Whose Law and What Order?

Abstract

Throughout the 1950s, the Nation of Islam encountered increasing surveillance and harassment from local and state police on the streets as well as inside prisons. As Malcolm X and the Nation of Islam became a force within the Harlem community, they seemed poised to submerge their political and religious differences in the interest of forming a local Black united front. An alliance of Black Nationalists, liberals, and labor activists was forging an ambitious and sweeping political coalition in Harlem around a platform of Black unity. Though the resulting Emergency Committee would not last long, it raises lasting questions about postwar Black social movements and the development of the carceral apparatuses that suppressed them.