speaker 4: a messenger. I s he's not here to tell us
- 21:13Speaker 4: what's gonna happen. He's tell us what's happening. He's a messenger.
- 21:16Speaker 4: He's a messenger of Allah to the so called negroes.
- 21:21Speaker 3: What about your own life now you're married, you have
- 21:23Speaker 3: a young.
- 21:23Speaker 6: Yeah, I got a little baby on the way in
- 21:25Speaker 6: about uh on my half, I'll have another little boy, hope,
- 21:28Speaker 6: and I'm young enough to hold the crown until he's around.
- 21:30Speaker 3: Do you think he'll be the champion?
- 21:32Speaker 4: Well, uh, I don't think I want him to box.
- 21:34Speaker 4: I'm gonna send him to school and I'm gonna make
- 21:36Speaker 4: him study and work, and he's gonna be a wise man.
- 21:40Speaker 5: He'pon box.
- 21:42Speaker 3: You're living in Chicago now right.
- 21:44Speaker 4: Bought me a nice little home, lin fix it up
- 21:46Speaker 4: nice and still that beautiful eighteen year old Mooselom girl.
- 21:51Speaker 4: Oh yes, I got a couple of them old Cadillacs.
- 21:53Speaker 4: But I'm trying to get my airplane cause are too
- 21:56Speaker 4: slow 'em. I travel so much every day, I'm in
- 21:59Speaker 4: certain cities and I'm always moving. I always have calls
- 22:03Speaker 4: and driving or killing me and so, and I would
- 22:06Speaker 4: like to have my own private playing.
- 22:08Speaker 5: And or now pricing a lyric.
- 22:09Speaker 4: Yet and I have a cousin like an artist in
- 22:12Speaker 4: Kansas City where they make those things with gitar. Uh
- 22:16Speaker 4: they are working now with giving me a good deal
- 22:19Speaker 4: on one where I maybe probably colease it cause it.
- 22:22Speaker 2: T I guess saw pride into your personal affairs. Have
- 22:24Speaker 2: been so many stories that you've been like Joe Lewis,
- 22:26Speaker 2: that you're broken.
- 22:27Speaker 5: Yeah, so you're large.
- 22:28Speaker 3: You have eighty thousand dollars on one hand. Now you
- 22:30Speaker 3: talk about buying the lyric.
- 22:31Speaker 5: Yeah, I'm about gone.
- 22:32Speaker 4: I said least see least he say leasey then yeah,
- 22:35Speaker 4: but uh, TAXI pay for it anyway. But uh, And
- 22:37Speaker 4: what I'm trying to say is that, uh, yeah, I'm
- 22:40Speaker 4: just about broke. I'm not allowed to work here now
- 22:43Speaker 4: in America. I'm not allowed to leave America. I'm not
- 22:46Speaker 4: al like Joe Lowis. I didn't fight thirteen years.
- 22:50Speaker 3: See, I was twenty nine fights and one of them all.
- 22:52Speaker 5: Yeah, but I was. I only had nine title fights.
- 22:55Speaker 4: And out of those nine big title fights, and my
- 22:57Speaker 4: cut was two million dollars and my cut after every after.
- 23:00Speaker 3: Everything that was your cut two million dollar.
- 23:02Speaker 5: No, not after everything. This is before taxes, before taxes.
- 23:05Speaker 6: Uh yeah, after the my manager was paid, after my
- 23:07Speaker 6: opponent was paid, the peanut man, the popcorn man, and everybody.
- 23:11Speaker 6: My cup was two million, and out of two million,
- 23:13Speaker 6: the ten white men, the black men in Louisville, they
- 23:16Speaker 6: made a deal with the government behind my back.
- 23:18Speaker 5: I knew nothing about it.
- 23:19Speaker 4: Real quick they made a deal with the government or
- 23:21Speaker 4: they would give the government ninety percent of all my
- 23:24Speaker 4: earnings before I got 'em. This was called a Joe
- 23:27Speaker 4: Lois law to keep me from uh being broke, they say.
- 23:30Speaker 4: But uh, ninety percent of my two million dollars went
- 23:34Speaker 4: to the American government, So that only left me uh
- 23:37Speaker 4: ten percent out of two million to live on. And
- 23:40Speaker 4: out of that I had to pay a hundred fifty
- 23:41Speaker 4: thousand to get rid of my first wife cause she
- 23:43Speaker 4: was enjoined my faith. And then uh naturally it cost
- 23:47Speaker 4: me money to live. So the money's about going and
- 23:50Speaker 4: not only me or I don't know why people are
- 23:52Speaker 4: so confused over one negro boxer, uh getting low in
- 23:57Speaker 4: funds or depleted in funds. When America broke, AMERICAUS now
- 24:02Speaker 4: counseling trips and things to save money. So if you know,
- 24:04Speaker 4: if big powerful America can get broke, you know a
- 24:07Speaker 4: little negro boxer can get broke.
- 24:09Speaker 3: Well, that's true, you can.
- 24:12Speaker 2: You've severed all connections now with your management group and
- 24:14Speaker 2: lo At though, which is the group that brought you on.
- 24:17Speaker 3: Did you leave them in a friendly manner?
- 24:19Speaker 5: Oh? Yeah, contract ran out now.
- 24:21Speaker 4: They wanted to renew it, but they didn't wanna give
- 24:23Speaker 4: me the price for it, so we just had to
- 24:25Speaker 4: find another manager.
- 24:27Speaker 3: You go back to Louisville often to see your mother
- 24:29Speaker 3: and oh.
- 24:30Speaker 4: Oh yes, I was there two days ago. I was
- 24:32Speaker 4: in Louisville. But I don't have time to stay there
- 24:34Speaker 4: too much. The town looks so small, and the people
- 24:36Speaker 4: move so slow. The friends are raised up. We'll still
- 24:39Speaker 4: stand on the same corner. Ain't doing nothing hanging around
- 24:42Speaker 4: the same places. And when you get out and travel
- 24:45Speaker 4: and knowledge and get when you get knowledge of wisdom, understanding,
- 24:48Speaker 4: and when they've been around the world a couple of times,
- 24:50Speaker 4: like me and uh, talking to wise men like you,
- 24:53Speaker 4: newspaper men and on all these TV shows and and
- 24:57Speaker 4: this makes you wise and intelligent. When you go back
- 24:59Speaker 4: to these little one, harsh towns. You just can't stay
- 25:01Speaker 4: the two hours just after day, I'm ready to get out.
- 25:04Speaker 3: Well, you gotta move, I've noticed that about you.
- 25:07Speaker 5: Or you gotta wrestle this person even in jail. I'm
- 25:10Speaker 5: gonna have a moving plan.
- 25:12Speaker 3: Movie from Sala salad. I don't know have you. Have
- 25:18Speaker 3: you gotten any specific word about when they will act
- 25:22Speaker 3: on your appeal?
- 25:23Speaker 5: I got a letter though, they said get ready be costs.
- 25:27Speaker 4: They're cleaning out your sale to take you on the
- 25:31Speaker 4: trail to the jail sale without bail.
- 25:35Speaker 3: Without a bail. How are you getting ready?
- 25:38Speaker 5: Yeah, if I have to.
- 25:39Speaker 4: I told my wife she's packing up a few things
- 25:42Speaker 4: and I left, uh certain money.
- 25:44Speaker 5: I bury it for her to go back.
- 25:46Speaker 3: To you married. You better watch the irs probably watching
- 25:48Speaker 3: this show.
- 25:49Speaker 5: Uh, that's alright.
- 25:50Speaker 4: I bury a lot of money that I make after taxes.
- 25:54Speaker 4: I make a little money, like if I make a
- 25:57Speaker 4: S fifteen hundred dollars speaking engagement, like give the government
- 26:00Speaker 4: that thirty percent.
- 26:02Speaker 5: Then I take what's left of mind. I don't put into.
- 26:04Speaker 4: Banks cause s banks might go broke or they might
- 26:07Speaker 4: get robbed or uh. Just take my money and I
- 26:10Speaker 4: hide it here and hide it there and tell her
- 26:12Speaker 4: where the hide uts are.
- 26:14Speaker 3: Well, you're not too worright now.
- 26:15Speaker 2: Bill Russell, whom you know, of course, the coaches, the
- 26:17Speaker 2: Boston Selling's here. I said to him two years ago.
- 26:19Speaker 2: I said, it's it's a shame that this boy, who's
- 26:22Speaker 2: such an attractive boy and such a fine guy and
- 26:24Speaker 2: a good fighter, is may wind up pro like Joe Louis.
- 26:28Speaker 2: And he said, well, that just shows that you don't understand.
- 26:31Speaker 2: And he said, uh, you just don't understand that. That's
- 26:33Speaker 2: why we admire him.
- 26:34Speaker 3: So is it because he's he's ready to give up
- 26:36Speaker 3: everything for as well?
- 26:37Speaker 5: Yeah, I haven't.
- 26:38Speaker 4: I haven't.
- 26:38Speaker 3: I held around to do this and they they don't
- 26:40Speaker 3: see he quit Jos.
- 26:41Speaker 4: So these people you talking about, they spent money on
- 26:44Speaker 4: white women. They set up bars, and they went playing
- 26:47Speaker 4: pool and golf a thousand dollars a hole, and they
- 26:50Speaker 4: were known to make millions and millions when it wasn't
- 26:53Speaker 4: no high taxes, and they were not hindered by a
- 26:55Speaker 4: white America.
- 26:56Speaker 5: They were allowed to see. The white America is completely
- 27:00Speaker 5: close all the doors on me. I'm not allowed to
- 27:02Speaker 5: work in America.
- 27:02Speaker 4: Out of America, I will stop writing my prime just
- 27:05Speaker 4: when I started making money, So it can't compare me
- 27:07Speaker 4: with nobody like Joe Louis or nobody and I have
- 27:11Speaker 4: I can yes, and tomorrow I can go back to
- 27:14Speaker 4: get the money. If I would only deny my faith,
- 27:16Speaker 4: if I would only join up against my religion, I
- 27:19Speaker 4: could easily go back to make a million.
- 27:21Speaker 5: So I can always say that I turned this down.
- 27:23Speaker 5: I didn't. I didn't lose. I didn't lose it. I
- 27:26Speaker 5: turned it down. And I'd go out still with my
- 27:29Speaker 5: head high.
- 27:30Speaker 3: You've always had your head high, man.
- 27:32Speaker 5: Yes, and thank you. I'm not uh what they call
- 27:34Speaker 5: Uncle Tom.
- 27:35Speaker 4: And money of a flushing, the blood of my freedom
- 27:39Speaker 4: of the flushing, the blood and the freedom of my
- 27:41Speaker 4: people comes before money. And this is why black people
- 27:45Speaker 4: don't know where today. A white man such as you
- 27:47Speaker 4: are saying now, They always talking about money. You're broke?
- 27:51Speaker 4: Are you losing money? They threaten out people with money
- 27:53Speaker 4: where you won't eat? How you gonna live? Well, this
- 27:56Speaker 4: is why we'll know where today, because every time a
- 27:58Speaker 4: black man get in a position wor all the babies
- 28:00Speaker 4: are following him, where all the youth is following him,
- 28:02Speaker 4: then he's looking.
- 28:03Speaker 3: When you're moving around, I.
- 28:05Speaker 5: Think, Yeah, he's who's looking.
- 28:07Speaker 3: Everybody's looking when you're there. They like to see you coming.
- 28:09Speaker 4: Oh yeah, So I feel proud. I can tell him
- 28:13Speaker 4: he's the greatest. I can tell him to be somebody.
- 28:15Speaker 4: I can tell him to fair or not or what
- 28:17Speaker 4: are you losing? Look what I did now, I can preach.
- 28:20Speaker 4: This all helps what I'm standing for, and I'm just
- 28:23Speaker 4: happy everything I'm doing all like. People see me and say,
- 28:25Speaker 4: why are You're not tired of old looking up gray,
- 28:27Speaker 4: You're so happy?
- 28:28Speaker 5: Where are your bodyguards? You don't have no bodyguards? That's
- 28:31Speaker 5: what I've done. Nothing.
- 28:32Speaker 3: Well, it's great to have you with us.
- 28:34Speaker 2: Muhammad Ali, price fighting champion, minister to his people.
- 28:37Speaker 3: Now, Muhammad Ali, and.
- 28:39Speaker 5: I want Joe phrase as soon as you get it wrong, okay.
- 28:41Speaker 5: Joe Fraser for the
- 28:42Speaker 1: Type conversation with Muhammad Ali