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118-512: The organization was strongly inspired by the Black Panther Party , which had established a firm base in the neighboring city of Chicago , adopting the party military-style uniforms, radical rhetoric, and black self-determination . The Black Liberators group was formally established in the summer of 1968 by veteran St. Louis civil rights activist Charles Koen opening a formal headquarters at 2810 Easton in downtown St. Louis. Just as

236-487: A "revolutionary internationalist movement ": [The Party] dropped its wholesale attacks against whites and began to emphasize more of a class analysis of society. Its emphasis on Marxist–Leninist doctrine and its repeated espousal of Maoist statements signaled the group's transition from a revolutionary nationalist to a revolutionary internationalist movement. Every Party member had to study Mao Tse-tung's "Little Red Book" to advance his or her knowledge of peoples' struggle and

354-431: A 17-year-old Oakland native and child prostitute was shot; she died three months later. According to the prosecutor handling the case, Newton is believed to have shot Smith after a casual exchange on the street during which she referred to him as "Baby," a childhood nickname he hated. The main witness of this case refused to testify due to an assassination attempt against her and, after two deadlocked jury trials, Newton

472-628: A 1958 rape conviction. They settled in Algeria. By the end of the year, party membership peaked at around 2,000. Party members engaged in criminal activities such as extortion, stealing, violent discipline of BPP members, and robberies. The BPP leadership took one-third of the proceeds from robberies committed by BPP members. No kid should be running around hungry in school. Bobby Seale Inspired by Mao Zedong 's advice to revolutionaries in The Little Red Book , Newton called on

590-434: A 90-minute gun battle with the police. The standoff ended with Cleaver wounded and Hutton voluntarily surrendering. According to Cleaver, although Hutton had stripped down to his underwear and had his hands raised in the air to prove that he was unarmed, Oakland Police shot Hutton more than 12 times, killing him. Two police officers were also shot. He became the first member of the party to be killed by police. Although at

708-508: A California law that permitted carrying a loaded rifle or shotgun as long as it was publicly displayed and pointed at no one. Generally this was done while monitoring and observing police behavior in their neighborhoods, with the Panthers arguing that this emphasis on active militancy and openly carrying their weapons was necessary to protect individuals from police violence. For example, chants like "The Revolution has come, it's time to pick up

826-973: A big influence on the White Panther Party , tied to the Detroit/Ann Arbor band MC5 and their manager John Sinclair (author of the book Guitar Army ), which also promulgated a ten-point program. Violent conflict between the Panther chapter in LA and the US Organization , a black nationalist group, resulted in shootings and beatings and led to the murders of at least four Black Panther Party members. On January 17, 1969, Los Angeles Panther Captain Bunchy Carter and Deputy Minister John Huggins were killed in Campbell Hall on

944-509: A child. As a teenager, he was arrested several times for criminal offenses, including gun possession and vandalism at age 14. Growing up in Oakland, Newton stated that he was "made to feel ashamed of being black". In his autobiography Revolutionary Suicide , he wrote: During those long years in Oakland public schools, I did not have one teacher who taught me anything relevant to my own life or experience. Not one instructor ever awoke in me

1062-614: A circulation of 250,000. The group created a Ten-Point Program , a document that called for "Land, Bread, Housing, Education, Clothing, Justice and Peace", as well as exemption from conscription for black men, among other demands. With the Ten-Point program, "What We Want, What We Believe," the Black Panther Party expressed its economic and political grievances. Curtis Austin states that by late 1968, Black Panther ideology had evolved from black nationalism to become more

1180-551: A comb. Following the arrest, Koen and Dent received strong public support from groups such as the International Brotherhood of Teamsters Local 688 , NAACP , and St. Louis Argus . In response to the arrest, the Liberators voted in favor of Yusuf Shabazz to succeed Koen as prime minister of the group, resulting in the decline and eventual end of the group. Nine months following his inauguration, Shabazz

1298-398: A desire to learn more or to question or to explore the worlds of literature, science, and history. All they did was try to rob me of the sense of my own uniqueness and worth, and in the process nearly killed my urge to inquire. Newton graduated from Oakland Technical High School in 1959. He attended Merritt College , where he earned an Associate of Arts degree in 1966. Plato 's Republic

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1416-435: A great love and a great understanding. And that we try to expand this to the general black population, and also, people oppressed people all over the world. And, I think that we differ from some other groups simply because we understand the system better than most groups understand the system. And with this realization, we attempt to form a strong political base based in the community with the only strength that we have and that's

1534-430: A living martyr. The trial, which began on July 15, quickly ascended beyond the scope of Newton himself, evolving into a racially-charged political movement. Over the two-year course of Newton's original trial and two appeals, the coalition continued to offer its support until the charges were overturned and Newton was released on August 5, 1970. In 1970, after his release from prison, Newton received an invitation to visit

1652-488: A plan to send a group of 26 armed Panthers led by Seale from Oakland to Sacramento to protest the bill. The group entered the assembly carrying their weapons, an incident which was widely publicized, and which prompted police to arrest Seale and five others. The group pleaded guilty to misdemeanor charges of disrupting a legislative session. At the time of the protest, the Party had fewer than 100 members in total. In May 1967,

1770-494: A police officer, Party members cited laws proving they had done nothing wrong and threatened to take to court any officer that violated their constitutional rights. Between the end of 1966 to the start of 1967, the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense's armed police patrols in Oakland black communities attracted a small handful of members. Numbers grew slightly starting in February 1967, when the party provided an armed escort at

1888-493: A prison term of 32 years to life. His next parole hearing is set for November 2028. Robinson stated that his motive was to advance in the Black Guerrilla Family , a narcotics prison gang , in order to get a crack franchise. Newton's funeral was held at Allen Temple Baptist Church, which he attended following his conversion . Some 1,300 mourners were accommodated inside, and another 500 to 600 listened to

2006-502: A raid by the Chicago Police Department . Black Panther Party members were involved in many fatal firefights with police. Huey Newton allegedly killed officer John Frey in 1967, and Eldridge Cleaver (Minister of Information) led an ambush in 1968 of Oakland police officers, in which two officers were wounded and Panther treasurer Bobby Hutton was killed. The party suffered many internal conflicts, resulting in

2124-736: A revolutionary anti-imperialist perspective working with more active and militant groups like the Soul Students Advisory Council and the Revolutionary Action Movement . Their paid jobs running youth service programs at the North Oakland Neighborhood Anti-Poverty Center allowed them to develop a revolutionary nationalist approach to community service, later a key element in the Black Panther Party's " community survival programs ." Dissatisfied with

2242-511: A role in getting the first African-American history course adopted as part of the college's curriculum. Newton learned about black history from Donald Warden (who later would change his name to Khalid Abdullah Tariq Al-Mansour), the leader of the AAA. Later Newton concluded that Warden offered solutions that didn't work. In his autobiography, Newton says of Warden, "The mass media, the oppressors, give him public exposure for only one reason: he will lead

2360-645: A show of force, as they did when they entered the California Legislature fully armed in order to protest a gun bill aimed at disarming them. Newton adopted what he termed "revolutionary humanism ". Although he had previously attended Nation of Islam mosques, he wrote that "I have had enough of religion and could not bring myself to adopt another one. I needed a more concrete understanding of social conditions. References to God or Allah did not satisfy my stubborn thirst for answers." Later, however, he stated that "As far as I am concerned, when all of

2478-554: A social consciousness." In 1982, Newton was accused of embezzling $ 600,000 of state aid to the Panther-founded Oakland Community School. In the wake of the embezzlement charges, Newton disbanded the Black Panther Party. The embezzlement charges were dropped six years later in March 1989, after Newton pleaded no contest to a single allegation of cashing a $ 15,000 state check for personal use. He

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2596-658: A variety of locations throughout the country which focused their curriculum on Black history , writing skills, and political science. The first Liberation School was opened by the Richmond Black Panthers in July 1969 with brunch served and snacks provided to students. Another school was opened in Mt. Vernon New York on July 17 of the subsequent year. These schools were informal in nature and more closely resembled after-school or summer programs. While these campuses were

2714-416: Is noted as saying, "I think that the school's principles came from the socialist principles we tried to live in the Black Panther Party. One of them being critical thinking—that children should learn not what to think but how to think ... the school was an expression of the collective wisdom of the people who envisioned it. And it was ... a living thing [that] changed every year. Joan Kelley oversaw funding for

2832-515: The Black Power movement and the politics of the 1960s and 1970s. The party's political goals, including better housing, jobs, and education for African-Americans, were documented in their Ten-Point Program , a set of guidelines to the Black Panther Party's ideals and ways of operation. The group believed that violence – or the threat of it – might be needed to bring about social change. They sometimes made news with

2950-663: The Ku Klux Klan . In December 1966, he became the first treasurer and recruit of the Black Panther Party at the age of just 16 years old. On April 6, 1968, two days after the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. , and with riots raging across cities in the United States, the 17-year-old Hutton was traveling with Eldridge Cleaver and other BPP members in a car. The group confronted Oakland Police officers, then fled to an apartment building where they engaged in

3068-601: The Peace and Freedom Party , a majority white anti-war political organization, joined with the Black Panther Party in support of Newton. This alliance served the dual purpose of legitimizing Newton's cause while boosting the credibility of the party within the community of more radical activists. Under the leadership of the Black Panther Party and the Peace and Freedom Party, 5,000 protesters gathered in Oakland on Newton's birthday, February 17, 1968, in support of Newton. They garnered

3186-644: The Progressive Labor Party , Bob Avakian of the Community for New Politics, and the Red Guard . For example, the Black Panther Party collaborated with the Peace and Freedom Party , which sought to promote a strong antiwar and antiracist politics in opposition to the establishment Democratic Party . The Black Panther Party provided needed legitimacy to the Peace and Freedom Party's racial politics and in return received invaluable support for

3304-926: The Southern states during the Second Great Migration , moving to Oakland and other cities in the Bay Area to find work in the war industries such as Kaiser Shipyards . The sweeping migration transformed the Bay Area as well as cities throughout the West and North , altering the once white-dominated demographics. A new generation of young black people growing up in these cities faced new forms of poverty and racism unfamiliar to their parents, and they sought to develop new forms of politics to address them. Black Panther Party membership "consisted of recent migrants whose families traveled north and west to escape

3422-1109: The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee , the Revolutionary Action Movement and the Nation of Islam , as well as leaders including the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. , Stokely Carmichael , H. Rap Brown , Maxwell Stanford and Elijah Muhammad . As assistant FBI Director William Sullivan later testified in front of the Church Committee , the Bureau "did not differentiate" between Soviet spies and suspected Communists in black nationalist movements when deploying surveillance and neutralization tactics. COINTELPRO attempted to create rivalries between black nationalist factions and to exploit existing ones. One such attempt

3540-518: The UCLA campus, in a gun battle with members of the US Organization. Another shootout between the two groups on March 17 led to further injuries. Two more Panthers died. Paramount to their beliefs regarding the need for individual agency to catalyze community change, the Black Panther Party (BPP) strongly supported the education of the masses. As part of their Ten-Point Program which set forth

3658-703: The excessive force and misconduct of the Oakland Police Department . From 1969 onward, the party created social programs, including the Free Breakfast for Children Programs, education programs, and community health clinics. The Black Panther Party advocated for class struggle , claiming to represent the proletarian vanguard . In 1969, J. Edgar Hoover , the Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), described

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3776-571: The murder of Betty Van Patter . During Newton's trial for assaulting the tailor, the tailor, who changed his testimony several times, eventually told the jury that he did not know who assaulted him. Newton was acquitted of the assault in September 1978, but convicted of illegal firearms possession and served 9 months in prison in 1987. In 2007, party member Ericka Huggins stated in an interview that Newton repeatedly raped her and threatened that if she told anyone he would hurt her children. In

3894-643: The "Free Huey" campaign. In 1968 the southern California chapter was founded by Alprentice "Bunchy" Carter in Los Angeles. Carter was the leader of the Slauson Street gang, and many of the L.A. chapter's early recruits were Slausons. Bobby James Hutton was born April 21, 1950, in Jefferson County, Arkansas. At the age of three, he and his family moved to Oakland, California after being harassed by racist vigilante groups associated with

4012-453: The Black Panther Party and a black nationalist group called the US Organization , allegedly sending a provocative letter to the US Organization to increase existing antagonism. COINTELPRO also aimed to dismantle the Black Panther Party by targeting their social/community programs, including its Free Breakfast for Children program, whose success had served to "shed light on the government's failure to address child poverty and hunger—pointing to

4130-448: The Black Panther Party and sought to focus directly on political action. Members were encouraged to carry guns and to defend themselves against violence. An influx of college students joined the group, which had consisted chiefly of "brothers off the block". This created some tension in the group. Some members were more interested in supporting the Panthers' social programs, while others wanted to maintain their "street mentality". By 1968,

4248-625: The Black Panther Party emerged. In late October 1966, Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale founded the Black Panther Party (originally the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense). In formulating a new politics, they drew on their work with a variety of Black Power organizations. Newton and Seale first met in 1962 when they were both students at Merritt College . They joined Donald Warden's Afro-American Association , where they read widely, debated, and organized in an emergent black nationalist tradition inspired by Malcolm X and others. Eventually dissatisfied with Warden's accommodationism, they developed

4366-445: The Black Panther Party founded over 60 community support programs (renamed survival programs in 1971) including food banks , medical clinics, sickle cell anemia tests, prison busing for families of inmates, legal advice seminars, clothing banks, housing cooperatives, and their own ambulance service. The most famous of these programs was the Free Breakfast for Children program which fed thousands of impoverished children daily during

4484-660: The Black Panther Party, down with U.S. imperialism," or, "We support the American people but the Nixon imperialist regime must be overthrown." During the trip, the Chinese arranged for him to meet and have dinner with an ambassador from North Korea, an ambassador from Tanzania, and delegations from both North Vietnam and the Provisional Revolutionary Government of South Vietnam . Newton was under

4602-596: The Black Panther symbol. Newton and Seale decided to adopt the Black Panther logo and form their own organization called the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense. Newton and Seale decided on a uniform of blue shirts, black pants, black leather jackets, black berets, the latter adopted as an homage to Che Guevara . Sixteen-year-old Bobby Hutton was their first recruit. By January 1967, the BPP opened its first official headquarters in an Oakland storefront and published

4720-588: The Black Panthers and their allies had become primary COINTELPRO targets, singled out in 233 of the 295 authorized " Black Nationalist " COINTELPRO actions. The goals of the program were to prevent the unification of militant black nationalist groups and to weaken their leadership, as well as to discredit them to reduce their support and growth. The initial targets included the Southern Christian Leadership Conference ,

4838-594: The Black Panthers had adopted a Ten-Point Program , the Black Liberators adopted a five-point programme: On August 17, 1969, the Black Liberators served as protection for African-American Congressman Adam Clayton Powell Jr. who represented New York City's historically black Harlem district. The following month the 9th Precinct of the Saint Louis Police Department was shot at by an unknown assailant and an African-American member of

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4956-532: The Intercommunal Youth Institute which was provided through a combination of Black Panther fundraising and community support. Huey P. Newton Huey Percy Newton (February 17, 1942 – August 22, 1989) was an African American revolutionary and political activist who founded the Black Panther Party . He ran the party as its first leader and crafted its ten-point manifesto with Bobby Seale in 1966. Under Newton's leadership,

5074-413: The Panther , writer Hugh Pearson alleges that Newton was intoxicated in the hours before the incident, and claimed to have willfully killed John Frey. At the time, Newton claimed that he had been falsely accused, leading to the Party's "Free Huey!" campaign. The police killing gained the party even wider recognition by the radical American left and it stimulated the growth of the Party nationwide. Newton

5192-785: The Panthers Party claimed to have fed twenty thousand children in the 1968–69 school year. The Black Panther Party's free breakfast program is "the greatest threat to efforts by authorities to neutralize the BPP and destroy what it stands for." FBI director J. Edgar Hoover Other survival programs were free services such as clothing distribution, classes on politics and economics, free medical clinics, lessons on self-defense and first aid, transportation to upstate prisons for family members of inmates, an emergency-response ambulance program, drug and alcohol rehabilitation, and testing for sickle-cell disease . The free medical clinics were very significant because they modeled an idea of how

5310-603: The Panthers invaded the State Assembly Chamber in Sacramento , guns in hand, in what appears to have been a publicity stunt . Still, they scared a lot of important people that day. At the time, the Panthers had almost no following. Now, (a year later) however, their leaders speak on invitation almost anywhere radicals gather, and many whites wear "Honkeys for Huey " buttons, supporting the fight to free Newton, who has been in jail since last Oct. 28 (1967) on

5428-527: The Panthers started a number of social programs in Oakland, including founding the Oakland Community School, which provided high-level education to 150 children from impoverished urban neighborhoods. Other Panther programs included the Free Breakfast for Children Program and others that offered dances for teenagers and training in martial arts. According to Oakland County Supervisor John George: "Huey could take street-gang types and give them

5546-464: The Panthers to "serve the people" and to make "survival programs" a priority within its branches. The most famous of their programs was the Free Breakfast for Children Program , initially run out of an Oakland church. The Free Breakfast For Children program was especially significant because it served as a space for educating youth about the current condition of the Black community, and the actions that

5664-458: The Panthers' many legal battles. The BPP adopted a "Serve the People" program, which at first involved a free breakfast program for children . By the end of 1968, the BPP had established 38 chapters and branches, claiming more than five thousand members. Eldridge and Kathleen Cleaver left the country days before Cleaver was to turn himself in to serve the remainder of a thirteen-year sentence for

5782-499: The Panthers. While recruiting, Newton sought to educate those around him about the legality of self-defense. One of the reasons, he argued, why Black people continued to be persecuted was their lack of knowledge of the social institutions that could be made to work in their favor. In Newton's autobiography, Revolutionary Suicide , he writes, "Before I took Criminal Evidence in school, I had no idea what my rights were." Newton also wrote in his autobiography, "I tried to transform many of

5900-449: The Party and incidents that are significant in its development", among which are how the United States federal government responded to the BPP as well as to the assassinations of Fred Hampton , Bunchy Carter , and John Huggins . Sources for material used to support the dissertation include two federal civil rights lawsuits. One suit was against the FBI and other government officials , while

6018-439: The Party had expanded into many U.S. cities, including Atlanta , Baltimore , Boston , Chicago, Cleveland , Dallas , Denver , Detroit, Kansas City , Los Angeles, Newark , New Orleans , New York City, Omaha , Philadelphia , Pittsburgh , San Diego , San Francisco, Seattle , Toledo , and Washington, D.C. Peak membership was near 5,000 by 1969, and their newspaper , under the editorial leadership of Eldridge Cleaver , had

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6136-452: The Party was taking to address that condition. "While the children ate their meal[s], members [of the Party] taught them liberation lessons consisting of Party messages and Black history." Through this program, the Party was able to influence young minds, and strengthen their ties to communities as well as gain widespread support for their ideologies. The breakfast program became so popular that

6254-468: The People's Republic of China. On learning of Nixon's plan to visit China in 1972, Newton decided to visit before him. Newton made the trip in late September 1971 with fellow Panthers, Elaine Brown and Robert Bay, and stayed for 10 days. At every Chinese airport he landed in, Newton was greeted by thousands of people waving copies of the "Little Red Book" (officially titled Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung ) and displaying signs that said, "We support

6372-412: The Sacramento action, in the second issue of The Black Panther newspaper. In August 1967, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) instructed its program " COINTELPRO " to "neutralize ... black nationalist hate groups" and other dissident groups. In September 1968, FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover described the Black Panthers as "the greatest threat to the internal security of the country". By 1969,

6490-467: The San Francisco airport for Betty Shabazz , Malcolm X's widow and keynote speaker for a conference held in his honor. The Black Panther Party's focus on militancy was often construed as open hostility, feeding a reputation of violence even though early efforts by the Panthers focused primarily on promoting social issues and the exercise of their legal right to carry arms. The Panthers employed

6608-465: The Temple's earliest " White Nights ". Newton's cousin, Stanley Clayton, was one of the few residents of Jonestown to escape the area before the 1978 mass murder of over 900 Temple members by Jones and his enforcers through forced suicide . By the 1970s, Newton had allegedly become increasingly paranoid, addicted to crack cocaine , and prone to violent behavior. On August 6, 1974, Kathleen Smith,

6726-544: The University of California at Santa Cruz's History of Consciousness program in 1980. In 1989, he was murdered in Oakland, California by Tyrone Robinson, a member of the Black Guerrilla Family . Newton was known for being an advocate of the right of self-defense and used his position as a leader within the Black Panther Party to welcome women as well. Newton was born in Monroe, Louisiana in 1942 during World War II,

6844-597: The University of California at Santa Cruz, where he earned a bachelor's degree. He was a member of Phi Beta Sigma . He later continued his studies and, in 1980, he completed a PhD in social philosophy at Santa Cruz. As a student of the Merritt College in Oakland, Newton became involved in Bay Area politics. He joined the Afro-American Association (AAA), became a prominent member of Phi Beta Sigma fraternity's Beta Tau chapter, and played

6962-416: The assailants, they attacked the wrong house and the occupant returned fire. During the shootout one of the Panthers, Louis Johnson, was killed, and the other two assailants escaped. One of the two surviving assassins, Flores Forbes, fled to Las Vegas, Nevada, with the help of Panther paramedic Nelson Malloy. In November 1977, Malloy was found by park rangers paralyzed from the waist down from bullet wounds to

7080-472: The attention of international news organizations, raising the profile of the party by astounding measures. The phrase "Free Huey!" was adopted as a rallying cry for the movement, and it was printed on buttons and T-shirts. Prominent Black Panther Kathleen Cleaver claimed the goal of the Free Huey! campaign was to elevate Newton as a symbol of everything the Black Panther Party stood for, creating something of

7198-460: The back in a shallow grave in the desert outside of Las Vegas. According to Malloy, he and Forbes were ordered by "higher-ups" to be killed to eliminate any eyewitness accounts of the attempted murder of Crystal Gray. Malloy recovered from the assault and told police that fellow Panthers Rollin Reid and Allen Lewis were behind his attempted murder. Newton denied any involvement or knowledge and said that

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7316-505: The black migration "fled to the suburbs along with white residents", the black population was concentrated in poor "urban ghettos" with high unemployment and substandard housing and was mostly excluded from political representation, top universities, and the middle class. Northern and Western police departments were almost all white. In 1966, only 16 of Oakland's 661 police officers were African American (less than 2.5%). Civil rights tactics proved incapable of redressing these conditions, and

7434-620: The books, make the money, buy the guns, and go on the streets with the guns. We'll protect a mother, protect a brother, and protect the community from the racist cops." On October 29, 1966, Stokely Carmichael – a leader of SNCC – championed the call for " Black Power " and came to Berkeley to keynote a Black Power conference. At the time, he was promoting the armed organizing efforts of the Lowndes County Freedom Organization (LCFO) in Alabama and their use of

7552-567: The charge that he killed a policeman ... In 1967, the Mulford Act was passed by the California legislature and signed by governor Ronald Reagan . The bill was crafted in response to members of the Black Panther Party who were copwatching . The bill repealed a law that allowed the public carrying of loaded firearms. The Black Panther Party first publicized its original "What We Want Now!" Ten-Point program on May 15, 1967, following

7670-399: The conviction was reversed and after two subsequent trials ended in hung juries, the charges were dropped. Later in life, he was also accused of murdering Kathleen Smith and Betty Van Patter , although he was never convicted for either death. Newton learned to read using Plato's Republic , which influenced his philosophy of activism. He went on to earn a PhD in social philosophy from

7788-474: The daughter of two Black Panther members, Mary Luana Williams . Fonda and other Hollywood celebrities became involved in the Panthers' leftist programs. The Panthers attracted a wide variety of left-wing revolutionaries and political activists, including writer Jean Genet , former Ramparts magazine editor David Horowitz (who later became a major critic of what he describes as Panther criminality) and left-wing lawyer Charles R. Garry , who acted as counsel in

7906-494: The early 1970s. Newton also co-founded the Black Panther newspaper service , which became one of America's most widely distributed African-American newspapers. In 1967, he was involved in a shootout which led to the death of police officer John Frey and injuries to himself and another police officer. In 1968, he was convicted of voluntary manslaughter for Frey's death and sentenced to 2 to 15 years in prison. In May 1970,

8024-492: The early hours of August 22, 1989, Newton was murdered in front of 1456 9th Street, near the corner of Center Street in the Prescott section of Oakland, California. Within days, Tyrone Robinson was arrested as a suspect; he was on parole and admitted the murder to police, claiming self-defense, though police found no evidence that Newton was carrying a gun. In 1991, Robinson was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to

8142-403: The events "might have been the result of overzealous party members." After the assassination attempt on Crystal Gray, she declined to testify against Newton. After two trials and two deadlocked juries, the prosecution decided not to retry Newton for Smith's murder. Journalist Ken Kelley , three weeks after Newton's death, claimed that Newton had confessed to him that he murdered Smith and ordered

8260-598: The explosive rebellious anger of the ghetto as a social force and believed that if he could stand up to the police, he could organize that force into political power. Inspired by Robert F. Williams ' armed resistance to the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) and Williams' book Negroes with Guns , Newton studied gun laws in California extensively. Like the Community Alert Patrol in Los Angeles after the Watts Rebellion , he decided to organize patrols to follow

8378-544: The faculty to student ratio was 1:10. The Panther's goal in opening Liberation Schools, and specifically the Intercommunal Youth Institute, was to provide students with an education that was not being provided in the "white" schools, as the public schools in the district employed a Eurocentric assimilationist curriculum with little to no attention to black history and culture. While students were provided with traditional courses such as English, Math, and Science, they were also exposed to activities focused on class structure and

8496-438: The failure of these organizations to directly challenge police brutality and appeal to the "brothers on the block", Huey and Bobby took matters into their own hands. After the police killed Matthew Johnson, an unarmed young black man in San Francisco, Newton observed the violent insurrection that followed. He had an epiphany that would distinguish the Black Panther Party from the multitude of Black Power organizations. Newton saw

8614-523: The first issue of The Black Panther: Black Community News Service . The newspaper would be in continuous circulation, though varying in length, format, title, and frequency until the party dissolved. At its height, it sold one hundred thousand copies a week. The initial tactic of the party used contemporary open-carry gun laws to protect Party members when policing the police. This act was done to record incidents of police brutality by distantly following police cars around neighborhoods. When confronted by

8732-587: The first to open, the first full-time and longest-running Liberation School was opened in January 1971 in Oakland in response to the inequitable conditions in the Oakland Unified School District which was ranked one of the lowest-scoring districts in California. Named the Intercommunal Youth Institute (IYI), this school, under the directorship of Brenda Bay, and later Ericka Huggins , enrolled twenty-eight students in its first year, with

8850-572: The following titles (listed in order): Number 5 of the "What We Want Now!" section of the Ten-Point Program reads: "We want education for our people that exposes the true nature of this decadent American society. We want education that teaches us our true history and our role in present-day society." To ensure that this occurred, the Black Panther Party took the education of their youth into their own hands by first establishing after-school programs and then opening up Liberation Schools in

8968-409: The gun, they can recapture their dreams and bring them into reality. On October 28, 1967, Oakland police officer John Frey was shot to death in an altercation with Huey P. Newton during a traffic stop in which Newton and backup officer Herbert Heanes also sustained gunshot wounds. Newton was convicted of voluntary manslaughter at trial, but the conviction was later overturned. In his book Shadow of

9086-425: The gun. Off the pigs!", helped create the Panthers' reputation as a violent organization. The black community of Richmond, California wanted protection against police brutality. With only three main streets for entering and exiting the neighborhood, it was easy for police to control, contain, and suppress the population. On April 1, 1967, a black unarmed twenty-two-year-old construction worker named Denzil Dowell

9204-499: The ideals and goals of the party, they demanded an equitable education for all black people. Study and reading was important for all would-be candidates of the Party, which included studying the Ten-Point Program, reading the Black Panther newspaper , and attending a series of political education classes as well as weapons training. A 1968 "Panther Party Book List" was circulated in the party newspaper, recommending Panthers read

9322-497: The impression he was going to meet Mao Zedong , chairman of the Chinese Communist Party , but instead had two meetings with Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai . One of these meetings also included Mao's wife Jiang Qing . Newton described China as "a free and liberated territory with a socialist government". Following Newton's Asian trip, the Black Panther Party began incorporating North Korea's Juche ideals into

9440-649: The killing of Frey and was sentenced to 2 to 15 years in prison. In May 1970, the California Appellate Court reversed the conviction and ordered a new trial. After two subsequent trials ended in hung juries, the district attorney said he would not pursue a fourth trial, and the Alameda County Superior Court dismissed the charges. In his autobiography, Revolutionary Suicide , Newton wrote that Heanes and Frey were opposite each other and shooting in each other's direction during

9558-458: The limits of the nation's War on Poverty". According to Bloom & Martin, the FBI denounced the Party's efforts as a means of indoctrination because the Party taught and provided for children more effectively than the government. "Police and Federal Agents regularly harassed and intimidated program participants, supporters, and Party workers and sought to scare away donors and organizations that housed

9676-486: The majority being the children of Black Panther parents. This number grew to fifty by the 1973–1974 school year. To provide full support for Black Panther parents whose time was spent organizing, some of the students and faculty members lived together year around. The school itself was dissimilar to traditional schools in a variety of ways including the fact that students were separated by academic performance rather than age, and students were often provided one-on-one support as

9794-593: The murder of Alex Rackley . Government persecution initially contributed to the party's growth among African Americans and the political left, who both valued the party as a powerful force against de facto segregation and the US military draft during the Vietnam War. Party membership peaked in 1970 and gradually declined over the next decade, due to vilification by the mainstream press and infighting largely fomented by COINTELPRO. Support further declined over reports of

9912-612: The next rallies. Awareness of the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense grew rapidly after their May 2, 1967, protest at the California State Capitol . On May 2, 1967, the California State Assembly Committee on Criminal Procedure was scheduled to convene to discuss what was known as the " Mulford Act ," which would make the public carrying of loaded firearms illegal. Newton, with Minister of Information Eldridge Cleaver , put together

10030-642: The organizations that had "led much of the nonviolent civil disobedience ", such as SNCC and CORE , went into decline. By 1966 a "Black Power ferment" emerged, consisting largely of young urban black people, posing a question the Civil Rights Movement could not answer: "How would black people in America win not only formal citizenship rights, but actual economic and political power?" Young black people in Oakland and other cities developed study groups and political organizations, and from this ferment

10148-588: The other was initially against the City of Chicago. Later, Newton's widow, Fredrika Newton, would discuss her husband's often-ignored academic research during C-SPAN 's American Perspectives program on February 18, 2006. After the decline of the Black Panther Party, Huey P. Newton completed and copyrighted dozens of essays on philosophy, political theology, evolutionary biology, and political economy which remain unpublished and held in archive at Stanford University. [Outro: Huey P. Newton] Uh, we view each other with

10266-405: The party as "the greatest threat to the internal security of the country." The FBI sabotaged the party with an illegal and covert counterintelligence program (COINTELPRO) of surveillance , infiltration , perjury , and police harassment , all designed to undermine and criminalize the party. The FBI was involved in the 1969 assassinations of Fred Hampton and Mark Clark , who were killed in

10384-551: The party's alleged criminal activities, such as drug dealing and extortion . The party's history is controversial. Scholars have characterized the Black Panther Party as the most influential black power organization of the late 1960s, and "the strongest link between the domestic Black Liberation Struggle and global opponents of American imperialism ". Other scholars have described the party as more criminal than political, characterized by "defiant posturing over substance". During World War II , tens of thousands of black people left

10502-746: The party's ideology. In January 1977, Jim Jones , leader of the Peoples Temple of the Disciples of Christ (commonly shortened to the Peoples Temple ), visited Newton in Havana, Cuba. That same year after Jones fled to " Jonestown ", a commune he established in Guyana for his followers, Newton spoke to Temple members in Jonestown via telephone expressing support for Jones during one of

10620-528: The people away from the truth of their situation." In college, Newton read the works of Karl Marx , Vladimir Lenin , Frantz Fanon , Malcolm X , Mao Zedong , Émile Durkheim , and Che Guevara . During his time at Merritt College, he met Bobby Seale , with whom he co-founded the Black Panther Party for Self Defense (BPP) in October 1966. Based on a casual conversation, Seale became chairman and Newton became minister of defense. The Black Panther Party

10738-459: The police around to monitor for incidents of brutality. But with a crucial difference: his patrols would carry loaded guns. Huey and Bobby raised enough money to buy two shotguns by buying bulk quantities of the recently publicized Mao Zedong's Little Red Book and reselling them to leftists and liberals on the Berkeley campus at three times the price. According to Bobby Seale, they would "sell

10856-424: The police board had his real estate office firebombed, the metropolitan police suspected the Liberators. Following these events, the Black Liberators' headquarters were substantially damaged, according to witnesses, by plainclothes police officers. Matters escalated when, eight days later, police arrested Charles Koen and Leon Dent for carrying a concealed weapon during a traffic stop, which was later determined to be

10974-404: The prevalence of institutional racism . The overall goal of the school was to instill a sense of revolutionary consciousness in the students. With a strong belief in experiential learning, students had the opportunity to participate in community service projects as well as practice their writing skills by drafting letters to political prisoners associated with the Black Panther Party. Huggins

11092-440: The programs like churches and community centers". Black Panther Party members were involved in many fatal firefights with police. Newton declared: Malcolm , implacable to the ultimate degree, held out to the Black masses ... liberation from the chains of the oppressor and the treacherous embrace of the endorsed [Black] spokesmen. Only with the gun were the black masses denied this victory. But they learned from Malcolm that with

11210-449: The questions are not answered, when the extraordinary is not explained, when the unknown is not known, then there is room for God because the unexplained and the unknown is God." Newton later decided to join a Christian church after the party disbanded during his marriage to Fredrika. Newton would frequent pool halls, campuses, bars and other locations deep in the black community where people gathered in order to organize and recruit for

11328-448: The revolutionary process. Panther slogans and iconography spread. At the 1968 Summer Olympics , Tommie Smith and John Carlos , two American medalists, gave the black power salute during the American national anthem. The International Olympic Committee banned them from all future Olympic Games. Film star Jane Fonda publicly supported Huey Newton and the Black Panthers during the early 1970s. She actually ended up informally adopting

11446-499: The role of flight crew self-deception in the 1982 crash of Air Florida Flight 90 , and Trivers dedicated one chapter of his autobiography to his relationship with Newton. Newton earned a PhD in the social philosophy program of History of Consciousness from the University of California at Santa Cruz in 1980. His doctoral dissertation titled War Against the Panthers: A Study of Repression in America "analyzes certain features of

11564-402: The service from outside. Newton's achievements in civil rights and work on behalf of Black children and families with the Black Panther Party were celebrated. Newton's body was cremated, and his ashes were interred at Evergreen Cemetery in Oakland. On February 17, 2021, in commemoration of the Black Panther Party the City of Oakland erected a bust of Huey Newton near the street corner where he

11682-479: The shooting began after Newton was under arrest, and one witness testified that Newton shot Frey with Frey's own gun as they wrestled. No gun on either Frey or Newton was found. Newton stated that Frey shot him first, which made him lose consciousness during the incident. Frey was shot four times and died within the hour, while Heanes was left in serious condition with three bullet wounds. Black Panther David Hilliard took Newton to Oakland's Kaiser Hospital, where he

11800-409: The shootout. Hugh Pearson, in his book Shadow of the Panther , writes that Newton, while intoxicated, boasted about having willfully killed Frey. Newton was arrested on the day of the shooting on October 28, 1967, and pled not guilty to the murder of officer John Frey. The Black Panther Party immediately went to work organizing a coalition to rally behind Newton and champion his release. In December

11918-454: The so-called criminal activities going on in the street into something political, although this had to be done gradually." He attempted to channel these "daily activities for survival" into significant community actions. Eventually, the illicit activities of a few members would be superimposed on the social program work performed by the Panthers, and this mischaracterization would lose them some support in black communities and white. Newton and

12036-651: The southern racial regime, only to be confronted with new forms of segregation and repression". In the early 1960s, the Civil rights movement had dismantled the Jim Crow system of racial subordination in the South with tactics of non-violent civil disobedience , and demanding full citizenship rights for black people. However, not much changed in the cities of the North and West. As the wartime and post-war jobs which drew much of

12154-404: The time the BPP claimed that the police had ambushed them, several party members later admitted that Cleaver had led the Panther group on a deliberate ambush of the police officers, provoking the shoot-out. Seven other Panthers, including Chief of Staff David Hilliard, were also arrested. Hutton's death became a rallying issue for Panther supporters. In 1968, the group shortened its name to

12272-766: The turn of the 20th century. This was the fifth-highest total of lynchings of any county in the Southern United States. As a response to the violence, the Newton family migrated to Oakland, California, participating in the second wave of the Great Migration of African-Americans out of the South. The Newton family was close-knit but quite poor. They moved often within the San Francisco Bay Area during Newton's childhood. Despite this, Newton said he never went without food and shelter as

12390-416: The two charges. Elaine Brown took over as chairperson of the Black Panther Party in his absence. Newton returned to the United States in 1977 to stand trial for the murder of Smith and the assault on the tailor. In October 1977, three Black Panthers attempted to assassinate Crystal Gray, a key prosecution witness in Newton's upcoming trial who had been present the day of Kathleen Smith's murder. Unknown to

12508-503: The world might work with free medical care , eventually being established in 13 places across the country. These clinics were involved in community-based health care that had roots connected to the Civil Rights Movement, which made it possible to establish the Medical Committee for Human Rights. In 1968, BPP Minister of Information Eldridge Cleaver ran for presidential office on the Peace and Freedom Party ticket. They were

12626-692: The youngest child of Armelia Johnson and Walter Newton, a sharecropper and Baptist preacher. His parents named him after Huey Long , former governor of Louisiana. Monroe is located in Louisiana's Ouachita Parish , which has had a history of violence against Black people since the Reconstruction era . According to a 2015 report by the Equal Justice Initiative , from 1877 to 1950, a total of 37 Black people were documented as lynched in that parish. Most murders had taken place around

12744-476: Was active in the United States between 1966 and 1982, with chapters in many major American cities, including San Francisco, New York City, Chicago, Los Angeles, Seattle , and Philadelphia . They were also active in many prisons and had international chapters in the United Kingdom and Algeria. Upon its inception, the party's core practice was its open carry patrols ("copwatching") designed to challenge

12862-422: Was admitted with a bullet wound to the abdomen. Newton was soon handcuffed to his bed and arrested for Frey's killing. A doctor, Thomas Finch, and nurse, Corrine Leonard, attended to Newton when he arrived at the hospital, and Finch stated that Newton was "agitated" when asking for treatment and that Newton was given a tranquilizer to calm him. Newton was convicted in September 1968 of voluntary manslaughter for

12980-501: Was an African-American left-wing organization advocating for the right of self-defense for black people in the United States. The Black Panther Party's beliefs were greatly influenced by Malcolm X . Newton stated: "Therefore, the words on this page cannot convey the effect that Malcolm has had on the Black Panther Party, although, as far as I am concerned, the Party is a living testament to his life work." The party achieved national and international renown through their deep involvement in

13098-525: Was an influential work in Newton's early adult life; he told the court during the trial for the killing of officer John Frey , that he had learned to read from studying the Republic . After that, he started "questioning everything". In his autobiography, Revolutionary Suicide , he states: "Most of all, I questioned what was happening in my own family and in the community around me." Newton continued his education, studying at San Francisco Law School, and

13216-507: Was arrested for mail fraud, and during court proceedings it was revealed that Shabazz had been operating as an informant for the metropolitan police. Black Panther Party The Black Panther Party (originally the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense ) was a Marxist–Leninist and black power political organization founded by college students Bobby Seale and Huey P. Newton in October 1966 in Oakland, California . The party

13334-479: Was murdered. That same year, a commemorative plaque "Dr. Huey P. Newton Way" was applied to this section of 9th Street. Newton received a bachelor's degree from the University of California at Santa Cruz in 1974. In 1978, while in prison, Newton met evolutionary biologist Robert Trivers after Newton applied to do a reading course with Trivers as part of a graduate degree in history of consciousness . He and Trivers became close friends, they published an analysis of

13452-500: Was not convicted. Newton is also alleged to have assaulted his tailor over the price of a suit. Newton posted bond after being arrested for pistol-whipping the tailor in 1974. Newton was subsequently arrested a second time for the murder of Smith, but was able to post an additional $ 80,000 bond, thus securing his release until trial. Newton and his girlfriend (later his wife) Gwen Fontaine then fled to Havana, Cuba, where they lived until 1977, which prevented further prosecution on

13570-455: Was released after three years, when his conviction was reversed on appeal. As Newton awaited trial, the "Free Huey" campaign developed alliances with numerous students and anti-war activists, "advancing an anti-imperialist political ideology that linked the oppression of antiwar protestors to the oppression of blacks and Vietnamese". The "Free Huey" campaign attracted black power organizations, New Left groups , and other activist groups such as

13688-607: Was sentenced to six months in jail and 18 months probation. Newton had been convicted of assault with a deadly weapon for repeatedly stabbing another man, Odell Lee, with a steak knife in mid-1964. He served six months in prison. By October 27–28, 1967, he was out celebrating the release from his probationary period. Just before dawn on October 28, Newton and a friend were pulled over by Oakland Police Department officer John Frey. Realizing who Newton was, Frey called for backup. After fellow officer Herbert Heanes arrived, shots were fired, and all three were wounded. Heanes testified that

13806-612: Was shot dead by police in North Richmond. Dowell's family contacted the Black Panther Party for assistance after county officials refused to investigate the case. The Party held rallies in North Richmond that educated the community on armed self-defense and the Denzil Dowell incident. Police seldom interfered at these rallies because every Panther was armed and no laws were broken. The Party's ideals resonated with several community members, who then brought their own guns to

13924-535: Was to "intensify the degree of animosity" between the Black Panthers and the Blackstone Rangers , a Chicago street gang. The FBI sent an anonymous letter to the Rangers' gang leader claiming that the Panthers were threatening his life, a letter whose intent was to provoke "preemptive" violence against Panther leadership. In Southern California, the FBI made similar efforts to exacerbate a "gang war" between

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