I guess the best way to describe that would be to connect with the fact that I came out of college just before the big Depression, and I came to New York.

Martin [Luther King] wasn't, basically, the kind of person - certainly at the stage that I knew him closest - wasn't the kind of person you could engage in dialogue with, certainly, if the dialogue questioned the almost exclusive rightness of his position.

My theory is, strong people don't need strong leaders.

In order for us as poor and oppressed people to become part of a society that is meaningful, the system under which we now exist has to be radically changed... It means facing a system that does not lend its self to your needs and devising means by which you change that system.

[Martin Luther] King was one of the two young ministers - and you know how directly oriented the Negro community still is towards the minister as the leader.

I went to what is known as, and was at that time, too, Shaw University in Raleigh, North Carolina. In fact, because of the lack of public school facilities, I began there. I began boarding school at the high school level; in fact, a year below the high school level.

Oppressed people, whatever their level of formal education, have the ability to understand and interpret the world around them, to see the world for what it is, and move to transform it.