Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm X were two black leaders who greatly influenced the civil rights movement during the 1960s. While they both wanted equal rights for black people, they often differed in their ideas and methods of achieving this goal. Martin Luther King was a strong advocate of racial integration and Malcolm X believed in racial separatism.
Martin Luther King hoped that someday blacks would share in the social and economic opportunity that whites had. For example, in his speech, "I Have a Dream," King stated that he dreamed of a day that the sons of former slaves and sons of former slave-owners would be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood. He dreamed of a day when black people would be judged not by the color of their skin but by the content of their character (King 104).
In this speech, King beseeched blacks not to satisfy their desire for freedom by being consumed with feelings of bitterness and hatred. It was important for blacks to conduct themselves with dignity and discipline in their struggle for civil rights. Above all, they should not be guilty of physical violence. King cautioned that the "marvelous new militancy" which had engulfed the black community must not lead them to a distrust of all white people. King had the vision to understand that many white people wanted blacks to have freedom and that whites would be instrumental in helping blacks achieve this freedom. Accordingly, King believed that the struggle for civil rights was a biracial movement (King 103), as well as one that encompassed people of all religions (King 106).
This, however, did not mean that blacks should be satisfied with their progress. King believed that blacks should not be satisfied as long they could not gain access to same hotels and motels as whites, or as long as they could not gain access to the same places white people could, or as long as they could not vote or have something for which the...