This analysis of four Black religious leaders–Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, Joseph H. Jackson, and Adam Clayton Powell Jr.–reviews their differences and determines whether grounds for coalitional activity still exists. These leaders all clearly agreed that racism should be opposed but they vigorously disagreed on the forms the opposition should take.
Peter J. Paris is Elmer G. Homrighausen Professor of Christian Social Ethics at Princeton Theological Seminary in Princeton, New Jersey.