presents afterwords. this week, author and civil rights activist, clarence jones, talked about behind the dream. he examines the creation of the i have a dream speech. the stanford university scholar and resident discusses the relationship with the civil rights leaders and civil fellow adviser. he talks with herb boyd. >> host: clarence, i feel so absolutely blessed and stonished to be with here because over the years, i have been trying to catch up with you and get a better understanding of king's life. you spent a solid eight years with him, and in four or five years there's been books where

you've been cited. i said, i need to catch up with him because i need that same information. i was never successful, but someone else was trying to catch up with you at that time, and that was dr. king. what would martin say, your first book, there's a very, very rivetting section in which you talk about the first time you had an opportunity to meet dr. king. >> guest: that's in the opening paragraph. just quickly, first of all, i'm delighted to be here, okay, and have this opportunity to talk to you. we have so many mutual friends in common. wow, your question brings me back so many years to february 1960. i was 29 years old. i'm going to be 80 years of age this saturday. i was just seven months out of the university law school. i got a call from a distinguished judge and lawyer in new york city.

>> host: from the delaney family? >> guest: yes. he had written me recommendations for law school. he called me and said, clarence, i'm the chief -- i've just taken on the chief defense counsel of defending dr. king from montgomery, alabama who's been indicted for tax evasion. i listened, and we have three other excellent attorneys two tax specialists from chicago. we need a law clerk. we need somebody to do the legal research. i mean, today we were just -- today, a law clerk, of course, has if you're clerking for a justice of the supreme court, but i knew in a defense case

here, i was essentially going to be a law clerk, aka a legal gofer. i was in california, and this was in alabama. i had just come to california in june of that year, and so i listened, and i said, well, judge, i'm willing to help you and do anything i can, go to the library, research, and mail the research to you. no, no, you have to come here, clarence. i said, you know, i'm trying to start a law firm. he said, that's the reason i called you. yoir in the beginning of the law career. whatever you're doing, i'm not trying to denigrate it in any way, but this would be a good experience for you. i said, judge, i can't do it. it was really difficult to say no to him. >> host: yes. that was on a thursday night. on friday morning -- >> guest: i got another call.

he said i didn't at the time, but, you know, dr. king was planning a speaking engagement in california. in fact, he's in the area now. before he left, i told him that he should try to see you when he gets there, and i gave, you know, i gave him your telephone number and so forth. i listened, and i thought to myself, you know, the judge doesn't give up. that's what i told my son. he doesn't give up. well, i'm not going to leave. i was in a suburb. i'm not going to leave and meet martin king, so he says, no, no, i've told him he needs to come to your home and visit with you. that was friday morning or friday night. doorbell rings, two gentlemen standing at the door. one has a hat on and both have dark suits on.

the fellow with the hat on extends his hand, mr. jones? i said, yes. he said, i'm martin king. this is -- they come into my home, sits down, and at that time, i had a reasonably nice home. in some ways you might say i was not living large, but semilarge, you know, and my then wife who is now deceased -- >> >> host: anne? >> guest: yes, anne, she had a green thumb. there were plants throughout the house. there was a tree in the middle of the house. >> host: she would get along famously with my wife. >> guest: by the way, just to

put it in context, this is 1960. dr. king had been successful in the month come ri bus boycott. i don't remember the exact date, but the supreme court handed down a decision outlawing segregation in interstate bus stations. >> host: right, uh-huh. >> guest: he was on the cover the "time" magazine. in common vie knack cue lar, he was considered a celebrity; right? my wife, she reacted to him like he was a celebrity. when i told her he was coming and when in fact he did come into the house, you would have naught that a combination of moses, jesus christ, michael jackson, george clooney, anybody you can think of all rolled into one had walked in.

she was so, you know, -- >> host: she knew in advance he was coming so the house was prepared? >> guest: oh, yes, yes, yes. they come into the house. there was snacks and so forth, and he sits down, and we go -- he gets right to the point. he says, you know, mr. jones, there are lots of white lawyers who help us in the south, help us in our work. he didn't say in the south, but help us. he said, but what we need are young negro lawyers. we need young negro professionals. the judge has spoken so highly about you, and i would hope that you would help us help me in this case because the judge

thinks so much about you. i listened, and he described what he was doing, and then he asked me questions about myself and so forth. i told him, and i said i was an only child. my mother was a maid and a cook. my father was a chauffeur. i was born in pennsylvania. my mother was old a gardener. i was born in january 8, 1931. the only house they had were the house of the people in which they worked as domestic servants, so that i have this recollection before the age of 6 of being in four different foster families. now, foster families are really, they were friends of my parents. >> host: i see. >> guest: looking back, they probably said, well, would you keep little clarence for us? i had four different families at that time. by the age of 6, my mother said we have to change this, so they

put me in a catholic boarding school. i told him about that experience, raised by irish nones, a boarding school. my mother died when i was a junior in columbia college, and she never lived to see my graduate. i was only 19 years old at that time, a lot of things. i repeated and said i really would like to help you. in fact, dr. king, i said i will do anything here that i can. contextual again, no cell phones or blackberries. i don't think there were fax machines. in fact, when you wanted something urgent, you went to the post office and sent it special delivery. i believe they had mailgrams, but unless you used a special carrier service, that's the way you did it.

>> host: different times. >> guest: just a few minutes out of the door, and my wife says to me and turns to me and says, what are you doing that's so important that you can't help this man that came all this distance to see you and ask for your helpment i said, hold on, anne, that's not quite accurate. he didn't come this distance to see me. he had a speaking engagement in california anyway, and the judge thought he would stop by, but he didn't make the trip to see me. she says -- well, i don't, you know, she pushed me. i do remember saying, look, just because some negro teacher got his hand caught in the cookie jar, that's not my problem. if he wasn't guilty, she wont be indicted. she said, i don't believe you. >> -- i said, well, that's the way i

feel. she was angry at me. >> host: yes. >> guest: and then i was angry at martin king in my mind because like young couples, we have no major arguments between us, and here this big well developed teacher, this stranger comes to my house and in a matter of two hours gets my wife angry at me. i'm angry at him. i have a hostile attitude towards him after that. next morning, i won't spend too much time on this, but next morning, phones rings. i pick it up. mr. jones? yes. i'm dora amc donald, and you know, dr. king his visit with you and mrs. jones, but he forgot to tell you that he wanted you to come as his

guest. he's preaching in las -- los angeles on sunday. my wife was standing there, and i told her what had been said. she turned against me again early in the morning. she says you may not be going to alabama, but you're going to that church. i said, well the invitation is for both of us. he's eight and a half -- she's eight and a half months pregnant so i just go to this church. this is 1960. baldwin hills, as you know or assume you know, it's like in california was the community of southern california. before successful blacks could

move to bel-aire, you know, this is where everybody lived if you had any money. i go to the church. reverend hb charles. i had heard about the church. you know, minimum of 1500 or more, minimum of 1500 people. a large church. dr. king is introduced as guest preacher, and then he gets up, and he says, ladies and gentlemen, brothers and sisters, the text of my sermon today is the role and responsibility of the negro professional in aiding our less fortunate brothers and sisters struggling for their freedom in the south.

i thought to myself, this is one smart dude because he came to the right church, the right pew, the right place to deliver this message. i had never heard him speak before. i had seen him, but heifer heard him -- heard him speak before. i saw him on television and so forth. he began to speak in greater detail, greater eloquence and greater passion. i had never heard anybody speak like that before. a passionate description of the struggle in the south, and then he pauses. i'm sitting like one-third, middle sort of front area. he looked at me, and he says, for example, there's a young man sitting in this church today. my friends in new york whom i

respect, they tell me that this young man's brain has been touched by the lord. they tell me that this man's brain was touched by jesus that when we goes into the law library and reads things and does legal research, just what they tell me, that he goes all the way back to the time of 1066, 1066 where the conqueror and the magna carta, and then when he writes this down, the words are so compelling, that the words jump off the page. i'm thinking to myself, i absolutely don't have the slightest thought he's talking to me. i'm thinking to myself, i've

only been in the law field 7 months. i know starting out as a young person like today, it's all about networking. i thought after the service, i want to meet this dude that he's describing. that will help me get ahead. then he continues on. he said, but i had a chance to visit with this young man, and he forgotten from wince he came. i thought, oh, lord. he then begins to tell the church things that -- he told the church things which i told him about myself that was said not necessarily in confidential, but in private. the only thing cocompare it to is "killing me softly," and he was killing me softly with

stories i gave him about my life with my parents who were domestic servants, and then as he said, he quoted this poem from langston hughes. he changed it to be my mother, and then he used the point like so many of you sitting in the audience today know you wouldn't be here other than the fact that somebody worked in somebody's white folk's house in order for you to be a lawyer. as he talks about this, particularly as he began to put my mother within the context of the poem, tears began to come down my face. it was like, you know, it's over. i'm bestirred.

as i said, he was like a celebrity; right? the church service is over. he's standing on the stephens of the pulpit -- steps of the pulpit, and as i'm walking toward him, he looks at me and smiles like a cat about to pounce on a mouse. he says, i never mentioned your name, mr. jones. i never mentioned your name. i walked to him. he says, you know, we understand us baptist preachers have to make an example to make our point. i just kept walking towards him. i extended my hand to him, and i put my hand into his hand and i said, dr. king, when do you want me to go to month come ri, alabama -- montgomery, alabama? the deal was sealed. what martin said about me, but really the sub text title should have been i was the making of a disciple. it changed my life, no doubt

about it. >> host: from there, clarence, what happened with the case? >> guest: oh, oh, the case. think about this, in april -- get my memory on the exact month, but the case -- he's acquitted by an all-white jury. >> host: may 6, 1960. >> guest: yeah. the reason he was acquitted, you know, bob laten, you know, these two tax attorneys in chicago, one had been a supervisor for the internal revenue service. one was the supervisor attorney for the internal revenue service, and the other had been a tax examiner for the revenue service. they literally destroyed the state's case, so it was clear to

me that the only way that those 12 white people could come back and bring a conviction, they said, we can't convict this because we're going to look like fools. racism may be something, but pride had something to do with it. they acquitted him because they destroyed the government's case. how can you convict somebody? they'd look like fools. that was amazing. >> host: yes. >> guest: but i don't think that -- i don't think that the judge, you know, there was -- we've had great lawyers, obviously, as you know from the 1954 case. >> host: sure, oh, yes. >> guest: fairgood marshall and clarence benjamin, but anyway, brilliant, brilliant

lawyers. >> host: yes. all the way down to johnny cochran. >> guest: oh, please, johnny cochran. >> host: what happened from being his attorney to being a confidant? >> guest: well, i ended up being -- first of all, there's a person i haven't mentioned. his name is stanley david leverson. >> host: should americans know who he is? >> guest: should they know? they will know after they read this book. this book is dedicated to him. now, why do i do that? he met martin king in late 1956, i believe, early 1957. he was an independently wealth -- not extremely wealth, but independently wealth

management attorney. he developed a bond with martin king. primarily, initially in terms of fund raising, stanley had this art of writing appeal letters, fundraising appeal letters. virtually all of the appeal, the letters soliciting money under martin king's name or on southern christian leadership letterhead, were substantially if not entirely written by leverson. stanley and i became very good friends when i came to new york, and -- just you moved to riverdale? >> guest: yes, in 1961.

>> host: yes. >> guest: and i immediately began working with, oh, not cleveland robinson, but the -- one of the top labor leaders in harlem and stanley, but particularly with stanley. the fact though was the north -- the fact the northern of the southern christian leadership conference was on, and jack o'dell. interesting, both jack and stanley had an organized left wing background. they were members of the communist party. >> host: yes. >> guest: stanley and his brother, an identical twin, were members of the communist party

up until 1956 i know, and they broke with the party over the soviet invasion of hungary, and that severed all relationships. >> host: okay. >> guest: i thought the civil rights movement and the relationship with martin king became the substitute for stanley. stanley was such an intensely organized person with causes. he severed the connections of the communist party and the civil rights movement became what the communist party had been to him. he devoted most of his nonprofessional working time to martin, but they developed a close working relationship, and -- >> host: too close for some people. >> guest: too close for some people, and as a result, i and stanley then began to work jointly. in fact, a large part of the

cash, a large part of the creditability, other than that which i earned on my own in relationship to martin, a large part of it was also from the fact that stanley would consistently -- in my presence even when i wasn't around, he would consist tently refer to -- consistently refer to me as one of the people he could most trust, one the people that was most essential to him, and so martin began to look at me and stanley together, look at me as a right hand. stanley was older, but we worked together. >> host: yes. >> guest: and so the reason -- and there came a time, there came a time in june 1963 when martin was having -- it was a

civil rights meeting at the white house, and john kennedy took martin away from the meeting and walked with him privately in the rose gardens saying i have bad news for you. two of your high-ranking people with communist, and one is a soviet agent, a spy. that's stanley leverson and jack o'dell. jack was an organizer for the maritime union, and jack when he appeared before a committee, he had taken the 5th amendment and so forth. now, the difference between jack and stanley in relationship to martin, that is, is that stanley had told martin, had told him that he had been a member of the communist party, and he had severed relationships with them, okay?

jack o'dell never told martin. it just never became an issue, but he never told him, okay? when srb -- so what when president kennedy revealed this thing about stanley, i don't know exactly what martin said in the conversation with the president, but, in fact, he told me, i told the president i knew about stanley's background, but was surprised with jack's. the president said they had to go. in fact, they used the analogy at that time, there was a scandal with the mcmillian government, and he said, i don't want -- if you get brought down as a civil leader, you bring us down because we have a major civil rights building. you have to get rid of them. >> host: yes. >> guest: the very next day, martin coming to new york. it's important. he comes to new york. we're having a one-on-one

discussion. he knew stanley before i did, and he said to me, clarence, do you think he's a communist? i said, no i don't. i said, but you introduced me to him. he said, well, yeah, but do you think that maybe he rejoined the party? i said, absolutely not, absolutely not. why are you so sure? i said, stanley would have to be -- he has an identical twin, but not two bodies. aside from his son and wife and when he says his identical twin, roy, he spends most of the part-time with me or with you. when he's not in his office, he's with me or on the phone with me. i don't know how or what kind of party member he could be because when does he do it?

it has between 1 a.m. in the morning and 6 a.m. in the morning when he's supposedly sleeping. it's not possible, and then, i didn't know it at the time which is why the fbi thing is so vicious. the fbi, they say that stanley's a communist and king has to get rid of him, but guess what? the bureau approached both stanley and roy bennett after they broke with the party knowing they had broken with the party and asked them if they would be double agents. in other words, they knew they were no longer communists, but wanted them to resume their party membership. i often wondered whether they were angry at stanley because he turned them down, and they wanted to continue to paint him as a communist, okay? >> host: yes. that's interesting point, though, clarence because now

stanley is coming close to martin. obviously, the whole wiretapping, surveillance, intel is in motion at that point. >> guest: july 13, 1963 until december 1967, listen to my carefully, every telephone call between martin luther king, jr. and clarence jones, between stanley and martin, every telephone call was wiretapped, and the conversations were transcribed and written down, okay? additional with respect to clarence jones and martin king, every meeting that we atepidded together, every place that we

agreed to meet or actually meet was under photographic surveillance. >> host: what about your home, for example? >> guest: listen, the fact that -- in fact, i said, you know, the wiretap, in fact, you know, i was thinking i used to drink heavily, but, you know, with controlled drinking, but i loved martinis. when i began to have suspicions, not proof, we would have conference calls, and martin, he would double up with laugher because we had a conference call at midnight, and when i had suspicions, i would say hold on now, fbi, do you have your equipment ready? okay, i want to be sure you get everything down, okay, because this is going to be a long conference.

get yourself comfortable. martin would say, stop the thee theatrics, clarence. let's move on. i believe that stanley leverson, this jewish lawyer in any other context when you look back at the magnitude of his contributions to martin king and the civil rights movement, he would be begin the nation's the civilian medal of honor without questions. >> host: he died in 1979. >> guest: yes. so i think that, i think that the movement, the civil rights -- personally, i think that the history of the civil rights movement in relationship to martin king, i think that stanley has not gten his proper

-- gotten his proper due. >> host: yes. >> guest: i think there's been little effort to rebalance or revisit history and not bring the contribution he made to the forefront, so i decided if no one else, i'm going to tell the story wherever i can and dedicate this book to stanley. >> host: it's taken like 47 years to get around to this particular book. what hesitation, what made you decide i have to do this book? >> guest: well, the first -- original he has dation with respect to what would martin say, i was concerned about some of the king family, particularly one whom i have great republic -- respect and affection, but after martin's death, i didn't see things the same way that she saw

them in relationship to martin. i certainly didn't see them in relationship to the assassination, and so i felt that i could speak more freely, and then the other thing is frankly, i got tired. i just get tired of everybody, blacks and whites, appropriating martin king's man -- mental, his words, his speeches for their own. perhaps the most current example of that, i mean, i was into the book when it happened. i couldn't believe that glenn beck was going to hold a rally at the foot of the lincoln memorial on the same day, august 28, 2010, and do it within the context of the i have a dream speech.

now, everybody, martin king doesn't belong to me. he doesn't belong to the civil rights movement. martin king is america's icon, but if you're going to associate yourself with him or even seek to claim part of that, do it within the context of truth and accuracy, okay? i guess i got so tired of having to hear all these opponents of affirmative action quote time after time, i'm aosed to a-- opposed to affirmative action because i stand with dr. king. i want my children to be judged by the content of character and not the color of skin, so martin king is opposed to affirmative action. absolutely wrong. he was one the earliest proponents of affirmative action. he understood the need that --

in fact, he educated johnson. the one where he's giving the commencement address. he says, you can't take a person in slavery and put him at the same position, the starting line. you can't do that. that's unfair. even white southern men from texas can get it, and yet, there's people who can't get it. now, i do think, and i've come to my own conclusion that race-based affirmative action may no longer be an appropriate remedy for this time to the extent that there is going to be affirmative action, it's got to be economic base, okay? in other words, what i'm saying to you is that the poor white person from appalachia, okay, may be entitled to affirmative action remedies just as a poor

african american. color-base or race based is not right. >> host: this speech and you make a beautiful analogy in the met fore of catching lightening in a bottle with this speech. now, in riverdale, he comes up there, working on the speech together, so it's finished and everything -- >> guest: no, we did not work on the speech as a finished entity, as a finished, you know, text. what we did work on was ideas. we worked on content, things that should be in there, okay and even considered language that might be appropriate to express the idea, but

ultimately, you know, i sometimes, i read things, and it says, clarence jones, coauthor of the i have a dream speech. no, that's not accurate. that's an overstatement. every speech that stanley leverson and clarence jones and i contributed in draft form from martin luther king jr., they were martin's speeches. the material which i am pleased to have contributed for him to, this draft material for him to refer to and to include in his final preparation, i'm proud that he included it, but once he included it, it's his, not mine, okay? it's his. i want to make that very clear.

>> host: the insufficient funds and that -- >> guest: well, that -- if there should be any -- there should be no clearer indication of any contribution than that. i'm from an investment banking background, but more than that i was a lawyer, but i had just had an experience in the bail money with raising and getting money from the rockefellers at the chaise manhattan bank. i went to a vault and saw the money to take to alabama. i thought as using an analogy in the first -- i talk about in the opening paragraph, i talk about i said a good analogy would be you can't believe that we've come this far as negro people. i can't believe we've come this far or i think i actually said

we've come here today. we've come here today to redeem, okay? >> host: yes. >> guest: to redeem a promissory note that's been unpaid for insufficient funds. >> host: because of rockefeller, exactly. >> guest: and we can't believe that there's not sufficient funds in the vault. i've been to the bank vault. i looked inside the vault. i said, i can't believe that there's not sufficient funds in the vault of justice to redeem this promissory note. >> host: yes. >> guest: essentially that's the thing. i added on some other things and so i didn't -- >> host: some of the language and stuff, you helped him with. >> guest: no question about that.

>> host: he's on the podium. you're off to the side in the back. he goes along. he gets to, i think, the word dispair. >> guest: the ninth paragraph. >> host: what happened with that speech? >> guest: what happened was harriet jackson who had just -- there was a special relationship with martin king. he would call up and say, sing to me. you know, she would sing to him in the phone, and two of them of the many hymns were his favorite, and those that he asked was precious lord and the old rugged cross. he had this special relationship with harriet. she is sitting up there, and i

don't know -- i don't know what -- she turns to him and says tell him about the dream martin. tell them about the dream. i've often thought, why did she shout that? in fact, somebody just asked me that a couple nights ago. why do you think she interrupted martin and said tell them about the dream. he's reading from the text, okay? when she shouts that to him, tell them about the dream, he acknowledges, looks up, looks out of the podium, and i read his body language. i turned to somebody who was next to me, and i said, these people don't know it today, but they are about ready to go to church, okay? i often thought, why did she yell that? for the first time just this week, i think that maybe she thought that she had heard him speak so many times before, and

this was such a special occasion, and somehow i think she was trying to say to him, martin, you need to preach. >> host: there you go. >> guest: tell them -- she didn't say preach, martin, but tell them about the treem. i think she knew that that would trigger him, okay? i read his body lang when she said that. he pushed the papers aside, grabbed the podium, looked at the audience, and i said these people are about ready to go to church. that's the i have a dream portion. the i have a dream phrase was used before. >> host: yes. >> guest: it was used in a speech in june in detroit. >> host: and chicago two weeks before. >> guest: uh-huh. it's the way he con figured the i have a dream phrase with other words. in the book, i think i say this which is, if i don't, then it

should be said. martin king afar from being an extraordinary gifted or tore as we know, using contemporary currency of technology, this brother, dr. king, he could cut and peas in realtime as he's speaking. i want to be sure you understand what i'm saying. >> host: i hear you. >> guest: he's speaking in realtime, but as he's speaking, he's meantly cutting and pasting and inserting into his or oratory those things he said before. that's what charlie parker does. that's what johnny -- excuse me. >> host: improvisation. >> guest: when he finished, i went up to the podium and told him, you were jon coldtrain.

it was unbelievable. >> host: you can speak to that music thing because you have a music background with the clarinet. >> guest: that's right. you know, as i say, it's a combination. it was a biewsm -- beautiful day. it's the vision of 250,000-plus people. it was the excitement. i mean, think about, you know, he was introduced, and you could feel it. he says, and now it comes to that time -- he's the last speaker. >> host: who wants to follow dr. king? >> guest: yeah. it's that time, brothers and sisters, and now it's my

pleasure and privilege to introduce the undisputed leader of this nation, the reverend dr. martin luther king, jr., and the place just like boom, okay? now, by the way, let me back, you know, there was some discussion in the preplanning march on washington on who was going to speak -- >> host: and how long. >> guest: and how long they were going to speak, right, right. those of us around martin and more tin himself felt he should be the last speaker. we thought it was not appropriate for him to say i want to be the last speaker. okay? so it was raised, and there seemed to be some resistance to

it. i said, come to the meeting with me, okay? they are talking about, well, i think that, you know, one of the reasons you want martin to speak is because you know he tends to speak so long. i listened to the discussion. i'm not getting into names, but they were all jockeying for position on who would be the closing act. finally, i looked at them and i said, now, i want you to think about this. do you really want to follow martin king? think about that. just pause. do you really want to follow martin king. they said, why do you say that? i said, because you run the risk of people getting up and leaving. you know, you don't put your -- when you have a major concert, you know -- >> host: you have

an opening act. >> guest: right. you don't want clarence jones where ray charles should be because i can't sing. apparently, just that question, well, what do you think? well, i think martin should be the last. i called him martin one on one, but everybody else i call him dr. king. it's amazing how that question sort of was the leveling ground. do you really want to follow dr. king? it was, so it was the right man in the right place at the right time. you know what? you know what that speech was? you know, the phrase i have a dream which is repetitive, you

know, a celebrated phrase? >> host: yes. >> guest: looking at a from a syntax point, he's speaking from the future. he's speaking in the future tense, not in the present tense. >> host: uh-huh. >> guest: that's because martin king had more confidence, had more greater prophetic vision of what american could be man america and the government had of itself. >> host: yes. >> guest: you know what america was before martin luther king, jr.? it was a dysfunctional alcoholic, a drug addict who had become addicted to racism and segregation, and it tried different forms to break their addiction, and nothing worked until this teacher from montgomery came along, and he

initiated a program of nonviolent civil disobedience. it's multiple steps. >> host: yes. >> guest: nonviolence civil disobedience which forced america's conscious to publicly see the contradiction in the reality of how it treated 12% of this population, people of color, and what is in the declaration of independence and in our constitution, and it forced america to see that contradiction. that was the first step to enable us to embark on a peaceful recovery. when he was introduced in auslow, norway to receive the

nobel peace prize, among things mentioned, the chairman of the any bole peace committing among the things said, martin luther king, jr., aside from ghandi is the only person in the western world who ushered in and led a fundamental and political social transformation in a major country without violence. think about it. >> host: one of the things in the book, though, that struck me that i didn't know about was the whole measured effort on your part to copy right that speech, not for profit's sake or prosperity. >> guest: it wasn't so much prosperity, but it was because i

had had it up to here with so many people ripping martin off. i had no sense this was going to be -- i knew the event was going to be major, but i had no sense it was going to be a major speech, but i did have a sense that whatever he said was going to be used and exploited, and i figured this time, let's stop it right at the pass. >> host: uh-huh. >> guest: i, in the limited copies that were made that the press got, i made them pull it out and got the circleed c to make sure he was not -- if it's distributed without limitation, you louis your ability -- lose your ability to copyright it under the united states copyright statutes. i did that. i didn't know how important that

was until after the march somewhere downtown by my offices and then by harlem. already, the record places are blaring out this speech. now, i know there was motown record had the rights. i went to the store and say this is 21st century fox. i got on the phone, called the people. they say, we can do this. it's a public domain. i said, excuse me. my two law partners, lawyers from harvard law school, okay, with their help and advice, we quickly went into federal court and got an injunction to -- an injunction and a request for an accounting of proceeds, and then the decision of the judge in the

southern district of new york, he upheld the copyright, okay? at the beginning of october, i don't remember what date it was, but i then formally submitted this speech for statutory copyright protection. in fact, the certificate issued to martin luther for the speech cites him as the author of the speech, but the copyright is issued in my name. in other words, the owner is martin king, but if you see the certificate, it's addressed to me as the person who filed it. i do a reproduction of that certificate in the book so everybody sees it. >> host: one of the thing that struck me also is the possible next book from clarence jones, "the letter from birmingham jail." you played a significant role in

getting that letter. >> guest: that's correct, yes. >> host: tell us about that. >> guest: well, it was the height of the dmon vaitions in -- demonstrations in birmingham in 1963. martin is one of the only people aside from the people who visited, and i went into visit him. when i went into see him, i wanted to see him to get his advice because we were having an enormous problem raising bail money. in other words, we were getting pressure from all the parents whose chirp followed their leadership, and they were in jail. we didn't have the money to bail them out, although we got money from the uaw, but we still didn't have enough money. i go in, martin, we have a serious problem. he almost dismissed me. he said, well, parents, i know. martin, understand how serious this is. there's some people that you suggest i talk to in your name to help. he really -- not that he

dismissed me, but he didn't pay serious attention to the problem i came to discuss with him. he was ride -- writing on toilet paper, newspapers, anything. he said, have you seen this? i said, what's this. it was a full page ad from the birmingham herald signed by 10 white clergyman that told him to get out town because he was a trouble troublemaker. he sat down to write a response to that. i took the writing out, put it under to give to mcdonald. when you visit me again, bring me paper. i would bring from the jail what he wrote, give it over, bring in people so he continued to write. i never looked at what he wrote. >> host: you had to smuggle that in. >> guest: yes. >> host: is it a possible next

book for you? >> yeah, i mean -- >> host: contextualizing the whole behind the dream. >> guest: a letter from the birmingham jail is really an extraordinary -- it's almost like a manifesto in some way, okay? what blue me away when i finally went to read it, he had no books. he had nothing. i'm reading this speech. i would expect him as a doctor in theology to know the scripture. i would expect that, but he was quoting from philosophers, poetry. when i used to do speeches, if you saw me working on a speech, i was sitting with a pile of books. i'm going, all right, i'm getting this and so forth. i'm thinking to me, to myself, dr. king could pull out from his

memory bank. it was a masterful thing. with respect to the next book, no -- >> host: what are you going to do next? >> guest: next is something i learned from the negro participation called no permanent friends, no permanent enemies, only permanent interests. a new paradigm for the political participation of african-americans in the 012 elections. >> host: well, folks, you heard it first here. i think it would be as successful as to what did martin say, and of course what's happening here with behind the dream, and you have an extraordinary journey in having those years with dr. king made you as prophetic as he was i think in many degrees. such a pleasure to talk to you.

>> thank you so much. thank you very much. >> booktv is on twitter. follow us for regular updates on our programming and news on nonfiction books and authors. twitter.com slash book-- twitter.com/booktv. ..