Black Panther Party for Self Defense
The Black Panther Party for Self-Defense was founded in October 1966, in Oakland, California by Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale. Armed with sincerity, the words of revolutionaries such as Mao Tse-Tung and Malcolm X, law books, and rifles, the Black Panther Party fed the hungry, protected the weak from racist police, and presented a Ten Point Platform and Program of Black political and social activism. Its "survival programs"-such as food giveaways, free health clinics and free breakfast programs for children-were popular fixtures in Black neighborhoods in the early 1970s, but for the white power structure and the vast majority of the white public, the Panthers represented only anti-government militancy; a view which engendered the wrath of the police and FBI and led to the murder of several Party members by law enforcement.
In time, the Black Panthers dropped the "Self-Defense" label from their name. The organization became more of a Marxist-Communist group that favored violent revolution, if necessary, to bring about changes in society. During the mid-1960's, the Black Panthers called for neighborhood control of such services as education and the police. The Panthers supported the use of guns--both for self-defense and to retaliate against people believed to be oppressing the poor. Hostility between the Panthers and the police led to several shoot-outs. During the late 1960's, the Black Panthers began to work with white radical and revolutionary groups that shared their goals. This policy brought the Panthers into disagreement with some African American groups that regarded the struggle of blacks as chiefly racial. According to the Panthers, the basic problem was economic exploitation of both blacks and whites by profit-seeking capitalists. The Panthers called for a fairer distribution of jobs and other economic resources.
In October of 1967, Huey Newton was shot, arrested and charged with the murder of a white Oakland cop, after a gun battle on the streets of West Oakland that resulted in the death of police officer John Frey. Newton was charges with First Degree murder. Young whites, angry and disillusioned with America over the Vietnam War, raised their voices with young, urban blacks, to cry in unison: "Free Huey!" Newton was convicted of manslaughter but the verdict was later overturned.
Fred Hampton was a high school student and a promising leader when he joined the Black Panther Party at the age of 19. His status as a leader grew very quickly.
Founded on October 15th 1966 in Oakland, California, the Black Panther Party for Self Defense was an organization opposed to police brutality against the black community. The Party’s political origins were in Maoism, Marxism, and the radical militant ideals of Malcolm X and Che Guevara. From the doctrines of Maoism they saw the role of their Party as the frontline of the revolution and worked to establish a unified alliance, while from Marxism they addressed the capitalist economic system, and exemplified the need for all workers to forcefully take over means of production (Baggins, Brian). Mao was important to the Black Panthers because of his different stance on Marxism-Leninism when applied to Chinese peasants. The founders of the Black Panther Party, Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale saw links between the Chinese peasants and the oppression of blacks in America and used Mao’s “little red book” as a guideline for social revolution (Baggins, Brian).
Power Struggle. Revolutionary Suicide: Controlling the Myth of Huey P. Newton. 17 Mar. 2004 .
This political shift materialized with the advent of the Southern Strategy, in which Democratic president Lyndon Johnson’s support of Civil Rights harmed his political power in the South, Nixon and the Republican Party picked up on these formerly blue states and promoted conservative politics in order to gain a larger voter representation. Nixon was elected in a year drenched in social and political unrest as race riots occurred in 118 U.S. cities in the aftermath of Martin Luther King’s murder, as well as overall American bitterness due to the assassination of presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy and the extensive student-led activist opposition to the Vietnam War. The late 1960’s also saw the advent of several movements promoting Black Nationalism to unify the African-American community through the efforts of Black Power, most notably the formation of the Black Panthers in 1967 who were dedicated to overseeing the protection of African-Americans against police brutality and the support of disadvantaged street children through their Free Breakfast for Children program. During this time, black power was politically reflected through the electorate as the 1960-70’s saw a rise in Black elected officials. In 1969 there were a total of 994 black men and 131 black women in office in the country, this figure more than tripled by 1975 when there were 2969 black men and 530 black women acting in office; more than half of these elected officials were acting in Southern States....
In Living for the City, Donna Murch details the origins and the rise to prominence the Black Panther Party experienced during the 1960s and into the 1970s. The Civil Rights Movement and eventually the Black Panther Movement of Oakland, California emerged from the growing population of migrating Southern African Americans who carried with them the traditional strength and resolve of the church community and family values. Though the area was driven heavily by the massive movement of industrialization during World War II, the end of the war left a period of economic collapse and social chaos in its wake. The Black Panther Party was formed in this wake; driven by continuing violence against the African American youth by the local police forces,
Through the history of African Americans in America, few political moments were more important than the formation of the Congressional Black Caucus. The thirteen black members of the House of Representatives founded the CBC in 1969. Their goal was to establish a voice for African Americans who felt forgotten and downtrodden. One early goals of the Black Caucus was to end the Apartheid in South Africa. During the early years of the organization, there was strife internally and externally. After the Reconstruction of America, African Americans were without organization amongst their representation in Congress until the establishment of the Congressional Black Caucus.
Bloom, Joshua, and Waldo E. Martin. Black against empire: the history and politics of the Black Panther Party. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2013.
On February 12th The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People was founded by a multiracial group of activists, who answered "The Call," in the New York City, NY. They initially called themselves the National Negro Committee. Founded in 1909 The NAACP, or National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, has been active in its attempts to break legal ground and forge better opportunities for African Americans. At the beginning in 1909, some twenty persons met together in New York City for the purpose of utilizing the public interest in the Lincoln Centennial in behalf of African Americans. The history, function, purpose, and current activities of the organization is important.to work on behalf of the rights of colored people including Native Americans, African Americans and Jews. (Janken 2003)
18 Jan. 2011. Darity A. William, Ed. Jr. “Black Panthers” International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences. 2nd Ed. Vol.
The dominant culture perceived the Black Panther Party to be a threat, prevented their success whenever possible, and greatly contributed to their ultimate demise. In 1968 FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover proclaimed: “The Black Panther Party is the single greatest threat to the internal security of the United States” (156). The Party’s founder, Huey Newton, came to represent “the symbol of change for Americans, (by) questioning everything scared to the American way of life” (237).
The Black Panthers aren’t talked about much. The Panthers had made a huge difference in the civil rights movement. They were not just a Black KKK. They helped revolutionize the thought of African Americans in the U.S.
After the death of Malcolm X the movement started to get funky. It seemed as though after the assinaition of Malcom X, the revolution’s focal point began to change. The movement began to head towards a more intense, and nitty gritty level. It seemed as though all the non-violent organizations such as the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, the Congress of Racial Equality, as well as the Christian Leadership Conference had little hold on what was about to happen to the movement. The death of Malcolm X brought a new direction in the movement. In a society of a violent system it was hard for young blacks to take charge in an non-violent organization, it seemed to be a hypocrisy. And the idea of tolerance was wearing thin for the whole generation.
These movements have many similarities in the goals that they wanted to achieve, however they have some differences as well. In the document written by the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense, they voiced their demands ...
A unifying figure for both the Panthers and the hippies, according to Brown, was one of the most interesting characters in the trajectory of the Black Panther Party: Huey Newton. Brown discusses at length the sort of spell Newton was able to cast over the people he met; he was an enigma of sorts, but he was also a strong and powerful leader, who was determined to make changes and be effective in terms of galvanizing racial hierarchies in America while simultaneously presenting himself as kind, loving and warm to his comrades. The event Brown discusses specifically occurred in 1970, and played an important role in the government perception of both the Panthers and the hippies going forward. Brown notes that “the domestic threat that caused
Since its beginning, and with increasing emphasis since World War II, the NAACP has advocated nonviolent protests against discrimination and has disapproved of extremist black groups such as SNCC and the Black Panthers in the 1960s and 70s and CORE and the Nation of Islam in the 1980s and 90s, many of which criticized the organization as passive.... ... middle of paper ... ... DuBois, Thurgood Marshall and Roy Wilkens and the hundreds of thousands of nameless faces who worked tirelessly cannot and must not be forgotten (NAACP 1). The history of the NAACP is one of blood, sweat and tears.
The first issue of the Black Panther Newspaper featured Denzil Dowell’s murder by the Martinez police in North Richmond. The newspaper played a very significant role in the African American community. This newspaper was run by the Black Panther Party for Self Defense. The Party had a significant impact on society and is credited for the massive amount of improvements in the equal human rights movement. The Black Panther newspaper shed light upon the social injustices such as unjust killing faced by African Americans like Denzil Dowell. The Black Panther newspaper, unlike other conventional newspapers, showed the brutal treatment of Blacks. The newspaper became a strong element of the Black Panther Party; it provided the African