WI: JFK and MLK Switch Date's of Death

I had a idea a little while ago, which I thought was interesting, so I thought I'd post it on here.

What if John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King were to switch date's of death? To make things more interesting, lets say they are also killed by assassination, but both are killed by the other's assassin, King is killed by Lee Harvey Oswald, and Kennedy is killed by James Earl Ray.

King would now be killed on November 22nd,1963. This would be just a few months after his famous march on Washington, as well as his "I Have A Dream" speeech. I imagine this would make the Civil Rights movement much more violent, to have one of the greatest voices in the Afriican-American community killed so much earlier.

Kennedy on the other had would be killed on April 4th, 1968. Now, I'm going to assume that Kennedy would be re-elected in 1964, so his assassination would now take place in the midst of his last year as President, as well as the '68 Presidential Election. Johnson would become President, at least for the time being, but if he gets elected to a term of his own is probably up him, as well as how the race for the Democratic Nomination is going that year.

RFK is a bit of a wild card in this senario. With his brother alive and still President, he may have stayed on as AG for a few more years than he did in OTL. I doubt he would have run for President in '68, since having one Kennedy serve after another probably wouldn't go over so well. I can see him running for senate, an maybe running for president in 1976.

So, any thoughts?
 
Problem is Ray specifically wanted to kill King "I'm going to get the big ni****", while Oswald wanted to kill the most accessible VIP. He nearly got Walker and would have tried to kill Nixon had Marina not locked him in the bathroom until he calmed down. Now, RFK in a JFK lives scenario will will become SecDef, McNamara goes to State, Rusk to the UN and Katzenbach to Justice. There are so many butterflies, especially on CR that gaming a victor in '68 in a JFK-lives scenario is near impossible. If RFK runs he will win, but I don't think he'd run in '68 if his brother was killed. Given how he exhibited many signs of depression (undiagnosed, since he loathed shrinks or discussing his emotions generally) until mid-1964, it wouldn't be a good idea, and Bobby wouldn't be as effective a campaigner as he usually was.
 
I can't comment on JFK. It's damaging to potential drama on my part.

Concerning MLK (Oswald wouldn't kill him, though. He was a Communist so killing a person fighting for equality would have been a no-no. You needed anti-communists like Nixon and Kennedy and Walker and all that for Oswald to take things into his own hand and act), you could see the rise of more extreme Civil rights movement earlier. In the vacuum, there'd be less of a strong moderate voice to counter the radical voices of Malcolm X and the Nation of Islam. Certainly there were many moderate leaders, but King concentrated all of that, and made it marketable to white society. And certainly there are successors to King who could come to the top, but I think the radicals will have a stronger position compared to the OTL.
 
King was losing his grip on the civil rights movement by April 1968. It became a Catch-22- either involve himself with left-wing causes that have nothing to do with CR, such as the Memphis garbage strike, or risk getting shoved aside and replaced by the Black Panthers. Both would result in a collapse of white support for the movement. In 1963 he is still on top of things. I could easily see King being branded an Uncle Tom by 1973, because he would become too identified with the white establishment. That's what happened to Randolph among others.
 
Oh, that reminds me. ITTL no one will ever know that RFK tapped King's telephone, which was leaked by LBJ before the Oregon primary 24 hours before polling day to prevent RFK's RRT from hitting back. There was no love lost between MLK and Bobby even before those revelations (personality clash mostly), so it always amuses me to see others depict them as BFF.
 
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