Black Against Empire

by Joshua Bloom

  86. Ibid.

  87. “Convention Statement on Huey and the Panthers,” New Left Notes, July 8, 1968.

  88. Our discussion of the “Free Huey!” rally in front of the Alameda County courthouse in Oakland on July 15, 1968, draws from four sources: original film and audio footage in Roz Payne and Newsreel Films, Off the Pig, [1968] in video collection What We Want, What We Believe (Oakland: AK Press, 2006); Gilbert Moore’s personal account in A Special Rage, 118–21; Daryl E. Lembke and Ray Rogers, “Black Panthers Chant at Start of Newton Trial,” Los Angeles Times, July 16, 1968, 3; “2,500 in a March at Trial on Coast: Protest as Panther Leader Appears on Murder Count,” New York Times, July 16, 1968, 14.

  89. The press contingent included reporters from the Boston Globe, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the San Francisco Chronicle, the San Francisco Examiner, the Oakland Tribune, multiple television and radio stations, the Berkeley Barb, the National Guardian, the San Francisco Guardian, the Mid Peninsula Observer, People’s World, the Sun Reporter, the Berkeley Gazette, and Time, Newsweek, and Life magazines.

  90. Bingham, Black Panthers 1968, 148–49.

  91. Mike Klonsky, “Free Huey! . . . Or the Sky Is the Limit,” New Left Notes, July 29, 1968, 6. See also “Huey in Court,” New Left Notes, August 5, 1968, 7.

  92. See William J. Drummond, “Cleaver Dispute,” Los Angeles Times, September 18, 1968, 1.

  93. Ronald Reagan quoted in “Reagan Demands Appointment of Cleaver Be Rescinded by UC,” Los Angeles Times, September 14, 1968, B1. See also “Eldridge Cleaver, UC Lecturer,” Los Angeles Times, September 16, 1968; “Bid to Cleaver Scored by Reagan and Unruh,” New York Times, September 18, 1968; “Assembly All but Kills UC Censure on Cleaver,” Los Angeles Times, September 19, 1968; “Campus Can’t Be Springboard of Revolt—Reagan,” Los Angeles Times, October 10, 1968; “Reagan Accuses UC Regents of Showing Disdain for Public,” Los Angeles Times, October 22, 1968; and extensive coverage in the Los Angeles Times.

  94. See “Reaction Varies Widely: Cleaver-UC Controversy,” Los Angeles Times September 21, 1968, B4; “‘Necessary,’ ‘Disturbing’: UC Regents and Cleaver,” Los Angeles Times, September 28, 1968, B4.

  95. Cleaver at Sacramento State College, October, 1968, audio reel 003–690217–000, Yuen Collection. See also “Cleaver Derides Reagan and 3 Candidates in Lecture at Stanford,” New York Times, October 3, 1968, 22; “Cleaver Assails Johnson and Reagan at UCI Racism Panel,” Los Angeles Times, September 27, 1968, H1.

  96. “Black Conference Threatens Campaign against University,” Daily Californian, October 3, 1968, 3.

  97. “Students Map Fight over Cleaver Ban,” Daily Californian, September 24, 1968, 1; Sharon Frumkin, “6 Campuses Decry Ruling on Courses,” Daily Californian, October 3, 1968, 1; John Dreyfuss, “Student Body at UC Demands Regents Rescind Cleaver Ruling,” Los Angeles Times, September 24, 1968; “California Students Back Lecture Series by Cleaver,” New York Times, September 25, 1968, 17; “Demonstrators Disrupt UC Regents Meeting,” Los Angeles Times, October 18, 1968, 2; “Jeering Reception for Reagan,” Los Angeles Times, October 20, 1968; “Students Seize Berkeley Office,” New York Times, October 24, 1968, 32; “New Cleaver Issue Eruptions,” Los Angeles Times, October 27, 1968, K5.

  98. “Cleaver Omits Obscenities in ‘Scholarly’ First UC Lecture,” Los Angeles Times, October 9, 1968; “6 Campuses Decry Ruling on Courses” 1; “Students Map Fight Over Cleaver Ban” 1; John Dreyfuss, “Limit on Cleaver,” Los Angeles Times, September 21, 1968, 1; William Drummond, “UC Academic Senate Rejects Regents’ Censure over Cleaver,” Los Angeles Times, October 4, 1968, 1.

  6. NATIONAL UPRISING

  1. Michele Russell, “Conversation with Ericka Huggins. Oakland, California, 4/20/77,” 10, box 1, Huey P. Newton Papers, cited in Robyn Ceanne Spencer, “Repression Breeds Resistance: The Rise and Fall of the Black Panther Party in Oakland, CA, 1966–1982” (PhD diss., Columbia University, 2001), 105.

  2. Biographical information on Ericka and John Huggins comes from Donald Freed, Agony in New Haven: The Trial of Bobby Seale, Ericka Huggins, and the Black Panther Party (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1973), 62–64; Elaine Brown, A Taste of Power: A Black Woman’s Story (New York: Pantheon Books, 1992), 131, 138.

  3. Elaine Brown, A Taste of Power, chs. 2–5. Of Elaine Brown’s white lovers, Jay Kennedy stands out as having an especially strong influence on her life and her political development; see ibid., 76–104. Kennedy was a former socialist known for working with the CIA to expose Martin Luther King’s ties to the Communist Party. According to CIA documents, “Kennedy’s position is one of complete sympathy with the Negro and the Civil Rights Movement, but holds that only through legal means and peaceful means should the Negro aims be accomplished”; quoted in David Garrow, The FBI and Martin Luther King, Jr: From “Solo” to Memphis (New York: Norton, 1981), 142, and see 139–44.

  4. Ray Rogers, “Alert Patrol Chairman Quits under Pressure,” Los Angeles Times, August 12, 1967, 3; Terence Cannon, “A Night with the Watts Community Alert Patrol,” Movement, August 1966.

  5. “Partial List of Black Congress,” Harambee, November 17, 1967, 8, cited in Scot Brown, “The US Organization: African-American Cultural Nationalism in the Era of Black Power, 1965 to the 1970s” (PhD diss., Cornell University, 1999), 156; In chapter 6 of Taste of Power, Elaine Brown gives a rich personal description of Harry Truly and her experiences in the Black Congress. See also Angela Davis: An Autobiography (New York: Random House, 1974).

  6. Scot Brown, Fighting for US: Maulana Karenga, the US Organization, and Black Cultural Nationalism (New York: New York University Press, 2003), and Brown, “The US Organization,” quote from 135.

  7. “The Black Panther Moves in Alabama,” Harambee, November 3, 1966, 1; “Speech by John Hylett [sic],” Harambee, November 3, 1966, 3; “From the White House to the Courthouse,” flier reproduced in Harambee, November 3, 1966, 8; “Panthers to Enter Politics,” San Francisco Chronicle, June 18,1967, 9; Rogers, “Alert Patrol Chairman Quits under Pressure,” 3; Davis, Autobiography, 162–67.

  8. Elaine Brown, A Taste of Power, ch. 6.

  9. This idea is supported by Elaine Brown’s account of fights about what posters to hang on the walls (Taste of Power, ch. 6), and Scot Brown, in “The US Organization,” also suggests that shared physical space contributed to the tension (172).

  10. Davis, Autobiography, 158–59.

  11. Scot Brown, “The US Organization,” 173.

  12. Scot Brown, Fighting for US, 74.

  13. Elaine Brown, A Taste of Power, 118.

  14. Jack Olsen, Last Man Standing: The Tragedy and Triumph of Geronimo Pratt (New York: Doubleday, 2000), 37–38; Earl Anthony, Spitting in the Wind: The True Story behind the Violent Legacy of the Black Panther Party (Santa Monica, CA: Roundtable Publishing, 1990), 44–45; Elaine Brown, A Taste of Power, ch. 6.

  15. See Elaine Brown, A Taste of Power, 120. for one account of Carter’s attraction to the Party.

  16. Olsen, Last Man Standing, 37–38; Anthony, Spitting in the Wind, 44–45; Elaine Brown, A Taste of Power, 118–20 and ch. 6.

  17. Alprentice “Bunchy” Carter quoted and event described in Elaine Brown, A Taste of Power, 125. Given how many years later the account was published and the fact that Brown cites no source other than her memory, this extract may be more of a paraphrase of Carter than a direct quote.

  18. Davis, Autobiography, 162–67.

  19. For US and wide Black Congress support of the “Free Huey!” campaign, see Scot Brown, “The US Organization,” 160.

  20. Clayborne Carson, In Struggle: SNCC and the Black Awakening of the 1960s (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1981), 282–83; Scot Brown, “The US Organization,” 163–64.

  21. Davis, Autobiography, 162–67; Elaine Brown, A Taste of Power, 126; Scot Brown, “The US Organization,” 160–63.

  22. Freed, Agony in New Haven, 62–64.

  23. Scot Brown, “The US Organization,” 176.
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  24. Eldridge Cleaver: Post-Prison Writings and Speeches, ed. Robert Scheer (New York: Random House, 1969), 38.

  25. “Watts Festival,” Los Angeles Times, August 11, 1968, L5; “25,000 Witness Parade as Watts Festival Closes,” Los Angeles Times, August 12, 1968, 3.

  26. Phil Fradkin and Dial Torgerson, “Negro Leaders Urge Suspect in Police Shootout to Give Up,” Los Angeles Times, August 7, 1968, 1.

  27. Ibid. See also “Three L.A. Panthers Murdered by Pigs,” Black Panther, September 7, 1968, 6. On the funeral, including the alliance with Chicanos, see William Drummond and Ray Rogers, “Negroes, Mexican-Americans Drill at Funeral of Panther,” Los Angeles Times, August 11, 1968, FB; and Black Panther, September 7, 1968, .6. On further police violence at the Watts festival, see Jack Jones, “Watts Violence Takes Toll of 3 Dead, 41 Hurt,” Los Angeles Times, August 13, 1968, 1; and “Watts Festival Revolt,” Black Panther, September 7, 1968, 6. According to Elaine Brown, the young Panthers had taken Newton’s Executive Mandate No. 3 to heart and extended its scope to include their car. The mandate required Panthers to defend their homes, by force, against unwarranted search. Elaine Brown, interview by Joshua Bloom, June 15, 2008.

  28. Fradkin and Torgerson, “Negro Leaders Urge Suspect.”

  29. Aaron Dixon, My People Are Rising: Memoir of a Black Panther Party Captain (Chicago: Haymarket Books, forthcoming).

  30. Ibid.

  31. Ibid., 110–19.

  32. Black Panther, special issue cataloguing conflicts with the police, February 21, 1970.

  33. “Welton Armstead Murdered by Seattle Pigs,” Black Panther Party Seattle Chapter Ministry of Information Bulletin #2, November 1969, 1, Vietnam War Era Ephemera Collection, University of Washington Libraries, Seattle; Earl Caldwell, “Lawyer Names 19 Panthers He Says Were Slain,” New York Times, December 21, 1969, 47; “Seattle Pigs Murder Panther,” Black Panther, October 19, 1968, 6.

  34. See, for example, Thomas A. Johnson, “Black Panthers Picket a School,” New York Times September 13, 1966, 38; Leonard Buder, “Schools in City Open Smoothly Despite Protests,” New York Times September 13, 1966, 1. Contrary to the national Black Panther Party headquarters in Oakland, the Party chapter in Harlem, drawing on the neighborhood’s deep historical roots of black nationalism, maintained strong cultural nationalist tendencies. New York Panther members adopted African names, wore dashikis, and spoke in Swahili. See Murray Kempton, The Briar Patch: The Trial of the Panther 21 (1973; repr. New York: Da Capo Press, 1997), 54.

  35. Kempton, The Briar Patch, 43.

  36. Joudon Ford quoted in ibid., 44; age on 43.

  37. In the Black Panther Party, the civilian titles were subordinate to the military ones. So Newton, as minister of defense, held the top position in the Party, whereas Seale, as chairman, was second in command. Similarly, chapter chairmen were usually subordinate to captains. But such titles were not systematic, and this hierarchy was not universally imposed; for example, Deputy Chairman Fred Hampton was the top Panther leader in Chicago.

  38. Kempton, The Briar Patch, 54.

  39. Ibid., 56.

  40. Dan Sullivan, “Black Panther Benefit Is Held in East Village. 2,600 at Program to Raise Funds for 7 Jailed Members,” New York Times, May 21, 1968, 42; “Rap Brown to Speak at Panther Benefit,” New York Times, May 16, 1968, 54.

  41. Lumumba Shakur in Kuwasi Balagoon, Joan Bird, Cetewayo, Robert Collier, Dhoruba, Richard Harris, Ali Bey Hassan, Jamal, Abayama Katara, Kwando Kinshasa, Baba Odinga, Shaba Ogun Om, Curtis Powell, Afeni Shakur, Lumumba Shakur, and Clark Squire, Look for Me in the Whirlwind: The Collective Autobiography of the New York 21 (New York: Random House, 1971), 295; Kempton, The Briar Patch, 45–46.

  42. Ibid., 89.

  43. Ibid., 175.

  44. Balagoon et al., Look for Me in the Whirlwind, 176–79.

  45. Lumumba Shakur in ibid., 179.

  46. Balagoon et al., Look for Me in the Whirlwind, 180–83.

  47. “Prison Racial Fight Injures 23 Upstate; 450 Join in Melee,” New York Times, September 28, 1963, 22; Balagoon et al., Look for Me in the Whirlwind, 183, 260–63. Sekou Odinga chapter in Can’t Jail the Spirit: Political Prisoners in the U.S.: A Collection of Biographies, 4th ed. (Chicago: Committee to End the Marion Lockdown, March 1998).

  48. Lumumba Shakur in Balagoon et al., Look for Me in the Whirlwind, 264–65 (quote on 265).

  49. Odinga in Can’t Jail the Spirit.

  50. Balagoon et al., Look for Me in the Whirlwind, 257–60.

  51. Ibid., 270–71.

  52. Afeni Shakur is known today not only as a key leader of the New York 21, but also as the mother of the late rap artist Tupac Shakur. Afeni married Lumumba Shakur and took his name, but Tupac was born in 1971, and Lumumba was not his father.

  53. Afeni Shakur in Balagoon et al., Look for Me in the Whirlwind, 287–88.

  54. Ibid., 288–89.

  55. Earl Caldwell, “Black Panthers: ‘Young Revolutionaries at War,’” New York Times, September 6, 1968, 49.

  56. Abayama Katara in Balagoon et al., Look for Me in the Whirlwind, 90–91.

  57. Ibid., 273.

  58. Balagoon et al., Look for Me in the Whirlwind, 277–78, 295–96. See also McCandlish Phillips, “4 Pupils Arrested at Brandeis High: Brown Appearance Barred before Trouble Erupts,” New York Times, June 6, 1968, 58; David K. Shipler, “Classes Go On Despite District Woes,” New York Times, June 11, 1968, 49; Sidney E. Zion, “5 Black Panthers Held in Brooklyn,” New York Times, September 13, 1968, 93; David Bird, “Judge Forbids Slogan Buttons at Panther Hearing in Brooklyn,” New York Times, September 19, 1968, 32; Steven Roberts, “Race: The Third Party in the School Crisis,” New York Times, September 22, 1968, 182; Leonard Buder, “Shanker Rejects Offer to Protect Ocean Hill Staff,” New York Times, September 25, 1968, 1; Peter Kihiss, “Open Schools, Galamison Tells Rally,” September 26, 1968, 56; “20,000 in N.Y. March for Black Control,” Black Panther, October 26, 1968, 15.

  59. Robert D. McFadden, “Police-Black Panther Scuffles Mark Brooklyn Street Rally,” New York Times, August 2, 1968, 31; “Panthers’ Account of N.Y. Incident,” Black Panther, October 5, 1968, 3.

  60. Furey quoted in Joseph Novitski, “Judge’s Ouster Sought,” New York Times, August 5, 1968, 1.

  61. Martin Tolchin, “150 Hunt Ambusheers Who Shot Policemen,” New York Times, August 3, 1968, 1.

  62. Joudon Ford quoted in David Burnham, “Panthers to Seek Voice Over Police,” New York Times, September 11, 1968, 56. The district attorney later said that Panthers were suspects in the case; see David Burnham, “Black Panthers Sought in West in Ambush of Brooklyn Police,” New York Times, September 4, 1968, 38.

  63. Novitski, “Judge’s Ouster Sought,” 1.

  64. Martin Arnold, “Bar Group Urges Inquiry on Judge,” New York Times, August 6, 1968, 40.

  65. Joseph Novitski, “Brooklyn Police Set Up Group to Back ‘Vigorous’ Enforcement,” New York Times, August 8, 1968, 18. “Warren Court” refers to the common view of the Supreme Court under Chief Justice Earl Warren (1953–1969) as liberal.

  66. Ira Glasser quoted in Sidney E. Zion, “Rights Groups Assail Demands of New Police Unit,” New York Times, August 9, 1968, 16. For other responses, see Irving Spiegel, “P.B.A. Will Issue ‘Get Tough’ Advice,” New York Times, August 12, 1968, 1; Sylvan Fox, “P.B.A. Directives Held Sop to Right,” New York Times, August 16, 1968, 38. The Fox article agrees with our assessment that the PBA head was playing politics, attempting to stay in front of his union membership by taking a strong rhetorical stand while staying within the law. David Burnham, “Leary Declares He Alone Makes Police Decisions,” New York Times, August 14, 1968, 1; “Inquiry Planned on Judge Furey,” New York Times, August 27, 1968, 82; “Bar Group Cancels Hearings on Charges against Judge Furey,” New York Times, September 10, 1968, 31.

  67. John Sibley, “100 Police Guard 7 Negro Suspects,” New York Times, August 22, 1968, 48.

  68. Kunstler quoted in David Burnham, “3
in Black Panther Party Win Hearing Over Bail,” New York Times, August 24, 1968, 30; David Burnham, “3 Black Panthers Win Bail Cut in Assault Case,” New York Times, August 28, 1968, 23; David Burnham, “Black Panthers Sought in West in Ambush of Brooklyn Police,” New York Times, September 4, 1968, 38.

  69. David Burnham, “Off-Duty Police Here Join in Beating Black Panthers,” New York Times, September 5, 1968, 1; “Brutality, New York Style,” editorial, New York Times, September 5, 1968, 46; “New Flash . . . New York Pigs Use New Tactic to Vamp on 12 Panthers,” Black Panther, September 7, 1968, 10; Balagoon et al., Look for Me in the Whirlwind, 275–77.

  70. Katara in Balagoon et al., Look for Me in the Whirlwind, 275–77.

  71. David Burnham, “Mayor and Leary Warn Policemen in Panther Melee,” New York Times, September 6, 1968, 1.

  72. David Burnham, “Black Panthers Give Grievances,” New York Times, September 7, 1968, 1.

  73. Emanuel Perlmutter, “N.A.A.C.P. Urges Inquiry on Police,” New York Times, September 8, 1968, 38.

  74. “Jury Study Ordered in Attack by Police on Black Panthers,” New York Times, September 21, 1968, 28.

  75. David Burnham, “Panthers to Seek Voice Over Police,” New York Times, September 11, 1968, 56; “Press Conference of N.Y. Panthers,” Black Panther, October 5, 1968, 3.

  76. Albin Krebs, “Two Policemen Shot in Brooklyn Ambush,” New York Times, September 12, 1968, 1; Murray Schumach, “50 Police Join Hunt in Brooklyn Sniping,” New York Times, September 13, 1968.

  77. Kathleen Cleaver in Henry Hampton and Steve Fayer, Voices of Freedom: An Oral History of the Civil Rights Movement from the 1950s through the 1980s (New York: Bantam Books, 1990), 514.

  78. Local law enforcement officials reported openings of Black Panther chapters, branches or National Committee to Combat Fascism offices (local interracial organizations that did not have the full status of Party chapters) to the House Committee on Internal Security, Gun-Barrel Politics: The Black Panther Party, 1966–1971, part 470, 92d Congress, 1st session (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1971), 88. These twenty cities comprise more than half of the Panther chapter openings for which the committee report provides dates. The report lists many Black Panther Party chapters for which the date of opening is unknown. So there were probably well over thirty chapter openings by the end of 1968. For additional coverage of Black Panther Party growth in 1968 outside Oakland, New York, Los Angeles, and Seattle, including the opening of offices in San Francisco and Long Beach, see the following articles in the Black Panther. October 5, 1968: “Two Strikeouts of Nebraska Power Structure,” 4. October 19, 1968: “A Message to the Ghetto” [on Long Beach chapter], 2; “Denver Pigs Incite Riot,” 6. October 26, 1968: Sacramento Black Panther Party, “The Pig, the Hog, and the Boar,” 6. November 16, 1968: “Panthers-B.S.U. Close S.F. State College,” 8; “Mafia Pigs of Alioto,” 8; “S.F. Gun Suit,” 17. December 7, 1968: “Pigs Uptight: Bomb N.J. Panther Office,” 3. November 21, 1968: “Panthers-B.S.U. Get It Together” [on San Francisco office], 3; “New Jersey Panthers Go Underground,” 16; “Denver Pigs Raid and Ransack Panther H.Q.,” 22. January 4, 1969: “San Francisco State Strike Spreads,” 2; “B.S.U. Mexican Students Revolt in L.A. Schools,” 2; “Denver Pigs,” 4. January 15, 1969: “Nationwide Harassment of Panthers by Pig Power Structure,” 1; “Sign Petition: Control Your Local Pigs,” 6 concerning Black Panther Party chapters in Northern California; “Pigs Raid Des Moines Panthers,” 9; “Pigs Uptight: Bomb N.J. Panther Office,” 9; “Indianapolis Panthers Target of Pig Attack,” 9; “Denver Pigs Incite Riot,” 10; “Denver Pigs Attack Panthers,” 11. See also the following articles in the New York Times: Wallace Turner, “Oakland Streets Have Led to Two Deaths—Group’s Backing Grows,” July 20, 1968; “Black Panther Says Police in Newark Planted Pistol,” September 19, 1968; “3 Black Panthers Arrested in Fight with Jersey Police,” September 25, 1968.