(intense music)
- I know this guy, couldn't have done it by himself.
And there was a very public hatred
for Dr. King expressed by the FBI and the government.
(forlorn piano music)
- [Graham] When Dr. King was assassinated
what do you remember seeing,
and what do you remember happening?
- (sighing) I remember the day before,
how excited we were about the prospect
of leaving there and going on to Washington.
We came from the courtyard about six o'clock.
POW!
The bullet hit him and severed his tie.
(forlorn piano music)
Pow!
It knocked him against this door.
What you see is him lying here,
his foot in this banister.
It happened so fast.
So I saw his blood just everywhere.
It knocked him against the back of the hotel door.
I remember someone, somebody said get low, get low!
'Cause whoever it was, they had sprayed bullets,
and they could've hit three or four of us in the courtyard.
There's a picture of Andy Young and somebody pointing,
that picture is, we were saying the police coming,
they're drawing guns.
The guns, the shot didn't come, it came that way,
go over where the shot came from.
That's what that picture was all about.
I hate to replay that moment.
He died so young, so innocent.
Such moral authority.
It hurts to think about it, talk about it.
- What do you remember thinking
at the time as all of this is going on?
- I remember vividly saying that we cannot
let one bullet kill a movement,
and we're going on to Washington, and we did.
Most of us are not spending time in Memphis at the trial,
we spent our time in Washington fighting in the war
and fighting for poverty to be ended.
- What did you say on the phone to Mrs. King?
- It was hard to get it out.
Dr. King has been shot, I think in the shoulder.
I couldn't say in the neck.
I'm sure within 8 or 10 minutes
she got a call from one of the wire services
who heard he had been killed.
And that drama took us in many ways to where we are today.
- Why was it important to you in the days that followed,
or the next day, to wear the blood stained sweater?
- My anger.
- Anger?
- My anger, I was upset, I was.
Blood not gonna stop us, we're gonna fight back.
It was a badge of honor.
- [Graham] What's the emotion when you come back?
- [Jesse] It's like pulling the scab off a wound,
it's just raw, it's not healed.
It hurts.
It's so wrong.
He was so young and so strong.
He had so much meaning, so much life left to live.
So much more to give and yet they just killed him.
And our government did not protect him.
Matter of fact, our government sought
to disgrace and discredit him.
Our government helped set the climate for his being killed.
- James Earl Ray, who is convicted of killing Dr. King,
why have you said before you believe he didn't act alone?
- He didn't have the money,
the motive or the organizational skills to do it.
A lone killer getting out of town at six o'clock
and getting into Mississippi and New Orleans,
ending up in London, he couldn't have done that by himself.
- What do you think happened?
- The government was very involved.
- You think so?
To what extent do you think J. Edgar Hoover
played a role in?
- I have no idea.
That gets in too much detail,
except I know this guy couldn't have done it by himself.
There was a very public hatred for Dr. King
expressed by the FBI and the government.
So, when we look at Dr. King's work,
we see evidence that he changed the law,
and changed the culture,
and changed our sense of self-belief.
And we fall then we get back up again
because the ground is no place for champions.
So champions keep fighting.
(clapping)
(intense music)