ABSTRACT
Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm X exerted much influence on American public life. But, as James Cone argues in his Martin and Malcolm and America, the deeper, perhaps spiritual significance of both men has been neglected to the detriment of their respective reputations and missions. At the center of the work is Cone’s effort to demonstrate the rapprochement of the visions of King and Malcolm X. According to Cone, both men were fighting the same battle against the same enemy; they also offered kindred solutions to many problems, for example, the unification of the black community and the quest for freedom. Malcolm X sought to remind African-Americans of their humanity and the possibility of overcoming the limits of their life at the “very bottom of the American white man’s society.” Instead of prophesying about the nation that was to come in the future, Malcolm X wanted African-Americans to energetically and practically confront the America they inherited.
