--- title: Newly Uncovered Letter from FBI to MLK Revealed description: Beverly Gage in the New York Times wrote the letter is “the most notorious and embarrassing example of Hoover’s F.B.I. run amok.” canonical: https://time.com/3582004/fbi-letter-hoover-mlk/ author: Maya Rhodan article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-11-12T21:21:22.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-21T11:23:54.747Z article:section: History og:title: Newly Uncovered Letter from FBI to MLK Revealed og:description: Beverly Gage in the New York Times wrote the letter is “the most notorious and embarrassing example of Hoover’s F.B.I. run amok.” og:url: https://time.com/3582004/fbi-letter-hoover-mlk/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltbf06c92da77f5b11/69875fc5524fc0d79ade9bba/nobel-peace-prize-winner-martin-luther-king-jr-2.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: MARTIN LUTHER KING A PARIS 1965 og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Newly Uncovered Letter from FBI to MLK Revealed twitter:description: Beverly Gage in the New York Times wrote the letter is “the most notorious and embarrassing example of Hoover’s F.B.I. run amok.” twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltbf06c92da77f5b11/69875fc5524fc0d79ade9bba/nobel-peace-prize-winner-martin-luther-king-jr-2.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # FBI Letter to Martin Luther King Jr Reveals Ugly Truths From Hoover's Era by [Maya Rhodan](https://time.com/author/maya-rhodan/) ## Maya Rhodan Nov 12, 2014 9:21 PM UTC  Martin Luther King, Jr., 1964"First person in the Western world to have shown us that a struggle can be waged without violence" Martin Luther King, Jr., 1964"First person in the Western world to have shown us that a struggle can be waged without violence"Gamma-Keystone/Getty Images by [Maya Rhodan](https://time.com/author/maya-rhodan/) ## Maya Rhodan Nov 12, 2014 9:21 PM UTC A scathing letter sent by the [Federal Bureau of Investigation](http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/16/magazine/what-an-uncensored-letter-to-mlk-reveals.html?%5Fr=1) to Civil Rights icon Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. has been uncovered, pulling back the curtain on J. Edgar Hoover’s efforts to discredit the leader as his popularity grew. In the anonymous letter, published for the first time in the New York [_Times_](http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/16/magazine/what-an-uncensored-letter-to-mlk-reveals.html?%5Fr=1) Wednesday, the author refers to the Nobel Peace Prize recipient as “evil,” a “fraud,” and a “dissolute, abnormal moral imbecile.” The author threatens to expose King as an adulterer and in the end flat-out suggests that the leader commit suicide. One passage reads: “No person can overcome facts, not even a fraud like yourself. Lend your sexually psychotic ear to the enclosure. You will find yourself in all your dirt, filth, evil, and moronic talk exposed on the record for all time. I repeat—no person can argue successfully against facts. You are finished.” The FBI under Hoover devoted a great deal of attention to Dr. King, whom Hoover considered a threat to national security, [_Vox_](http://www.vox.com/xpress/2014/11/12/7204453/martin-luther-king-fbi-letter) reports. The letter reportedly came to be after Hoover failed to prove King was a Communist, which he could have used to disgrace him. Yale professor of American History Beverly Gage wrote in the New York _Times_, the letter is “the most notorious and embarrassing example of Hoover’s F.B.I. run amok.” Read the full letter at the [New York _Times_](http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/16/magazine/what-an-uncensored-letter-to-mlk-reveals.html?%5Fr=1). ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3582004/fbi-letter-hoover-mlk/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3582004/fbi-letter-hoover-mlk/"},"headline":"FBI Letter to Martin Luther King Jr Reveals Ugly Truths From Hoover's Era","datePublished":"2014-11-12T21:21:22.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-21T11:23:54.747Z","description":"MLK is depicted as evil and a fraud in the letter that urges the civil rights icon to commit suicide","url":"https://time.com/3582004/fbi-letter-hoover-mlk/","keywords":["Civil Rights","History","FBI","Investigations"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltbf06c92da77f5b11/69875fc5524fc0d79ade9bba/nobel-peace-prize-winner-martin-luther-king-jr-2.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Maya Rhodan","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/maya-rhodan/"}],"articleSection":"History","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltbf06c92da77f5b11/69875fc5524fc0d79ade9bba/nobel-peace-prize-winner-martin-luther-king-jr-2.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"MARTIN LUTHER KING A PARIS 1965","caption":"MARTIN LUTHER KING A PARIS 1965","creditText":"Gamma-Keystone/Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/history/","name":"History"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/civil-rights/","name":"Civil Rights"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3582004/fbi-letter-hoover-mlk/","name":"FBI Letter to Martin Luther King Jr Reveals Ugly Truths From Hoover's Era"}}]}] ```