The Breakfast Club - Best of full interview: Andrew Young & John Hope Bryant Talk 'The Dirty Work' Documentary, Friendship With MLK Jr. + More

Episode Date: January 19, 2026

The Breakfast Club BEST OF  - Andrew Young & John Hope Bryant Talk 'The Dirty Work'  Documentary, Friendship With MLK Jr., Recorded 2025. Listen For More!YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@BreakfastClubPower1051FMSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. Guaranteed Human. Every day I wake up. You're all finished or y'all's done? Yes, it's the world's most dangerous morning show, The Breakfast Club. Shalamey and the God, DJ Envy, Just Hilarious. Envy's not here today, but Lauren LaRosa is.

And we have an amazing guest in the building today, man. You know, it's interesting when we talk about, you know, black history, as if it's a thing of the past. Like, you know, as if we don't have living legends and icons and people who, you know, actually talk, what we're there for the things that we talk about, Mr. Andrew Young is here. Good morning, sir.

Good morning. How are you, brother? I'm really glad to be here with you. Yes, sir. I'm long overdue. Man, who are you telling? I mean, I need to know where you are. Yes, sir.

And I'm out of the sink. I look at the book and be honest, a die lying, and I probably, you know, I need to read that quickly. Yes, sir. John Hope Brian is here as well. John Ho Brian. Good morning, sir. Good morning. Mr. Andrew Young has a new documentary out called The Dirty Work. It comes out on this Friday, 1017. Why was it important for you to tell this part of your story now?

Well, I'm telling my story, and we see the glamour of the civil rights movement, and it was very glamorous. But every one or two you see on television, there were 500 to 1,000 to 1,000. of us in the background doing the dirty work. And it's the way I got into it. I was actually up here in New York in 1957, 58. And Dr. King needed somebody to move with him to Atlanta. My wife was from Marion, Alabama, which was a little country town near Selma. and we saw the MSN, I meant it was the NBC documentary on John Lewis in a National Sitting story.

We just bought a house out in Queens. And I was working up at the National Council of Churches. And when the documentary came on, my wife said, it's time for us to go home. I said, we are home. She said, no, this is New York. New York can't ever be my home. And I said, well, we just bought this house.

We got a good job. She said, yeah. And I hope you'll deal with that. I said, well, what are you going to do? She said, I'm going back to my mama in Alabama. And I'm taking my children. And I said, well, what do you want me to do? She said, I want you to sell this house and find a job down south.

And she was, The blessing in New York, though, was that she got a chance to go to Queens College for $18 a semester and get a master's degree. And that's what supported us in those early days. But it was the attraction of going back south that got me back in the movement. And it was in that transition, Martin Luther King had just been stabbed. and he took in New York he took a month off

to go to India and was just coming back and planning to move from Montgomery to Atlanta so I ended up getting pulled in to try to help him move and that was the dirty work he needed to be

in a bigger city than Montgomery and but he couldn't afford to live in Atlanta except with his parents. And so he was trying to raise funds. And that's another story. No, no, that's this story. But that he never... He keeps avoiding his own...

He never had... He never had a million dollars a year to work with the entire time we had the movement going. And so I was trying to help him raise some funds and went to my church up here, the United Church of Christ. and asked them, they founded a number of colleges, Howard and Tbilis, Talladega, Tuguloo, all across the south. And so I said, you know, if you would let us use some of these properties or some of them, we could have a movement southwide in little and no time.

And so I was sort of being a bridge between him making the transition to Montgomery. and coming to Atlanta. I was then moved from Atlanta back to, I mean from New York back to Atlanta. And the first job I got, he was not there. His secretary said, well, once she said, my wife's in Alabama, she said, you can't be hanging around here loose.

He said, idle miners, the devil's workshop. And we got a whole lot of devils. And she said, you need something to do. I said, well, anything I can do to help. And she gave me a great big egg crate packed with letters. She put about 100 letters in a package, tied them up. And there were maybe a dozen packages.

And so she said, if you can help Dr. King with his mail, well, that's kind of dirty work. But that's really, if you want to get to know a company, If somebody's coming in here and wants to get to know it, answer the mail. Or at least read the mail. I know what's happening around. And so it gave me, I mean, I ended up with a bucket of mail. And that was sort of a dirty work.

So you missed a couple pieces. First of all, you and Dr. King's wife, your wife and Dr. King's. Yeah, my wife and Martin's wife were by coincidence. And I said, coincidence, God's way of remaining anonymous. They were from the little same country town of 3,000, Marion, Alabama. But there was a good school there. And actually in the 1940s, that school turned out more black PhDs than any school in the nation. Because it had a, I don't know, had people who were studious.

and Julian Barnes' daddy got his PhD writing it on Lincoln School in Marion, Alabama which is where all of these young people came from. And it was where the movement, a lot of movement people came from there. So Charlemagne, also when he went to go

get the job, when he went to go out south, the stab didn't want him. Dr. King was out giving speeches. and on the road. The staff didn't want him. He was smart. He was articulate. He was like all the seats are taken.

We all, we're good. They sent him packing. So he came back with a grant. The grant was self-funded. And it was for nonviolent education or something like that. But he funded his salary. So Dr. King said, well, you can sit, you pay for it? You can sit right over here.

Well, we're not only paid for it. Huh? We not only paid for it. I brought access to all of those schools. Yes. In North Carolina, Kings Mountain, Georgia, it was Atlanta University, Alabama, it was Tugalu, Talladega, Talladega, Alabama and Tuguloo and Mississippi. But the key point of that in Bastiongge Young was, again, you won't take credit of this,

he became the one person nobody could fire. So he could speak truth of power. Yeah, but we didn't fire anybody. Exactly, because Dr. King didn't like conflict. If you let me finish my point. Yes, so. Dr. King didn't like conflict. So he was the conflict manager.

So he was the one inside of the staff. You had crazy people on the left and crazy folks sort of over here trying to do revolutions. Dr. King didn't want conflict. So he would expect Ambassador Young to knock heads. That's part of the dirty work. That's it. And when he came in, he wanted it to be resolved. And so he was a resolution manager inside the,

the movement and outside the movement. Again, he doesn't take credit for it, but that really became one of his magic pieces was that he was an independent thinker, just like you are, just like all you guys are, independent thinkers. Did I get that right? I guess.

No, the thing is that the one thing I couldn't do, I couldn't move in there. I grew up in New Orleans. I lived in the South all my life, but I was up here in New York, when the movement started. So I couldn't come back down there and claim

and I hadn't done anything. Everybody had been beaten up, gone to jail and I come down with a grant. Well, that's no, I mean, that gives me no scoring points at all. And I didn't need them.

I just wanted to be there to help because, well, I don't know. I left hospital. And I really, well, I really fucked up for three and a half years. Man. See? But I somehow got a degree.

And why you say he was fucking up? Because I was playing around, wasn't studying, I was trying to make the swimming team, trying to make the track team, even tried the wrestling team, and trying to play basketball in the gym. And I was, I went to college at 15. And so I was trying to, you know, kid on the girls and I wasn't making any progress at all. You know, a little nigger from New Orleans.

And I got along with people, but I was trying to grow up. And when I came, left Howard, and we stopped because you couldn't, had no hotels that let you stay. We stopped at a Kings Mountain, North Carolina, where we had a church conference going on. And I decided to run up to the mountain. And that was where I was in good shape, but when you're in the hills, you're never running flat.

You either running downhill or uphill. And I was running downhill too fast and still tried to make it to the top of the mountain. And somewhere along there, I kind of blacked out. and I looked around and everything seemed perfect. You know, it was a perfect sky, perfect cornfield, the green trees were sparkling. And I said, damn, everything here has got a purpose.

And, but me. And I said, I cannot be put here on this earth with no purpose at all. And how do I find a purpose? Well, what I came to was if there's something that I think needs doing and nobody wants to do it, that becomes my purpose. So I was looking for stuff that needed to be done that nobody wanted to do. Did MLK Jr. being working with him? Did that feel like part of your purpose? Well, he was the only game in town and he had just finished, you know, the Montgomery Improvement Association. He got stabbed up here in Harlem, and he was recovering from he and Coretta took a trip to India to study more about nonviolence.

And that was sort of when I came in, and he wasn't around. So I started cleaning up. But I learned that when he got to be head of the Montgomery Improving Association, he wasn't even in a meeting. He was back in the in the Mimeograph room running a Mimograph machine, turning out handbills, telling people that we're going to have a one-day boycott. Well, that one-day boycott turned into 381 days. But they went to the back room because two preachers, Methodists and Baptists usually. They were arguing about whose turn it was to be the spokesman.

and the ladies in the group said, look, these brothers always fussing and fighting. Why don't we let this young man in the back be the spokesman? And so they voted him to spokesman, and he didn't even know it. That's how, wow. That's how he became like the first of the world. And they went to the back and told him that he was going to chair the meeting, and he had less than an hour.

It was about 7 o'clock. The mass meeting started at 8 o'clock at another church across town. and he had to stand up and define this whole movement. Well, he really was brilliant. But with that kind of stuff, when you run in a mimicrypt or seeing all day, your mind's wandering, and somebody says, hold up, you've got 20 minutes,

you've got to speak. And nothing you can do but go to the bathroom and lock the door. But somebody had to know he had those gifts, right? Like somebody had to... Well, they had heard him. preaching in his church, but it wasn't a gift like running a mass movement. And I mean, this was the first time and a long time. It was the first time.

I can remember that any city got together and did and agreed that everybody would stop riding the bus. Started out for one day. But it was so successful that it ended up being 381 days. That was an early Uber, by the way. because there was a black taxis. Everybody just decided to drive everybody else around and not get on the bus.

But the thing he's, the message for your audience, Charlemagne, is when he was running up that mountain, he was insecure. He was lost, and he was looking for a purpose. A lot of people are looking for a purpose. Dr. King was looking for a purpose. He was back in the mimogram machine

and trying to figure out what his life was going to be like. And he'd spend 18 hours preparing for a sermon. He had 18 minutes. When his moment came, you're on in a half an hour, dude. But you know, the speeches, that speech, his wife was pregnant. So she couldn't be there. She asked the choir director to record it. So we have it recorded.

And what you see is all of the, you see references to all of the speeches he made when he got the Nobel Peace Prize, when he was at the March on Washington, in Selma. I mean, he had a repertoire. And he just pulled it all together. And he had a nice voice and a nice cadence. And he knew how to move across. So he put all of the stuff together and preached his way to the top.

It's such an interesting perspective when you talk about purpose too, John. Because in my mind, you know, I always thought the purpose was the liberation. of black people. But you're always just looking for a purpose within yourself. First and foremost. Well, except you've got to start liberating black people by liberating the one you are. Black person sitting there.

And I'm not liberated. I'm enslaved all of the crap that goes on on every college campus and in every neighborhood. And so let's get into some real. talk. He's got survivors guilt. He doesn't sleep. He's always working because he was on that balcony when Dr. King was assassinated. And he was right there. It was his friend. Before that, though, we all born into a mess. I mean, I was born into a neighborhood where my brother and I would only black kids. There were three, four black families. But you had an Irish grocery

store on one corner and Italian bar on the next. The Nazi party was on the third corner and I'm smack dab in the middle. 50 yards from each one of them and at four years old. That's you? That's you? I've been hearing it. Yeah, I hear it.

Is that you? I got to be your phone. I don't know. Tell me you. Call them back. The governor calling you. Let me turn it off for you. I don't know. So, so when he, when Dr. King was assassinated, the FBI told him the instructions for the shooter. If you miss the dreamer, kill the strategist.

So he's been, all this time, UN ambassador, first black union ambassador in history of the United States under Carter, first congressman since reconstruction in the south, brought the Atlantic, the Olympics to the Atlanta, made Atlanta international city, mayor, presidential medal or Freeman Awardee, French foreign legion of 40, 150 honorary doctor degrees,

brought a venture capital to Africa, liberated Zimbabwe, helped to get Mandela out of prison. But underneath all this is I'm here because my friend was a shot. So he couldn't enjoy any of it. He'd give all his money away. He's been a servant, his whole life. And he is the closest thing we have to Nelson Mandela. But he...

But he had to stay in jail for... to 30 years. Yes. I have, and that was one of the things I was guilty about. Everybody else had been, been to jail. They called him an Uncle Tom. The staff called him Uncle Tom. Because I was managing the foundation money, I couldn't.

I wasn't supposed to go to jail. And so until I got set up in St. Augustine, Well, really, even in Savannah, I ended up first time getting arrested because I was walking to try to get Jose Williams out of jail. And there were kids playing picketing in front of the holiday inn. I mean, they were 10 or 12 years old. And the police come up there to arrest them. And I went on and I said, look, these kids are not part of anybody's movement. We wouldn't put people out here like this.

with no adults. I said, if you arrest these kids, you're asking for trouble. And they grabbed me and threw me in the paddy wagon. But I was glad I went because they immediately shut the thing down. And you got a little slit than that. It was at least close to 100 degrees in Savannah. and they closed the air off. And I got, you know, 15, 20 kids in there.

And they expected us to start, you know, crying and screaming. Because we were really closed in and hot. And that's where going to Sunday school helped me. And I said, look, y'all, y'all know how to sing Wade in the water. We go into the beach, close you. gosh. And I said, and I said, we're going down to Tybee Beach. When to get to the beach, the water's cold. And we're going to get, and the song goes, it chills the body, but not the soul. And so we started then walking, like they were in their mind, walking into the water. I said, we're not going to

pass waist deep. Then everybody's going to get down. We're going to cool off. And so when we're kind of figured out how to stay in an oven and not burn. I said, we're going to sing. And they started singing, wade in the water. God's going to trouble the water, see. And we turned a tragedy into a triumph. The police got mad and took everybody to jail. And I had to go with them.

but then when we got to jail it was dinner time and they gave everybody a paper plate and they put up grits and grease is what they served them and the kids said we don't eat this shit and they started sailing the plates

across the jail and I mean it was it was a wild time but there again And that's, I accidentally got into that. But that was the dirty work. When you look back, was there a moment when you realize the moral weight of what you were doing could also cost you personally?

I think I never worried about that. And I never worried about that because I've never been, I mean, the school I went to in the elementary school, Belina C. Jones was an all-black public school, overcrowded, and I could have gotten killed in school. I mean, it was called a bucket of blood, but I got along. And then between that in my schooling, and then I went to a church nursery. And they taught me to read and write. So when they put me in public school, I was six years old,

but they put me in third grade. And everybody else was nine, ten. And so I've always had a burden, which I learned to deal with. And not, you know, but it, it, it, it, it, I was always playing catch up. Why do the staff call you that supposedly unpleasant phrase, which actually, when you're doing a little research on Uncle Tom, he was a bad brother, actually. He actually took slaves up north to Canada.

He bought a home, bought some property in Canada, and actually housed them and created self-sustainability. Other folks turned the story into something negative. But why do they call you some of the staff, Uncle Tom? Because my dad had taught me to live in that name, neighborhood. And to go to that school, I had to stay calm. And my dad is motto. He was a little man, five, four. And he said, look, you're never going to be big enough to beat up anybody. So stay calm and let your mind lead you. Your mind is more powerful than your fists or your

feet. You can run from trouble, but you won't feel good about running. And you can fight, but you're probably going to get beat. But if you let your mind work, you can figure out how to get through any trouble. But don't ever get mad. Get smart. And I heard that from four. In fact, he took me to the movie, a segregated movie,

to see Jesse Owens in the 1936 Olympics. Because when Jesse Owens won 100 meter dash, Hitler got mad, and he was supposed to give Justin. Jesse Owens the medal, but he walked out of the stadium and took all of his troops with him. And my dad said, now watch Jesse, what's he doing? I said, he's going about his business. He said, that's the point.

He's not letting Hitler get him upset. He's got three more medals to win. And he ended up coming out with four gold medals and a couple of world records. And so it was that preparation that that made me ready to do whatever I had to do.

They didn't understand this role. Dr. King never wanted him arrested. Dr. King, he needed him on the outside. He didn't want, he was not useful getting locked up like the other people. He needed, it was a different frequency. And he's not saying it, but he was the strategist. And I think that's the interesting thing about the doc, right? Like, it shows you

that the civil rights movement wasn't just about marching, and you said this, it was about strategy. So what other dirty work had to be done quietly in the private, for the public victories to be popular? Well, you know, they bombed, they, they bombed 62 homes in Birmingham in 1961, 62. And Fred Shuttlesworth came over there. to see us and said, look, we cannot be passively nonviolent. We got to find a way to be more aggressive. And we need you to come over and help us. So we agreed before Christmas that we would, in January, we would come over to Birmingham

and start a movement. And Dr. King turned to me and said, Andy, you know any white folks in Birmingham? I said, I don't know any black folks in Birmingham. I ain't been to Birmingham. And he said, no, well, you got six weeks to get to know some. I said, why? He said, look, if we're going to go there and tear up to people's town, somebody has to go in early and tell them we're going to do it.

I said, then they're going to kill me. I didn't say that. I said, well, why me? He said, because you grew up with white folks. You ain't worried about white folks. folks. You get along with people. And so I ended up by myself, going into Birmingham, and I had met some people in Michigan at a conference from Birmingham. So I call the Episcopal Church. And then one of the people I met answered the phone. And I said, I need you to help

set me set up a meeting with Dr. King and the Episcopal Bishop. And she said, well, I can't do that. She said, I don't know Dr. King. And he's got a, he said, I tell you what she said, you come here and I'll get you to see the bishop. So then I had to go see the bishop and explain to him that we're about to move 50 more black folk into your already 90,000 people. And we intend to tear up your town. We intend to boycott. We're not going to buy anything but food and medicine.

You know, and, but we want to find a way to sit down with you and draw up a map where we can peacefully live together and you can respect us and we can respect you and everybody can get along. Well, I mean, he's looking at me like I'm crazy because he ain't used to black folk talking straight to him like that. And, but, I mean, that was no problem for me. And so we set up a series of meetings and all this stuff that they're talking about at Harvard now. What is it?

D-E-I. Yeah. That came from Birmingham because at the same time, Wyatt Walker, who was pastor up here for a while, he's gone to glory. He was meeting with Fred Sheldsworth and the black preachers. And they wrote a Birmingham manifesto, all the things that were wrong with Burrower. Birmingham and I was meeting with the white folks and they were writing all the things they could do to change that you had to sit down and put it to them bluntly say look you got black water and white water now you know that's not real there's no difference between the water why you

got to put a sign on and saying this was for black folk and that was for white folks it's all water take the signs down If you don't take the signs down, and then you got these black women, and you got them in aprons and smocks, and you let the white women dress up with the clothes they're selling, and they get a commission. But the black folks have to do all the work, keeping the shop clean, and keeping the clothes, said,

why not just let everybody wear their dresses on the rack and let everybody get a commission? And they said, well, we could, and then they'd have a thousand reasons why they couldn't do it. But we had 90,000 black folk in Birmingham. And when 90,000 black folk decided that they were going to stop spending money on anything but food and medicine, they bought no shoes, no, I mean, that's what a blue jeans. came from. Everybody had raggedy blue jeans. And so nobody bought any clothes. And that's when

the college students who had come down with us from all over the country, they went back and started wearing blue jeans. Well, that came out of Birmingham. The stuff that the preachers and workers wrote down in the Birmingham manifesto, the things they wanted, and the things that the white folk wrote down about what they could do to answer this. All of that became public, but they blamed it on Martin Luther King, and he was in jail. So he wrote the letter from the Birmingham jail, and he didn't have any paper.

So he wrote it around the march. Somebody left him, well, lawyer up here from New York, left him a section of New York Times. And he wrote the letter from the Birmingham jail around the margins of the newspaper. When he ran out of newspaper space, he wrote on toilet paper. And he used to joke and say, it's a good thing they had tough toilet paper in the Birmingham jail. But he smuggled it out through you. But he smuggled it out.

And we got all of these published. And that was the dirty work behind the movement. And Bashan, I need you do me a favor. You're talking to a whole generation. They're the voice for this generation. Your habit is to talk about this person and that person to give this person credit.

Look, they need you to tell your story crisply and bluntly so they can get the memo on how they need. This generation has no business plan about what you did. What you did was absolutely historic. This is no time to be humble. This is no time of humble pie.

Like I'll do it. I'll set you up, but you got to hit it out the park. There's some stories I know. I know these stories. We want them to watch the dirty work too. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. But you can.

Even listening to you talk about this boycott, like the work that you did with the boycott. And everybody plays a role in the movement is what I've always heard and learned. I feel like today when we talk about the boycotts that we're trying to do actively, there's no real roles. We don't take one serious. We might take the other one serious because there's no structure. There's no. How did you get people?

people to fall in line, even though not everybody agreed with you. Well, everybody used to go to church back then. And radio. Black radio wouldn't say anything about, black radio was owned by white folks, and they would play the music. But we'd have to slip in an announcement. There's going to be a certain meeting at, you know,

such and such a Baptist church or such and such a Methodist church. And they finally even stopped them from doing announcements. So it went by word of mouth. We knew that every night we'd have a mass meeting at some church in some neighborhood. And people would get together about five o'clock and nothing to do. And they'd sing these old songs that the young folk then came in and modified the freedom songs. and then the preachers would come in and preach a little bit and tell what's going on but it was it was all around the church and in the daytime when the churches were not operating

the kids went to the schools and the guys who were hanging out at the pool hall we'd stop by they had fact Dr. King was a very good pool play grew up in the YMCA and he he'd could get that by his attention because he would go into a pool hall and challenge the guy said, can I take the winner? And after he, they saw he could run the table, they listened to him. And it was, it was finding a way to get to people where they are. And it didn't matter what they looked like. It didn't matter what the clothes were. It didn't matter anything except that I'm ready. Well, they would really say I'm ready to die for my people.

And it was a threat of death to almost every black man in the South until just recently, and it's coming back now. It's more organized now But we had to mobilize The entire community But in mobilizing the entire community of Birmingham That's 90,000 black folk We brought people from Atlanta I came from New Orleans

Some others came down from Memphis Some came from New York the hospital workers, 1199 was here in New York, they would come down and they would work with the hospital workers. And we found a way to mobilize the whole city to, one,

stop buying anything but food and medicine. And you do that for six weeks and then six months. And the economy dries up. and close, people have to start closing stores. Then we finally ended up with 80 businessmen, people who own the hotels, people who own the drugstores, the shopping centers, sitting down with us,

and they got these two complaints together and agreed on the fact that they could change. But they didn't say we were automatically going to change, everything today. We say, let's try it. Okay, we're going to take down the signs immediately about black and white water. Everybody's going to drink water. And, okay, that's a good sign. We're going to let the ladies in the women's department, we're going to let them take all those smocks and aprons, and we're going to let them put on the clothes that they sell in. See?

And they can get a commission too. And we're going to treat them fairly. And we took apart the town piece by piece and everything that was not fair. We said from now on, let's make it fair. and people began to realize that when 90,000 people haven't been shopping and all of a sudden they start showing up like you go to Atlanta now and all of these stores now same thing happened there we didn't have to organize it like they did in Birmingham but the brothers who start making a right now the rapists run the department stores because they can come in with

with their girlfriends, and they spend money about thousands of dollars. But to answer your question, there were rules, just like you have here. He's being humble again. It was strategy. By the way, it wasn't we got the business people to take down the whites only signs. He did. Dr. King would shut the economy down in six weeks. They'd march.

They knew that 60% of the residents were black. The dollar was the same dollar. So after six weeks, the merchants were, the Wallace were on fire. Then Dr. King would send Andy Young in, Bastard Young, Andy, he called him Andy. Go on there quietly. Take your overalls off. Put your business suit on.

Go behind closed doors. Cut a deal. Don't embarrass them. Don't humiliate them. We want them to win, too. Well, it was a little bigger than that. Well, okay, yeah, but... Because we had to do it.

We had to get... We're acknowledging that. The whole town... I'm trying to get the blunt truth out. Well, but also, if I take credit for it, I'd be dead. Well, you're not, yeah, but you're alive now. But by the way, clearly they knew it because they told them it.

You can't kill the dream of them. Kill the strategist. But there was rules. There were, there were roles. Everybody had a role. He had a role. Dr. King had a role. The crazy people had a role in the movement.

The women had a role. Yeah. The kids had a role. But the dirty work is getting everybody to realize their world. That's right. And you get the kids. and you let them know that they can pass out handbills. And if they happen to see somebody shopping that they think they shouldn't be shopping,

just go and politely hand them a handbill. Don't throw it at them, say, or just put it on the windshield of that car. But they know that the community is watching. But it really was class. to do it in Birmingham with 90,000 folks. We had trouble when we got to Chicago or New York, and you got millions of folk. And so we, that's where we stumbled.

And that's when Dr. King, I mean, when we were going, coming north and threatening to shut down, I mean, Chicago's got more black folk. Then they got folk at Alabama. And half of Mississippi and Alabama was gone to Chicago. So we didn't have any problem doing the same things with them that we did with their parents in back home. But it was on such a larger scale. And these cities just getting around,

is different. I want to, it's a question for both of you all. How do we teach young people now that the real revolution isn't in just outrage, especially the social media outrage, but it's an actual organizer? Well, that's what my dad started telling me when I was four. Don't get mad, get smart. See, when you lose your temper in a fight, you lose the fight.

And every time, he was a boxing fan. and when who was the Sunny Liston was supposed to be fighting Muhammad Ali and Sunny Liston was a bear of a man and my daddy said watch

Muhammad Ali he probably knock him out in two rounds I said oh daddy you don't know what you're talking about he said that man I said that man I said he is a bear and I said Muhammad is I mean he's so thin

he's light he, one or two punches, and he's going to go down. He said, no. He said, watch, Muhammad is not going to lose his temper. And Mohammed is going to be cool. And he'll take him a couple of rounds of playing with him, and then Sunday listing is out of there. Well, I said, well, he said, don't forget.

Same thing applies to you. If you're going to get in a fight, don't get mad. get smart. Sonny Liston has gotten mad. And he's going to get his ass whipped. Didn't your dad slap you in this example? Well, that's, I mean, we used to. No.

I mean, look. No, it wasn't. It wasn't slapping. It wasn't slapping. It wasn't slapping. It was, it was, he always, he always wanted a shadow box. And he tapped me on the face like that. if I was going the wrong way.

But if I got lost my temper and started swinging out, then he'd knock the hell out. And he'd say again, you lose your temper, you're going to lose your head. That's right. Because I always wondered, like, how did y'all...

So for you, right, you're the strategy he brains. You can't lose your temper. But, like, there were times I went to a museum in Memphis at the Lorraine Motel when I was there last, and they were talking to me about when Martin Luther King was in, I believe it was Rowley and the KKK was marching because he was in the city. And times like that, what happened all the time with there was death threats.

There were so many things coming you guys away. I'm sure you had to have sometimes face-to-face conversations to clear the way before he got certain places. And you still stayed strategy and brains thrown. The truth is we didn't. That everybody knew. In fact, the only person who would talk about it openly was Martin Luther King. And he said, now, you know, if we go messing with Berman, him. Some of us ain't going to come back. He knew he was the one most likely targeted,

but he'd start, I mean, he'd make a joke out of it. And he had a real good sense of humor. He'd said, John, it might be your turn. But it's going to be one of the hardest things I ever do. but I'll try my best to preach your ass into heaven. Dang. And then he'd start preaching all the things that I pick on him about, say. What are you pointing to what me? Because you're the illustration, I'm saying that that's the way he did all of us. Gotcha.

See, he would know, and he would say things you didn't know he knew about you. And he'd ask God to forgive you. and please let him into heaven. You know, I mean, he really, he really turned your death into a comedy. And it was, it was,

it wasn't sadistic. But the fact that people knew that they could potentially die and still were willing to make that sacrifice is what I think is missing now. But they shouldn't have to, you shouldn't be willing to make the sacrifice. You should be willing to,

to take your time and assume that you can make the world right. And you don't have to die. And we maybe have made it too difficult. Most of the people who died, we can remember their names. But there are literally millions. Like Martin Luther King got stabbed. by a black woman up in Harlem. And with a letter opener.

And a letter opener was pressing on the A order of his heart. And they said if he had sneezed, he probably would have died. And he talked about that all the time. But what he talked about, he said, but he got a letter. And this is why writing the letters answering the letters was important. he said, I remember getting this letter. And this girl said, I'm 11 years old. And it shouldn't matter, but I happen to be white.

And I just want to thank you and thank God that you did not sneeze. And he would talk, he talked about that all the time because it represented the fact that there's still many, many good people. and you shouldn't believe that the whole world is going to hell at a handbasket. That right now. So even right now in this moment. Right now. Okay. The whole world is not going to hell in the handbasket.

I think there's Friday or something there's supposed to be marches in 28 cities. Saturday. Saturday. Is that for a protesting against the voting rights act? No, no. They're calling it the no king rally. Oh, no, king rally. But we didn't have anything to do with that.

But it's... You mean we mean black people. Black people, but we'll join. But that's mostly white people, see? And like, what was it that started? Why are you thinking about that? Let's answer the her question, though. Yes, there was level head in this.

And he was it. No. He would go... There was a whole. there were a whole lot of smart black folks. Vasi Young, with all due respect, you're being, we can either have an interview or a master class, okay?

Now, they want it either way, because they're not getting these stories. What about the master class, but Jackie Robertson can tell his own story. We're telling yours. But we're telling the story of people who were heroes in a crisis. Yes.

And who were cool and didn't get mad, they got smart. but they got you here in person. They can go read about Jesse about Jackie Robert. Okay. They don't read. They're all right.

She has. No, she has. Jazz, he been watching. He better shut out. I need a lot of Jesse. And I want my raggedy jeans for you, too. All right.

God bless you. Right. Thank you. So, so let me give you one example. Ambassador Young. So Dr. he had actually a ferocious sense of humor. But he couldn't,

he didn't want to be like that. he didn't think people were going to take him seriously. So he was, like, boxed in, but he had this important role. He needed him to play a role. And the one time he didn't play his role, Dr. King got upset with him. The one time, it was only one time. All the time. All the time you didn't play a role.

What did you do? Well, when Meredith got shot on road walking in Mississippi, first place, he shouldn't have been walking down a highway by himself. And making this point without getting everybody wanting people and getting somebody to help him. But anyway, we had a rule. If somebody gets killed or hurt doing something that's right for the benefit of all of us, if they go down, we have to go take their place. And we were already in Chicago.

we were registering voters in Mississippi, Alabama, and Georgia. And we didn't need to have another march to show we were brave. But everybody was mad because Meredith got shot. And so they said, let's go, let's go. We've got to keep it going. Well, I saw that they were leaving all of the stuff we've been working on for months behind and it would all suffer. But I got tired of play an Uncle Tom role.

I said, okay, let's go. And Dr. King said, Andy, hold up, I got to go to John, meet me in my office. And he came in and he said, look, if you're not going to talk sentence and help balance it on the right side, I don't need you. He said, I don't need another crazy Negro. We got plenty. Everybody can get emotional. Somebody's got to stay calm.

And I said, but I get tired of playing that Uncle Tom role. He said, yeah, but you've been doing it all your life and you ain't going to quit now. Why did they call being calm and level-headed and using strategy being an Uncle Tom? Because when everybody's mad and you calm, then they think something's wrong with you. They thought the most, they thought that the most courageous, manly thing he can do was to go to jail. Going to prison, getting your rear end whipped was a badge of honor. By the way, strategically, they put women and children in those marches.

They didn't want Charlemagne or me or they didn't want, because that was aggression against aggression. You wanted to get the sympathy from the TV cameras and the meet. So they put women and children. That was strategic. No, we didn't put it. Well. The men wouldn't come. Okay, well, that's okay.

All right. Whatever it was, it worked out. But the point is, the point is that he was playing a very important role. Like, if you look at the pictures in the civil rights movement, Dr. King and Andrew Young, Andrew Young is never looking at the camera. He's looking here. He's looking here. He's looking for threats to his friend.

He's not trying to become Dr. King. You guys, when you're interviewing, you're not trying to be the guest. You're not trying to be the star. That's reason you're so good at it. You're playing your role. and you do it brilliantly. And as a result of that, you became stars by focusing on the star. Ambassador Young wanted Andrew, Dr. King, to be successful.

And he deferred himself. Again, I'm basically the only person that lets him, that he lets push him like this, but he knows I'm just trying to pull it out of him so that people can benefit. He's very uncomfortable talking about himself. But this is so important to understand the dirty work, the stuff behind the scenes, the little things.

It's everything. thing. And so this role he played of being calm and cool and chill and stepping overmess and not in it. That's the way I was born. It's a certain temperament. Like I don't even know he can learn that. Like that's why, but he saw that in. You can learn it, I think.

Well, can you unlearn it? I mean, I learned it. Every man learns it with his wife. Every man. Okay, that was good. I mean, your wife can cuss you and, I mean, talk about you like a dog. And my wife does regularly. Now?

Now. Carol is no joke. No. Carol is fantastic. No, she, but she was a schoolteacher for 30 years. And she said, I've been dealing with you bad boys all my life. And I ain't going to let you get away with nothing. Well, okay.

But I've been married twice. and both of them were schoolteachers. And both of them knew how to, well, one, I knew how not to get riled up with, I don't believe I've ever lost my temper with my wife. Either one, one for 40 years and another one for 30 years. He taught me, you can either be married or you can be right. That's right. Those are two different things.

In the doc, you said after Martin Luther King Jr. got shot, you knew there was no hope. What did you know? I don't think I said that. I knew that it was going to be hard, but I really, you know, my mama used to make me go to Sunday school. And one time they were talking about Elijah going to heaven in a flaming chariot, and I was about nine years old. I said, I don't believe that. They put me out of Sunday school. but I never forgot that and that's what I thought when I saw Martin laying there

one I said he probably didn't even hear that shot the bullet powers travels faster the speed of sound so it hit him right in his and severed his spinal cord so he probably never heard it and he probably never felt any pain and he was dead instantly. And the thing that occurred to me then was, damn, my brother than gone to heaven in a flaming chariot. And see, he used to keep wanting to go back to Memphis. Well, Memphis is right next to the river, Mississippi River. And Mississippi River runs through, and all our spirituals, you know, my home is over Jordan. Well, Jordan is the Mississippi, first down, and all of the spirituals talk about, you know, steal away, steal away to Jesus.

And I just felt that he'd gone home to the Lord. Yeah. And they left you here. And left me here. But I knew, and I still know, that there's, hardly a day that I don't talk about him and learn or remember something that he said in a similar situation. And I pass that on to my children, but to all children. And it's one of the reasons why I'm really grateful to those folk. And John is one of them that put together money to tell

this story. Because I don't believe it has ever been And I don't mean anybody, black, white, rich, or poor, has ever had 90 minutes of TV time telling their story. And these folk came in, brother from England, they backed three 18 wheelers up into my driveway and unloaded the equipment. and they set me down and I talked for three days, eight hours a day. They came back a month or so later with another three days,

eight hours a day. And I think we did that, we did that three or four times. He's 93. I'm sitting here, like, just watching this and some talk now, like, wow, 93. It was,

and they had read everything ever written by me. And this brother sat down there, and he asked me a question. I said, where did you get that from? And he told me where it came from. And he made me remember. And so I saw this as having a chance to tell a story. And I don't care how much we don't read like we used to. if we ever did.

But all the books that were written by the movement are big, thick books. And we don't keep still along. So the mass media, radio and television is still our means of communication. And it's why you play such an important part in our community. And why I had to, I mean, I was in a meeting last night until 10 o'clock, went home, got me a few hours sleep, got up at 4 o'clock in the morning, got on a plane and came up back here, because I wasn't coming to talk to you all. You talk to more people than anybody I know.

And when John said, he's going to let you talk to his people. I said, thank you, Jesus. No, it's a privilege, man. Well, but it's a privilege for me. because I, well, like I was mayor for eight years. And we took Atlanta from, well, half a million people to five million. And we got the world's busiest airport. And I went up to the airport, the world's business airport.

And they used to complain that they didn't have enough women in the decision-making. And I go into the board meeting, and there's 12 people in there. And nine of them are women, black women. Well, eight black women, one white woman. And that's, that airport handles 114 million people a year. see and and black women are running it and and they we have worked that out and we're trying to expand it and but we voted and we get out and vote I got elected because and it poured down rain it was like Gladys Night's thing,

raiding night in Georgia. And it poured down from Sunday, and the only day was Tuesday, and I said, Lord, please stop this rain. And it kept all raining Monday, and rained all day Tuesday, and half the night. And I went out to see how I was doing,

and Black folk was still in lines. They went lines in Atlanta elect they went in line with Mandela and South Africa. They stayed in line for days in South Africa because they got Mandela out of jail and elected him president. They elected me mayor. And then after that, they elected Maynor, they elected me to Congress in 72. And then 73, they elected Maynor Jackson mayor. And we've had nine black mayors in a row. And everyone has grown the city more. And it's doing well. I have a favorite question.

I don't ask you for me any favors. I've never seen these folks so quiet. They're going to pay you respect because you are the iconic. I've never seen them as quiet. They're going to sit. Yeah, but they got questions, right? And if you keep telling stories about Joe, Jack, Schmoe, and the other person, I need for them,

this is a master class. This is an opportunity for... He's giving one, John. Okay. But I know there's some jewels. But I've been giving him one for the last 20 years. Yes, yes, yeah. But also, everything can be said in one interview.

That's why the documentary is important as well. But, I mean, I'm learning a lot. I do, to John's point, I do have a question. Do you think we've honored Dr. King's legacy or just branded it? No, I don't think there's anybody around that doesn't respect what he did and what he gave his life for. I think that, I think he is a sacred personality

in our history. And, but everyone is like that. I mean, Christmas addicts. I knew about him. He's the first black man, first man to die for this country in Massachusetts. And he's black. And it,

well, this country would not be what it is without us. And I think Martin Luther King represents the best of us. But he ain't the only one of us, see? That there were people around him, and only a half a dozen of us had been to college. I mean, most of us learn from the streets,

and they learn from our experiences. but the I mean Louis Armstrong grew up in my neighborhood in New Orleans he didn't I don't think anybody ever gave him trumpet lessons he just picked up the thing and made it blow

and and and the thing that I'd like to remind people is that he is a man who grew up in one of the poorest neighborhoods in New Orleans and he sings it's a wonderful world.

And there's Ray Charles, who's blind. And there's a big piano out in Albany, Georgia, where he grew up. And he sings America to beautiful.

But he doesn't start with the spacious skies. He starts with, oh, beautiful for heroes proved in liberating strife. Who more than self-th their country loved and mercy more than life. And we take the history of this country and the history of this planet

and we turn it into a piece of music or a symbol of grace. If we do something, we do it with style. You know, and it's, and no matter what it is, we do it better. and I used to think I could play basketball I wouldn't go near a basketball court with a bunch of women on it because they all would beat the day when the Olympics win in Korea

the women's Olympic team was playing an army team and I went to the brothers I said now look don't you all like too rough with these broads I said, you've got to show them some respect. He said, man, you don't know. He probably beats the shit out of us.

And, but I said, well, they said, no, we got to try to get even. And if you look at the way, well, the Atlanta airport, I can remember the lady when they said 80% of the way, of the, no, $800,000 was made by women in the airport. And this black woman said, no, no, no, don't clap. Don't clap. It should be a billion. Come back when you've got a billion dollars.

You've got a woman making a billion dollars in this airport. Then we'll clap. And it's been that pushing. and pulling and thinking and sweating that we have excelled at. Yeah. I just say earlier, going back to what you said earlier, you said it's coming back, right? So my question to you is, does the state of this country where it is now, is it reminiscent of civil rights movement back in the day?

No, it's not because when I came up in a city, well, maybe so, because I was born in 1932, that was a recession year. And there were people starving. That's where Social Security came from. That's where food stamps came from. The government were trying to meet people who were starving. And they were not, they were not black. I mean, and right now, the way the government is moving, it's not doing right for anybody. Yeah. But there's some good happening. And I... What do you feel the good is that's one, one, I believe in this country and I believe in God. And I believe this country is a God-fearing, God-blessed country. There's something, I haven't seen any other country. Well, I've been to, I've traveled 151 countries.

And they're only about 210 countries in the world. And I've been to 150 of them. But I come right back to the United States, and I come back to Atlanta. I enjoy New York. And I'd like to come to New York. But it's just, it takes too long to get places. And the traffic now, you know, I worry about.

But now the traffic's come to Atlanta. So we've got to figure out what to do with that. Well, traffic comes to growing cities. Traffic comes to growing cities, which you built in Atlanta, by the way. $800 billion, sorry, $580 billion GDP. The same, so Atlanta's bigger GDP than Singapore. and he built it. And the people he just talked about,

they built that into what my wife calls Wakanda. And there's nothing like it in the entire world. Again, these are things that he doesn't talk about. Some of it's in the documentary, by the way, some of it's not. A lot of it's not. A lot of it ended up on the editing floor. By the way, thanks Rachel Maddo, Bill Griffin, MSNBC,

for putting resources behind us to make it possible. But this guy's a walking treasure trove of strategic thought. I mean, and most of it is unarticulated, unrecorded. He just goes about his business. Yeah. And he's, he got to just literally pull it out of him.

You start talking, you ask him a question, he goes into 15 other directions. I love it, though. I love it all. He's bragging about other people. You said this now with all of the, you said it's a god-faring country, but when you think about all of the oppression

and black people are facing this country, all the challenges we face in this country, how can those people be fairing? of God treating people like that? Well, because God's son suffered. And suffering is not, suffering is not the end. It's not acceptable. And we should do everything we can to wipe it out,

but we shouldn't be afraid of it. Like, I just have never been afraid to die. And most of us that march with Martin Luther King used to argue and and say, okay, who's bombing ham? Is bombing him? Somebody going to get bombed. And that means I hope, and Dr. King would start preaching your sermon. He said, now if it's you, Shawmane,

I'm going to have a hard time getting you in the heaven, but he ain't lying, though. But he would start with finding some of the things that you have gathered my people together on this radio. And I want to bless you for that. And the Lord will bless you for that. Because you talk to more people about life than maybe anybody else I know. And we're grateful.

We're not going to forget that. But we also know it took you a little. while to get here. And we know that whatever got you here wasn't always, you know, wasn't lessons you learned in Sunday school. And we, we, but you have forgiven the things in the struggle.

And you, you got a place in glory. It's not like you having a hard time getting me in heaven. It's all right. Everybody got their role. I'm not in yet. But doesn't revolution start when people get tired of suffering? Yeah, no.

Revolution, I think, is continuous. And like I picked up one of your books off the table. And what is it? Get honest? A die lying. And sometimes in history, history, books like that would make one group of people wake up. Now, it's hard to get us to read, that's why you're on the radio, but that's why we're

on television also. And Dr. King used to say that news media is worth a million dollars a minute. we would try to get our demonstrations on ABC, NBC, and CBS, and, you know, Kronkite and Brink. But each one of them, if you could get on those three, that time is worth a million dollars a minute. And so you put in some good hours here. Thank you, and you built a good audience. Is it true that you made the call to Ms. Corrida Scott King after Dr. King was shot? Did you make the call to Ms. Corretta Scott King when Dr. King was shot?

I did, but she had already heard it. But I knew Corretta, see, Corretta and my wife grew up together in a little country town. And we talked all the time, and they talked to each other. and she wasn't crying she wasn't she said well there's what I've been worried about but now we have to carry on and that's the way all of her children have tried to carry on and it's hard and but all of us in some way a Dr. King's children. And we see the example that he said, and we see her.

She was up here in Boston trying to train to be an opera singer. And he said, I'm, I need you back down south with me. She actually raised money. She would do concerts. Credit of Scott King would sing concerts, operating concerts,

and raise money for the civil rights movement for her husband. Behind every successful man is an exhausted woman, which is why he keeps telling the story of women who don't get the credit, who don't get acknowledged. He keeps pulling... I do admire that he keeps pulling everybody into his story so they get their name mentioned so that they get acknowledged.

His wife now is strong. His first wife, Geneal, Chow Jung, was strong. when he was you and ambassador they went to Gene Child's hometown little country town in Alabama

and they were on they were in an open air car and Gene Child wrong said hey Andy she called him Andy there's a guy I used to date in high school

he's a bum now he's on a street corner so Bassie Young's a new I said I said golly I guess you're glad he he had a hard time in Vietnam

and he he's not doing right, I guess you're glad you didn't marry him. And she says, she is. If I married him, he'd have been the ambassador to the United Nations. And that's true. And there's a John Bryan quote. Behind every great man is an exhausted woman. Many exhausted women.

I'm glad that you keep bringing up, you know, other people. and I'm glad the doctor is called the dirty work because I think playing your position is a lost start. I think everybody wants to be a star now. And it's like, you know, it makes me wonder, has social media made the struggle too performative because people don't see that unseen grind. They don't see that dirty work.

They don't understand how important playing your position is. Well, you know, the, Those who in music noted you've got to create a certain harmony, a certain rhythm, that you can't do it. I mean, jazz was everybody soloing on their own. But the music now has far more, well, in good times it has melody. In hard times, it gets funky. But you've got each one. expressing the way they feel.

And somehow when you hear it and it relates to you, you go out and buy the records or you turn on whatever it is, you have to turn on nowadays. I don't have one of them. I don't have one of them. Anyway, go ahead. No, but it's, this is a very complex life. I mean, when I lived in New York, I worked up on the near Harlem and near Riverside Church.

And one time the lights went off. And I had to walk from up there at 120th and Broadway across the Queensville down bridge to get a bus on the other side to get me up to Hollis. And it's a huge complicated city. And there's nothing simple. But you have to figure that for anything to work in this city and in most great cities, there's got to be a series of teams that are making it work. And most of the time, you don't see the ones that are in the background. Yeah.

And you don't, I mean, you, you might see the cook that's preparing the meal, but you don't see the guy that had to slaughter the cow. With all this work and, you know, all the sacrifice that you guys put in, when Martin Luther King was here, he wasn't as liked and as revered by everybody as he is today. How do you feel when you say? Oh, he almost was, you know. Almost talk about that. I mean, there were a few people who were jealous of him.

who wanted to be him. But they were preachers too. But he was one. They never stopped that kind of hate. I just want you, they've never stopped that kind of hate. No, but he, he did not let that bother him. And it, well, well, you have to watch your enemies.

But you see them better if you bring them closer and try to get them involved in what you're doing. And, you know, the teams that win play together. And everything requires a team. Now we get into a real conversation. Can you tell me about the team that you and Clarence Avon formed? Oh, Lord. I tell you, that is one of the,

he's one of the most beautiful brothers I've ever made. Matt. Love him. He called me and said, I'm trying to reach Andrew Young, Andy Young. I said, yeah, I'm Andy Young. He said, nigger, are you crazy? And I said, I don't know what, why you what makes you think that? They tell me you running for Congress in Georgia. Don't you know that they just killed Medica over there in Mississippi, how you ain't got a good sentence and you want to run for Congress? I said, well, before Dr. King was killed, the last thing we talked about was how are we going to take our people from the streets into politics? And with John came along, it was from the streets to the suites and the banks. And how are we going to integrate

the money. How are we going to integrate the culture? And he said, well, if you're crazy enough to run, I'm crazy enough to help you. And I said, what would you, he said, what would you do if I could get Bill Cosby, if I could bring Bill Cosby and Isaac Hayes? Now, this was 1970. Bill Cosby was boom and he just got on, you know, and Isaac Hayes was good music out of Memphis. And I said, well, you know, I said, I don't even have money to make a phone call to invite him. He said, nigger, I didn't ask you if you had any money. I said, what would you do if they came here?

Right. And I said, well, I'd get to baseball stadium and we'd fill it up. that'd be a great start for a campaign I said but I told you I don't have any money he said I told you I ain't said nothing to you about money money is my business and I shut up and and and he hung up on me

but he found out who can handle the radio I mean the Braves Stadium and it was about in six weeks signs were four weeks. Signs were up all over town

that Bill Cosby and Isaac Hayes were coming to the baseball stadium. And he blew it out, right? And they filled it up in a pouring down rain. And gave you the money. And didn't even charge anything. I love Claren's, man. See? That's my idol.

What was the issue, the real issue between Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X? You know, there was no issue. the difference was that Martin Luther King learned in college, Malcolm X learned in jail. But Malcolm X read the dictionary and the Bible. And when Martin came back with the Nobel Prize,

we were up there in Harlem and the armory. And when we came in the back door, who was standing next in the back door of Malcolm X. Two people. Malcolm X and Nelson Rockefeller. And Malcolm X said, I just wanted to thank you for all that you've done

and I want you to know that I am with you and anything you want me to do. But I think that it's probably better strategy if you and I don't seem to be so close. And said, that's why I'm not going to come in there with you in public. He wasn't trying to profile.

Malcolm was not trying to take his life. Malcolm did used to disparage Martin publicly sometime, though. We'll call him Uncle Tom. That was his brand. It wasn't Malcolm so much as it was that whole whole crowd around Elijah Mohammed. Now, but Martin

was close to Elijah too, it seemed like. I know. Well, because when we, because when we came to, if we were, if we went into a town, like when we went to Chicago, we got all the big preachers together and got them to agree that we would be there with them and that they could tell us what they wanted us to do. Now, some didn't like it, and some just didn't want anybody to have a profile but them. and we just went on around them.

But Malcolm, well, I met Malcolm when I was here, and Mike Wallace did the story on Malcolm on 60 Minutes. And the black guy who was working with Mike Wallace was married to one of my secretaries at the National Conference. of churches. And they invited me and my wife over to dinner. This was before Malcolm X was even known around. But we'd had dinner a couple of times together. Anytime he came to Atlanta, he came by our office. But Martin was never there. But he went to Selma to see Martin. And Martin got arrested that day and was in jail. So he spent the day with Corretta and me and spoke at the

mass meeting that night and then went on his way. Come on, Malcolm. Malcolm. They haven't met? They met once? Yeah, they met. No, they met several times. But it was always in private. Publicly. Yeah, publicly. Yeah. That's when they had that that picture together. Yeah, yeah. By the way, when he became mayor, just the point about people playing their Rose, when he became mayor of Atlanta, the civil rights leaders, his friends, the second day he was mayor, they picketed him. So he went outside. He said, what are you guys doing? They said, well, you're the mayor now. So you got your job, we got ours. And he accepted that. So Malcolm was playing his lane, is playing his role publicly. But privately, he respected Dr. King and just didn't

feel that he was useful to him. By the way, a lot of these, the black power movement, out of standing right next to Dr. King, walking in the South, the Black Power movement, that's where it started. They used Martin's visibility to get visibility for what they were doing, which was easier because he were angry, black power getting angry. So, and Martin allowed all of that. He allowed everything to flourish around him. He wasn't insecure, but he just wasn't his, it wasn't his way. What he did was on just that, he invited, uh, stokely to come to church

said next time you're in Atlanta if you're in Atlanta on a Sunday please come to church and then come home and have dinner with us afterwards we need some time to talk and he came to Atlanta went to church and then they went home together

and Coretta fixed dinner well preachers wives always have a way of fixing food no matter who's shows up they got enough. Yeah.

But isn't it true that all of those leaders at some point criticized Dr. King? Yeah. Snick. Snick. Go ahead. Yeah, Snick. I mean, that's why I love the documentary

King in the Wilderness. You know, because it shows that, but it seemed like it was respectful. Yeah. You know, like they were walking together and they were disagreeing during interviews, but it was respectful disagrees. Yeah. Yeah.

But people like John Lewis. I like now. Never disagree. you know and it was it was people I mean you have rivalries on the same football team but they all run in the same play and and and that's sort of that's sort of the way we were we said look we may disagree on how to get there but we all are trying to do the same thing and we can do it best if we do it together. So Charlemagne, what I'm hearing from, what I've learned from him is the mission back then was we.

The mission now is me. Yeah. This is the, basically, if you want to summarize what the problem is and what you brought up earlier, people would wait today wake up and go, I'm tired of talking about me, now you talk about me, me, I, I'm, and if it doesn't benefit me, I'm not interested. My likes, my engagement, my views. That's right. My opinion.

And if I got to hurt you, if I got to step on you to elevate myself, then so be it. Back then it was almost the exact opposite. Well, even now. I mean, I just... You're being gracious. Yes. I'm not being great. You are being gracious.

I'm being respectful. Exactly the point. But I've learned this from here. I'm trying to find if you're going to get along with people, you can, Easily point out differences. But if you really want to work together, you've got to find those few things that you agree on. And say, let's get this straight first.

That's right. And that's true in the neighborhood. You know, it's true in everything we do. Yeah. I totally respect what you said a little bit back when you said, I've never been afraid to die, right? But I think it's greater that you've never been afraid to die without making a difference or without making a change because you've got a lot of young people that aren't afraid to die either,

but for the wrong reasons. No, they're afraid. Okay. They scared to death. Okay. And it's because they're scared that they do stupid things. I mean, most street fights would be avoided if somebody could say, blow a whistle and say, just take 10 seconds to cool off.

They wouldn't shoot. But they're doing something, and I don't really understand it because I've never had to be that way. So let me, Bridget. The most dangerous person in the world is a person with no hope. So they had hope?

Slow that down and say that again. The most dangerous person in the world is a person with no hope. they had hope. They had self-esteem, not just confidence. You can be great in music or great in whatever, and have enormous confidence, but have low self-esteem.

They had spirituality. They believed in something larger and more important themselves. Dr. King said, I'm here to say black people. He said, I'm here to redeem the soul of America from the triple evils of war, racism, and poverty. He wrapped everybody in his vision, and he brought everybody in and then lifted everybody up, And with it, yes, black people got lifted too.

But it wasn't black people only or black people at the cost of everybody else. And so he made it hard for people to disagree with them. But he had his own self-esteem. When you have no hope, your life has no value. They are willing to die because they had hope. Because it wasn't about them. It's a different nuance. They valued themselves enough, they valued everybody else enough that they're willing to sacrifice themselves.

So that's a different thing than I don't value me. I don't value it. I'm not going to live to 25 anyway. What does it matter? None of this matters. So I'm not. The most dangerous person in the world is a person with no hope. That's why he said he can't relate to it.

So it is that, Charlie, what you said earlier about has it changed? Are you asked? Yes, I think it has changed. It's me, me, I, because I don't value myself. I need to keep pouring water in this cup because this cup has no bottom. The cup has no bottle. I'm pouring all the time. Trying to fill up my self-esteem.

And people need validation. They seek validation. Yes, through everything. So what he's talking about is purpose and life. My God, what he's got to... What's your real purpose? What's your intention? What are you here for?

Yes. And you guys are, I think, the most powerful what you do in the country, and I believe in the world, because you're all about something. You don't just show up here. Me, me, I, I. Again, you facilitate a conversation, and you wouldn't let the other person be, you want the other person to be the center of that conversation to pull it out of them, and you even sacrifice yourself sometimes with the people talking mess to you.

You got to know who you are. He knows who he is. Dr. Can you tell him a quick story? It's not in the documentary. Quick, quick story about, I'm just trying to do this quick because I'm trying to get a lot in and a little bit of time. When you came back with Dr. King from the Nobel Peace Prize and President of the United States, This was when he saw Malcolm and Rockefeller, and the President of the United States refused to meet with you guys

because he didn't want the ask that he knew was coming. And you were in New York. Rockefeller offered you his jet. Well, Rockefeller assumed that we were going to see the President Johnson, and he said, you all can let me know what time you want to leave. I'll have my jet ready to pick you up and take you down to Washington. And that was in the paper. So we got an appointment we thought for three o'clock

And we got there on time With the president With the president We got there on time But they said he was tied up with the Generals talking about Vietnam He didn't want to see him And

It I mean we really didn't get to see him till dark It was about 6 o'clock Two or three hours late But we were with the vice person president and the attorney general talking about voting rights. When we got in with President Johnson, he was really depressed. And he said, I agree with you, Dr. King. Everything Martin says, he said, I agree with you. I just don't have the power. And that was his only answer.

Everything we said, he said, I agree with you. I just don't have the power. He's the president. Who had the power if it wasn't him? Well, he didn't have the votes. And he'd just gotten beat up by the people who were trying to get him to drop atomic bombs on Vietnam. And so he was depressed. And when we left, I said to Dr. King, I said, you know, the president is right. He doesn't have the power. And we don't either.

And I said, this is a perfect time for you to take a sabbatical. You need to take three or four months off, go wherever you want to go, think this through, take your family or not. And then after the next election, we'll have a better position. And he said, no. I said, well, what are you going to do? He said, we've got to get the president some power. And I said something else, and he said, no, we got to get the president some power.

And finally, I said, nigger, you more housemen, you broke. You see, because the Nobel Peace Prize was $60,000. Rockefeller doubled it, so we had $120,000. But then Martin divided up against all six, he gave everybody a, a sixth of it. Every civil rights organization, he split up the money. And keeping anything for himself.

And, and, and, and, I, I said, here, we ain't got a pot to piss in or window to throw it out of.

And you're talking about getting the president some power. I say, you niggas got some nerve. And I was talking, I went to Howard, he went to Morehouse. So we always were picking on each other.

And that's the only thing he'd kid you about. But when we got back home... So you can tell you... What's it about a Moorhouseman? You can tell Moor Housemen? Well, yeah. I mean, that was my line. I said, you Moor Houseman got more nerve

than a brass-ass monkey. You ain't got a pot to piss in or a window to throw it out of, and yet you're going to get the President of St. What did he say? Huh? He just said we're going to get the President's of Power. So what happened? When we got back, two days later,

Amelia Boynton called and said she was on the way to see us from Selma. Now, Amelia Boynton had been in Selma since 1932, that's the year I was born. And she went there at 18 with George Washington Carver to teach sharecropper women how to feed, their children in the midst of the recession. And so they were doing things like smashing beans. Here you go again, tell everybody else's story.

What happened in Selma? But in Selma, when we got to the office, she called and said she was there to see Dr. King. And she and three preachers came in and told what was happening in Selma and said, we have to, you have to help us.

And this was just before Christmas. So he said, well, right after Christmas, we'll come over. And, you know, everybody has an Emancipation Day celebration on

the 1st of January. And so we didn't have it on the 1st of January because that was a, that was the first Sunday and that's the reason that threw everything off but we had it on the second Sunday and

we didn't have it on a Sunday we had it on Tuesday and so but that's when we started to sell them a movement 90 days later Lyndon Johnson was on television saying we should over So back up.

So the important part of this is Dr. King made a commitment to go to Selma. If he had shown up in Selma, the police wouldn't have attacked John Lewis. They wouldn't have attacked Dr. King strategically a bad move. They would have let Dr. King march. But Dr. King got the wrong date. That's what he just, that's what just, again, history for him is just like talking about, like, that's a monitor. He just glossed over it. They told him the lady in Selma a date, but they, oh, I can't come on that.

date, that's the first Sunday. I got to be in my church. So he stayed back and sent Andy Young, Basie Young, I called him Bastion, to go there for him, like make sure that the Mike gets in trouble. Don't let anybody march. He got there and said, well, these people will march anyway, but they're going to probably go turn us around, so don't worry about it. Well, 300 people in the country town. That's a lot of folk. So they didn't turn them around. They let them march, but then the troopers ran,

that's that famous film where they ran over everybody and they knocked John Lewis out. All that was an accident. I mean, it wasn't supposed to happen because Dr. King was supposed to be there. It was supposed to be in a proper speech. So all are because Dr. King had to be in his church on First Sunday, and they got the date wrong. So they called John Lewis, Doc, accidental trouble then. That's it. That's what he used to talk about, good trouble.

Yeah, good trouble. Absolutely. And so that then triggered three months later. It wasn't, it wasn't, that was the first of March. Yeah, it was, 4th of July. And what happened? He signed a civil rights bill. Wow.

And that gave us the right to vote. Wow. Got him some power. Two little black boys from the south, flipping the President of the United States. You've been very generous with your time, man. His interview's been longer than the documentary, by the way. Okay?

But we appreciate it. And I want to leave on this, the dirty work. If the dirty work documentary could teach one lesson to this generation and the next generation to organize this, what would you want it to be? Well, you know, I call it to dirty work, but when I kind of realized I had no purpose in life, and the way I decided,

I said if there's something that I think needs doing and nobody else wants to do it, that's my job. And that's the way I defined my calling. When I went to work with Dr. King, nobody wanted to work with him. He didn't have anybody there. And so I've started, well, Wyatt Walker was coming down, but he hadn't gotten there yet. And it's, and once I got there, most of the stuff that nobody wanted, no, nobody wanted to go sit down and argue with white folk.

And I didn't argue because I would, I would be cool. But if Jose had gone, he would want to. it would have been an argument because he had to argue about everything. But that was my role, which was, which I did, though I didn't necessarily like it to be in that role all the time. But it, so what's the lesson of this generation? The lesson of this generation is there is some dirty work in any struggle for freedom.

but dirty work could be hard work. Dirty work could be thoughtful work. You know, whatever nobody else wants to do. Like we didn't want to mess with money. And John decided that he was going to teach folk how to, that you can't be free without voting, but neither can you be free if you broke. And so teaching people how to manage money,

how to save money, how to invest money, how to know the meaning of money to your salvation and survival. That's another issue altogether, but communications is an issue. So don't be afraid of doing the dirty work, embrace it. It is noble work, is that dirty work? Yeah. Is that right? Not only the noble work is, it's,

is the kind of work that has to be done. So when Charlemagne was doing that internship way back when, in that first radio program and when people noticed you, that was the dirty work. Absolutely. I'm sure you've done dirty work in your career. Both of you not always been sitting here prime time. You've had to hustle.

You've had to do things and jobs nobody else wanted. I still do the dirty work now. You need me. Maybe. And the work you're doing with mental health, the foundation you're doing, the stuff that nobody sees, the conversation that we have at two in the morning about life in general, all that's the dirty work. And raising your children is the most honorable version, raising your paying, paying school fees. Like, we've got to be about the basics. We've got to get back to the basics and be about we and notches about me.

that's really who he is. And I spent Moses' interview trying to draw him out. This was good. You could see him. Yeah. This was good. I loved it. John O'Brien,

thank you for bringing this walking memorial, this iconic, this icon living, Mr. Andrew Young. Thank you for coming, brother. Thank you for having me. That's right. And check out the dirty work this Friday on,

it's a peak eye, right? MSNBC. MSNBC, globally. On MSNBC globally. 9 p.m. 9 p.m. this Friday. Thank you, brother. Thank you.

And thank all of your audience. Yes, sir. This is college on the radio. Woo! I like that. That's a word. If you didn't have money to go to college, listen in. That's right.

Thank you. It's the Breakfast Club. Every day I wake up. Wake your ass up. The Breakfast Club. If you're all finished or y'all done? This is an I-Heart podcast, guaranteed human.