I told Mr. Muhammad, "Sir, I agree with you, and I submit, one hundred per cent."
I flew back to New York psychologically preparing myself to tell my Mosque Seven assistants that
I had been suspended-or "silenced."
But to my astonishment, upon arrival I learned that my assistants already had been informed.
What astonished me even more-a telegram had been sent to every New York City newspaper
and radio and television station. It was the most quick and thorough publicity job that I had ever
seen the Chicago officials initiate.
Every telephone where I could possibly be reached was ringing. London. Paris. A.P., U.P.I. Every
television and radio network, and all of the newspapers were calling. I told them all, "I disobeyed
Mr. Muhammad. I submit completely to his wisdom. Yes, I expect to be speaking again after
ninety days."
"Malcolm X Silenced!" It was headlines.
My first worry was that if a scandal broke for the Nation of Islam within the next ninety days, I
would be gagged when I could be the most experienced Muslim in dealing with the news media
that would make the most of any scandal within the Nation.
I learned next that my "silencing" was even more thorough than I had thought.I was not only
forbidden to talk with the press, I was not even to teach in my own Mosque Seven.
Next, an announcement was made throughout the Nation of Islam that I would be reinstated
within ninety days, "if he submits."
This made me suspicious-for the first time. I had completely submitted. But, deliberately, Muslims
were being given the impression that I had rebelled.
I hadn't hustled in the streets for years for nothing. I knew when I was being set up.
Three days later, the first word came to me that a Mosque Seven official who had been one of my
most immediate assistants was telling certain Mosque Seven brothers: "If you knew what the
Minister did, you'd go out and kill him yourself."
And then I knew. As any official in the Nation of Islam would instantly have known, any death-talk
for me could have been approved of-if not actually initiated-by only one man.
My head felt like it was bleeding inside. I felt like my brain was damaged. I went to see Dr. Leona
A. Turner, who has been my family doctor for years, who practices in East Elmhurst, Long Island.
I asked her to give me a brain examination.
She did examine me. She said I was under great strain-and I needed rest.
Cassius Clay and I are not together today. But always I must be grateful to himthat at just this
time, when he was in Miami training to fight Sonny Liston, Cassius invited me, Betty, and the
children to come there as his guests-as a sixth wedding anniversary present to Betty and me.
I had met Cassius Clay in Detroit in 1962. He and his brother Rudolph came into the Student's
Luncheonette next door to the Detroit Mosque where Elijah Muhammad was about to speak at a
big rally. Every Muslim present was impressed by the bearing and the obvious genuineness of the
striking, handsome pair of prizefighter brothers. Cassius came up and pumped my hand,