by Joshua Bloom
75. Quoted in Crowe, “The Origins of the Black Revolution,” 139.
76. Flier reproduced in Bradford, Oakland’s Not for Burning, 16.
77. Thomas C. Fleming, “Wild Rioting by Oakland Youths,” Sun Reporter, October 22, 1966, in Crowe, “The Origins of the Black Revolution,” 196.
78. Sun Reporter in Crowe, “The Origins of the Black Revolution,” 193n10. Also Bradford, Oakland’s Not for Burning, 194.
79. Sol Stern, “The Call of the Black Panthers,” New York Times Magazine, August 6, 1967, 10. Newton and Seale were not the only ones enraged by the incident. On September 29, the predominantly white chapter of the Students for a Democratic Society at UC Berkeley held a protest on the steps of San Francisco City Hall to demand the policeman be tried for murder. In a press statement endorsing the student demonstration, Community for New Politics argued that in the twenty years since the black neighborhood of Hunters Point had been established, “the white power structure in San Francisco has done nothing about the worsening conditions of the area. And when the residents finally rebel against these conditions they are met with a policeman and a gun.” SDS identified the National Guard as an “alien occupying force” in the ghetto and called for its immediate withdrawal from Hunters Point. “In the ghetto, too often police are protecting white property and serve white interests, while treating the people who live in the area as the enemy,” explained an SDS spokesperson. Picketers at the rally also expressed opposition to the government policy in Vietnam. The rally became a march as several hundred students and community members shouted “Cops must go!” and “Jobs not cops!” Soon, truckloads of National Guardsmen and police pulled up, and the officers, carrying rifles with bayonets, jumped out and surrounded the marchers. Without giving an order to disperse, the police started to pull protestors out of the march and beat them. More than seventy protestors were arrested, many charged with “inciting to riot.” Bill Crosby, “SDS: ‘Aliens’ Occupy SF Ghetto,” Daily Californian, September 30, 1966, 6; “SDS Rally: ‘White Power’ Hit,” Daily Californian, October 3, 1966, 3; “In Support of the People of the Ghetto,” flier 313–660930–000, Yuen Collection; “Eighty Arrested on Protest March,” flier 313–660930–001, Yuen Collection.
80. Terence Cannon, “A Night with the Watts Community Alert Patrol,” Movement, August 1966, 1, article in Huey Newton’s possession, Huey P. Newton Collection, series 7, flat box 9, folder 13, Stanford University; Horne, Fire This Time, 54.
81. Newton, Revolutionary Suicide, 115; Seale, Seize the Time, 73, 89.
82. See Daily Californian, October 1966, multiple articles.
83. Associated Press, “Reagan Hits Campus Meets: Cites Fear of Riot,” Daily Californian, October 21, 1966, 1; Associated Press, “Brown First on Stokely,” Daily Californian, October 27, 1966; Bill Crosby, “Oakland Visit: Brown on Black Power,” Daily Californian, October 28, 1966.
84. “Black Power and Its Challenges,” flier 313–661030–000.
85. Original footage of the Conference on Black Power and Its Challenges held in Berkeley, October 29, 1966, in The Frog in the Well: The Life and Work of Hoh-Kun Yuen, a film produced by Cervando David Martinez, Yuen Collection. Bill Crosby, “Afro-Students Tongue Lash SDS,” Daily Californian, October 27, 1966, 1; Rich Weinhold, “‘Power’ Aftermath,” Daily Californian, October 31, 1966, 1.
86. Footage of the Black Power conference in The Frog in the Well. Ivanhoe Donaldson in “Stokely Carmichael,” audio reel 044–661029–000, Yuen Collection; Gary Plotkin, “Black Power Meet,” Daily Californian, October 31, 1966, 16.
87. “Stokely Carmichael,” audio reel 044–661029–000, Yuen Collection.
88. Ibid.
89. Ibid.
90. Committee for Lowndes County, Support the Lowndes County Freedom Organization, pamphlet 313–661108–006, Yuen Collection; Stokely Carmichael, “What We Want,” New York Review of Books, September 22, 1966; Roy Reed, “Alabama Negro Candidates Lead in 2 Legislative, 3 Sheriff’s Votes,” New York Times, May 4, 1966, 28; Gene Robers, “The Story of Snick: From ‘Freedom High’ to ‘Black Power,’” New York Times, September 25, 1966, 242; Jonathan L. Foster, “Radical Loss: The First Black Panthers and the Lowndes County Election of 1966,” Vulcan Historical Review, Spring 2001; Carson, In Struggle, 162–66; John Hulett quoted in Frank Miles, “Lowndes County Freedom Organization Leaders Talk about Their Party,” Movement, June 1966, 3, cited in Carson, In Struggle; Hasan Jeffries, Bloody Lowndes: Civil Rights and Black Power in Alabama’s Black Belt (New York: New York University Press, 2009).
91. “Black Panthers Open Harlem Drive,” New York Amsterdam News, September 3, 1966, 1; “Negro Leaders Show Differences,” New York Amsterdam News, September 3, 1966, 30.
92. Carmichael, “What We Want.”
93. “Black Power and Its Challenges,” flier 313–661030–000; Support the Lowndes County Freedom Organization, pamphlet 313–661108–006; “Support the Black Panther!” flier 313–661108–007; all in the Yuen Collection.
94. Newton, Revolutionary Suicide, 113.
95. Some have suggested that contrary to Newton and Seale’s assertions in their memoirs, there was originally only one Black Panther Party in the Bay Area and that Newton and Seale split off from RAM’s Black Panther Party of Northern California at the time of their conflict during the Shabazz incident in February 1967, or even later, after the action in Sacramento in May 1967, both discussed in chapter 2. These suggestions are incorrect. The evidence clearly supports Newton and Seale’s claims that they founded the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense as a separate organization from RAM well in advance of either the Shabazz incident or the Sacramento action. See, for example, “Black Panther Close,” Berkeley Barb, February 17, 1967; and “Oakland’s Black Panthers Wear Guns, Talk Revolution,” San Francisco Chronicle, April 30, 1967. It is hard to pin down a precise date for the Party’s founding. Some have claimed that the Party was founded on October 15, 1966, and suggested that Huey Newton and Bobby Seale decided to start their own organization, chose to adopt the name and logo of the Black Panther Party from the Lowndes County effort, and drafted their Ten Point Program all on that day. The evidence does not support this conclusion. Newton and Seale likely adopted the name and logo sometime after the October 29, 1966, Black Power Conference at Berkeley, and they likely drafted the Ten Point Program in 1967. See chapter 3 for more on the development of the Ten Point Program.
2. POLICING THE POLICE
1. The description of the event comes from Bobby Seale, Seize the Time: The Story of the Black Panther Party and Huey P. Newton (1971; repr. Baltimore: Black Classic Press, 1990), 93–98; and from Joshua Bloom’s tour of the site of the incident with Bobby Seale, January 19, 1999.
2. Seale, Seize the Time, 97. While numerous firsthand news accounts attest to the general character of the Panthers’ early armed confrontations with police, the thickest descriptions are in retrospective accounts, especially Bobby Seale’s 1970 Seize the Time. Published during the height of the “Free Huey!” campaign, the text portrays Huey as the main person speaking to the crowd in this confrontation. But this portrayal is inconsistent with Huey Newton’s character. By many accounts, Newton was neither comfortable nor skilled at rousing public audiences. Although Newton likely developed the tactic of legal armed confrontation with the police and led the confrontations with the police in practice, Bobby Seale probably did most of the public speaking to crowds during these confrontations, as elsewhere. In a discussion of a draft manuscript with Joshua Bloom at the East Side Arts Alliance in Oakland on June 3, 2011, Seale asserted that this was the case and that he originally credited Newton with speaking to the crowds to support the Free Huey! campaign but that he was really the one who did most of the rallying.
3. The description of Aoki is based on Joshua Bloom’s impressions during several informal meetings with him. Bobby Seale, interview by Joshua Bloom, April 25, 1999; and interview by Robyn Spencer, October 13, 1997, quoted in Robyn Ceanne Spencer, “Re
pression Breeds Resistance: The Rise and Fall of the Black Panther Party in Oakland, CA, 1966–1982” (PhD diss., Columbia University, 2001), 24; Seale, Seize the Time, 73.
4. Seale, Seize the Time, 79–85. For the timing of the publicity for the sale of Mao’s Little Red Book, see “World Sale of ‘Quotations’ Brisk,” New York Times, February 17, 1967, 3.
5. Seale, Seize the Time, 77.
6. This treatment of the Shabazz escort, the buildup to it, the confrontation at Ramparts, and the aftermath is taken from five firsthand accounts: Eldridge Cleaver, “The Courage to Kill: Meeting the Panthers,” June 1968, in Eldridge Cleaver: Post-Prison Writings and Speeches, ed. Robert Scheer (New York: Random House, 1969); Gene Marine, The Black Panthers: Eldridge Cleaver, Huey Newton, Bobby Seale—A Compelling Study of the Angry Young Revolutionaries Who Have Shaken a Black Fist at White America (New York: Signet, 1969), 52–56; Earl Anthony, Spitting in the Wind: The True Story behind the Violent Legacy of the Black Panther Party (Santa Monica, CA: Roundtable Publishing, 1990), 22–23; Seale, Seize the Time, 113–32; “Frightening ‘Army’ Hits the Airport,” San Francisco Chronicle, February 22, 1967, 1.
7. Nessel quoted in “Frightening ‘Army’ Hits the Airport,” 1.
8. Ibid.
9. Cleaver, “The Courage to Kill,” 36.
10. Black Panther, April 25, 1967, 1–2.
11. “Sudden Death: Suspect in Robbery Shot Down,” Oakland Tribune, April 1, 1967, 1.
12. Marine, The Black Panthers, 57–59; Anthony, Spitting in the Wind, 28; Black Panther, April 25, 1967, 1–2.
13. Marine, The Black Panthers, 57; Huey P. Newton, Revolutionary Suicide (1973; repr. New York: Writers and Readers, 1995), 137–38.
14. Black Panther, April 25, 1967, 2; “Youth Sought in Slaying Investigation,” Oakland Tribune, December 11, 1966, 1B.
15. Marine, The Black Panthers, 57–59; Black Panther, April 25, 1967, 1–2; Newton, Revolutionary Suicide, 138.
16. George Dowell, interview published in the Black Panther, May 15, 1967, 2; Marine, The Black Panthers, 58.
17. Newton, Revolutionary Suicide, 139.
18. Marine, The Black Panthers, 60.
19. Newton, Revolutionary Suicide, 139.
20. Ibid.
21. Seale, Seize the Time, 141–42.
22. Jerry Belcher, “It’s All Legal: Oakland’s Black Panthers Wear Guns, Talk Revolution,” San Francisco Chronicle, April 30, 1967, 1; Seale, Seize the Time, 141–42.
23. Marine, The Black Panthers, 61; Seale, Seize the Time, 145–47; Belcher, “It’s All Legal,” 1; Black Panther, April 25, 1967, 2.
24. Newton, Revolutionary Suicide, 142.
25. Seale, Seize the Time, 138–39; Black Panther, April 25, 1967, 3.
26. Gilbert Moore, A Special Rage (New York: Harper & Row, 1971), 58; Black Panther, April 25, 1967; Anthony, Spitting in the Wind, 31; Marine, The Black Panthers, 62; Newton, Revolutionary Suicide, 142–43.
27. Belcher, “It’s All Legal,” 1; Black Panther, April 25, 1967, 1; Anthony, Spitting in the Wind, 29.
28. Oakland police officer Richard Jensen interviewed for Eyes on the Prize II: America at the Racial Crossroads 1965–1985, episode 3, “Power!” (1967–1968), produced and directed by Henry Hampton, aired 1987 (Washington, DC: PBS, 2010), DVD.
29. For details about the passage of AB 1591, see California Legislature, Final Calendar of Legislative Business, 1967, part 2,506.
30. Statutes of California, 1967 Regular Session, Chapter 960.
31. Belcher, “It’s All Legal,” 1.
32. Seale, Seize the Time, 153–63; Marine, The Black Panthers, 63–64; Eyes on the Prize II; Newton, Revolutionary Suicide, 149.
33. Seale, Seize the Time, 153–63.
34. Marine, The Black Panthers, 63–64.
35. “Black Panthers Disrupt Assembly,” San Francisco Chronicle, May 3, 1967, 1.
36. Seale, Seize the Time, 153–63; “Black Panthers Disrupt Assembly,” 1.
37. “Black Panthers Disrupt Assembly,” 1; Sacramento footage in Eyes on the Prize II, part 3.
38. Executive Mandate No. 1 as quoted in Philip S. Foner, ed., The Black Panthers Speak (Philadelphia: Lippincott, 1970; repr. New York: Da Capo, 1995), 40.
39. “Black Panthers Disrupt Assembly,” 1.
40. TV footage from Eyes on the Prize II; on the concealed weapon charges, see Marine, The Black Panthers, 65; on the Forte arrest, see Seale, Seize the Time; on the Fish and Game Code booking, see “Black Panthers Disrupt Assembly,” 1.
41. On the conspiracy charges, see “Black Panthers Disrupt Assembly”; Cleaver situation from Moore, A Special Rage, 63; unknown black woman from Marine, The Black Panthers, 65.
42. On the press conference, see Marine, The Black Panthers, 65.
43. See San Francisco Chronicle Index, “Negroes, Black Panthers Armed with Firearms, Invade State Capitol.”
44. Sol Stern, “The Call of the Black Panthers,” New York Times Magazine, August 6, 1967. The magazine gave the story a full two-page spread, with large photos, and the article took up three columns on three additional pages.
45. Belcher, “It’s All Legal,” 1.
46. Seale made this point in a speech in February 1968 that was printed in the Black Panther: “Now I’m gonna show you how smart Brother Huey is when he planned Sacramento. He said, now, the papers gon call us thugs and hoodlums. A lot of people ain’t gon know what’s happening. But the brothers on the block, who the man’s been calling thugs and hoodlums for four hundred years, gon say, ‘Them some out of sight thugs and hoodlums up there!’ The bothers on the block gon say, ‘Who is these thugs and hoodlums?’ In other words, when the man calls us ‘nigger’ for four hundred years with all its derogatory connotations, Huey was smart enough to know that the Black people were going to say, ‘Well, they’ve been calling us niggers, thugs, and hoodlums for four hundred years, that ain’t gon hurn me, I’m going to check out what these brothers is doing!’”
47. Billy John Carr quoted in Stern, “The Call of the Black Panthers,” August 6, 1967.
48. Emory Douglas interview in Eyes on the Prize.
49. George Dowell interview in Black Panther, May 15, 1967, 2, 4.
3. THE CORRECT HANDLING OF A REVOLUTION
Epigraph, part 2: Césaire excerpted by Frantz Fanon in Wretched of the Earth (New York: Grove Press, 1963), 88. For the Black Panther Party booklist, see, for example, Black Panther, October 26, 1968, 18.
1. Newton’s analysis in “Fear and Doubt” (Black Panther, May 15, 1967) is foreshadowed in an article in the first issue of the Black Panther: “The White man has instilled fear into the very hearts of our people. We must act to remove this fear. The only way to remove this fear is to stand up and look the white man in his blue eyes. Many Black people are able nowadays to look the white man in the eyes—but the line thins out when it comes to looking the white cops in the eye. But the white cop is the instrument sent into our community by the Power Structure to keep Black People quiet and under control. . . . The BLACK PANTHER PARTY FOR SELF DEFENSE has worked out a program that is carefully designed to cope with this situation” (“Armed Black Brothers in Richmond Community,” Black Panther, April 25, 1967, 4). Though this earlier article reflects Huey Newton’s tactic and thinking, the author is unlisted, and its style and tone indicate that it was probably written by Eldridge Cleaver, particularly because Cleaver was principally responsible for assembling the first issue of the paper.
2. Huey P. Newton, “The Functional Definition of Politics,” Black Panther, May 15, 1967, 4.
3. Huey P. Newton, “In Defense of Self-Defense,” Black Panther, June 20, 1967, 3–4.
4. Huey P. Newton, “The Functional Definition of Politics,” Black Panther, May 15, 1967, 4.
5. Huey P. Newton, “The Correct Handling of a Revolution,” Black Panther, July 20, 1967, 3.
6. For a related discussion, see letter from S. C. Anderson in “S. C. Anderson Writing from New York Concerning (R.A.M.) R
evolutionary Action Movement and B.P.S.D. Possibly Being the Same,” Black Panther, July 3, 1967, 10.
7. “What the Muslims Want, What the Muslims Believe,” Muhammad Speaks, August 16, 1963.
8. Black Panther, May 15, 1967, 3, original was published in all caps. Despite many later issues of the Black Panther that labeled other versions of the Ten Point Program the “October 1966” version, this is the earliest surviving print version. Versions printed in subsequent issues, often under the header “October 1966 Platform and Program,” added the demand for a United Nations–supervised plebiscite, changed point 3 to identify the capitalist rather than the white man as the robber of the black community, interspersed the sections on wants and beliefs rather than presenting them sequentially, removed the introductory paragraph, and corrected the typos. These changes took place well before the 1972 overhaul of the platform and were reproduced as the original platform by others. Almost all previous renditions of the Ten Point Program actually reproduce much later versions and date them to October 1966. For example, even the great historian Phillip S. Foner, in his edited Black Panthers Speak of 1970 (reissued by Da Capo Press in 1995), makes this mistake. On the first page, he gives October 1966 as the date for a reproduction of the Ten Point Program that mentions the U.N. plebiscite and contains other changes that did not appear until the October 1968 issue of Black Panther, after the Panthers sent a delegation to the United Nations. Indeed, there is no evidence that the Ten Point Program was even written before late April 1967. The earliest evidence we could find, suggesting the points had been drafted by the time of the Dowell mobilizations in late April 1967, was a brief mention of the Party’s program in the first issue of the Black Panther, on April 25, 1967, 2. While the Ten Point Program could have been drafted earlier, only when the Black Panther Party sought to promote a broader political program after the Sacramento incident did it distribute the Ten Point Program broadly to the public. The program is not mentioned in news accounts for which Huey and Bobby were interviewed at the time and in which they describe the philosophy and program of the Party. For example, in Jerry Belcher, “It’s All Legal: Oakland’s Black Panthers Wear Guns, Talk Revolution” (San Francisco Examiner, April 30, 1967, 1), Huey identifies some concerns that are generally similar to a couple of the points in the Ten Point Program, but he does not mention an overarching program and he uses different language from that in the published program. It is striking that, after the Sacramento action on May 3, the version of the Ten Point Program printed in the May 15, 1967, Black Panther was distributed in different forms—for example, as a flier handed out on the University of California, Berkeley, campus on May 5, three days after the Sacramento action. Black Panther Party for Self-Defense, “What We Want, What We Believe,” flier 329–670505–000B, H. K. Yuen Collection, Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley. The long quotation from the Declaration of Independence provided a classical political justification for the Party’s revolutionary demands and situated its revolutionary politics in the democratic tradition of the American Revolution.
