Education
Saint John"s University. University of Michigan.
Saint John"s University. University of Michigan.
He was a lifelong activist in progressive causes. Levison was in the leadership of the Communist Party United States of America (CPUSA) in the 1950s. The Federal Bureau of Investigation had him under the surveillance of Jack and Morris Childs, two former CPUSA members who became Federal Bureau of Investigation informants.
According to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Levison"s CPUSA activities ended in 1957.
He had initially been introduced to King by Bayard Rustin, a Quaker, in New York City in 1956. Though King had offered to pay Levison in exchange for his help, Levison refused on every occasion stating that "the liberation struggle is the most positive and rewarding area of work anyone could experience".
He was questioned by the Federal Bureau of Investigation twice, on February 9 and March 4, 1960. Two years later, on April 30, 1962, he was called to testify under subpoena at an executive session of the Senate Subcommittee on Internal Security, where he was represented by William Kunstler.
Large parts of his testimony are still classified.
Although there was no evidence of Levison having further ties to the CPUSA, the Federal Bureau of Investigation used his earlier communist history to justify wiretaps and bugs on his offices and the offices and hotel rooms of Martin Luther King. Federal Bureau of Investigation Director, J. Edgar Hoover, did not consider King to be a communist, but did consider the possibility that Levison might use or manipulate King to stimulate political unrest within the United States. Levison was instrumental in all the activities of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (Southern Christian Leadership Conference), the organization established by King and other Southern black preachers to further the cause of civil rights.
He professionalized the fund raising of the organization and took on many of the publicity tasks, in addition to serving as King"s literary agent.
He was also a close adviser to King and a ghostwriter for him.