Why did J. Edgar Hoover hate Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.?

The FBI was obsessed with Martin Luther King Jr. from the mid-1950s until his assassination in 1968. King was only 39 when he was killed on April 4, 1968, having spent 12 years—almost a third of his life—under the FBI's watch. In all that time, the bureau—and Director J. read more

Still, most people who see J. Edgar would never know that when segregationist governors such as Ross Barnett (Mississippi) and George Wallace (Alabama) campaigned against civil rights legislation by smearing Martin Luther King for supposedly being part of a"communist training school" in Tennessee and claiming that King"belonged to more communist organizations than any man in the U.S," it was Hoover's bureau that produced information refuting such lies. read more

Hoover was a racist. He was born and spent his entire life in Washington, D.C., which before the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was a very segregated city, and he absorbed the local Zeitgeist. read more

Hoover did not fear MLK, J Edgar Hoover feared Communists were trying to infiltrate the Civil Rights Movement, but when no such evidence emerged, the bureau used the incidental details caught on tape over the next five years in attempts to force King out of the preeminent leadership position. read more

AARON MATÉ: It was 50 years ago today FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover made headlines by calling Dr. Martin Luther King, quote, “most notorious liar in the country.” Hoover made the comment in front of a group of female journalists ahead of King’s trip to Oslo, where he received the 1964 Nobel Peace Prize, becoming its youngest recipient. read more