How Many Cups #14: The FBI Tells Martin Luther King To Kill Himself

P.S every post this January will be King or King-adjacent

Quick Note: I’m still flabbergasted about why my tiny, unimportant articles have been read over 2,700 times since February of 2022. How encouraging it is, especially the feedback on my 2023 wrap-up. Please, continue to share with family and friends. As always, for the love of the game - Espo.

You Might Need Something Stronger Than Coffee

I hate modern conspiracy theorists. They used to be a righteous mixture of nebulous and gravitational, like a sexy storm cloud. Today however, they just bring zip ties to the D.C because a Pillow Guy sold them snake oil. But this, my dear friends, is far from conspiracy.

For Quite Some Time

…memos and documents from the FBI’s Hoover Administration have been dripping into the basin of declassified government information. In fact, dutiful lawmakers and lawyers have spent decades battling the court system to arrange for their continual cascade into the public realm. The next slate of major documents relating to Dr. Martin Luther King are scheduled to be released in 2027.

Yet we need not wait another thousand days to unearth the jarring and illegal tactics deployed onto King himself. Increasingly renowned biographer Jonathan Eig has done the heavy lifting for us. In due time his latest work on Dr. King will prove to be as seminal as it is revelatory.

For Years

…Director Hoover had coordinated with the Kennedys, both President and Attorney General alike, to wiretap and surveil King. Robert Kennedy in particular was responsible for signing off on the continuation of these wiretaps and at many points simply ignored putting his name on them despite knowing it would not curtail Hoover’s spy games. Both men are complicit in the unlawful, unethical intelligence operation into King’s personal life.

Moreover, Hoover was in possession of audio recordings - captured by FBI microphones - which picked up on the many affairs King had while on the road. Nowadays, his unfaithfulness to Coretta Scott is common knowledge. Back then, however, this information would have been news to millions of admirers. Hence, Hoover tasked his underlings with the leaking of this information to a press corp which repeatedly failed to publish it. Doing so would have been considered beneath their creed.

So Hoover Took The Matter Into His Own Hands

In 1964 Dr. King won the Nobel Peace Prize, likely sending Hoover over the edge. Hoover, inaccurately and foolishly, thought King to be a communist. Or perhaps he labeled him as such to justify his disdain for the Civil Rights Movement and its non-violent messiah.

That fall, according to Eig, Hoover sent a package to the Kings. It contained not only an ominous letter, but a recording of King having sex with a slew of mistresses. The full content of the letter can be read here, but I’ve edited it down to the most relevant parts.

“KING,

In view of your low grade, abnormal personal behavoir I will not dignify your name with either a Mr. or a Reverend or a Dr. And, your last name calls to mind only the type of King such as King Henry the VIII and his countless acts of adultery and immoral conduct lower than that of a beast…

…It is all there on the record, your sexual orgies. Listen to yourself you filthy, abnormal animal. You are on the record. You have been on the record — all your adulterous acts, your sexual orgies extending far into the past. This one is but a tiny sample. You will understand this. Yes, from your various evil playmates on the east coast to ⁠ and others on the west coast and outside the country you are on the record. King you are done.

King, there is only one thing left for you to do. You know what it is. You have just 34 days in which to do (this exact number has been selected for a specific reason, it has definite practical significant. You are done. There is but one way out for you. You better take it before your filthy, abnormal fraudulent self is bared to the nation.

There is little left to infer. “King, there is only one thing left for you to do,” followed by a release date for the tape - Christmas day 1964, which was 34 days after this package was delivered. “There is but one way out for you. You better take it…” The suggestion is as clear as day. Kill yourself, Dr. King, or have your lurid affairs revealed to the world.

Let’s Be Frank About The Stakes

The FBI, by directive of J. Edgar Hoover, pressured the most important Civil Rights leader in American History to take his own life. In other words, an arm of the Federal government called for the death of the greatest champion for racial equality to grace this nation. Rather than have voting rights, equal access to public and private enterprises and the freedom to walk down the street without fear of vigilante murder, the FBI would have Dr. King dead.

It is hard to grapple with such findings, but reconcile them with your personal narrative of American History, you must. This January, this 15th, take some time to ponder the framework of federal power in this nation and how it has impacted the cultural stories we tell ourselves.