Huey Newton
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In the late 1960s and early 70s posters of the Black Panther Partys co-founder, Huey P. Newton were taped and plastered on walls of college dorm rooms nation-wide. Wearing a black beret and a leather jacket, sitting on a wicker chair, a spear in one hand and a rifle in the other, the poster portrayed Huey Newton as a symbol of his generations anger and courage. He was a symbol of anger and courage in the face of racism and the class in which blacks were placed. His intellect and leadership abilities were the key components that served in the establishment the Black Panthers. Newton played an instrumental role in refocusing civil rights activists to the problems of urban Black communities. He triggered the rage and frustration of urban Blacks in order to address social injustice. However, the FBIs and White Americas fear of the Panthers aggressive actions would not only drive the Panthers apart, but be responsible for the false information regarding its programs and accomplishments. In spite of the advances Huey Newton contributed towards equality in the early sixties, historians have paid so much attention to Malcolm X and Martin Luther King that he is often overlooked. The Panthers and Huey Newtons leadership of the Party are as important to the Black freedom struggle as the more known leaders of the Civil Rights Movement. Any typical American history textbook not only neglects to mention Huey Newton but too disregards the existence of the Black Panthers altogether.
Unlike King and many other civil rights leaders who were religious Southerners, from middle class and well-educated families, Huey P. Newton was a working class man from a poor urban black neighborhood. Born February 17, 1942, in Oak Grove Louisiana, Huey moved to Oakland, California when he was just two years old. During childhood, remarkable quick wit and strength earned him the respect of his peers and the reputation of being a tough guy (Seale 40). Upon his enrollment at Merrit College Hueys academic achievements quickly began to surpass other students, while at the same time he was still able to relate to those he grew up with on the streets of Oakland. Hueys ability and desire to develop his intellect and receive a college education while still identifying with his peers on the street played an influential role in his effective leadership in the Black Panther Party. Early on in life Huey experienced hostility from local police on a regular. “The police were very brutal to [him] even at [an early] age” (Newton 53), Even as a child, Newton was called nigger and force out of public places. Police harassment and physical abuse of Black people was apart of every day life for many Blacks all across the country. Although the Civil Rights movement was mainly a down south event, the ideas of non-violence and the integration focus of the movement became an increasing frustration and disappointment for many Blacks in up north and west-coast as well. As the Civil Rights Movement approached the end of the 1960s, northern Blacks became angered by the television coverage of police beatings, incarcerations of those who were non-violent, employment discrimination, and the constant police brutalities in their own neighborhoods. Newton even recalls a time he seen “Martin Luther King [go] to Watts in an effort to calm the people and [see] his philosophy of nonviolence rejected” (Newton 114). According to Newton, “black people had been taught nonviolence; it was deep in us. What good, however, was non-violence when the police were determined to rule by force” (Newton 155). This view served as the development of the approach of Black power. It was against this non-violence environment that Huey Newton attended Merritt College where the idea for the Black Panther Party would soon be born.
At Merrit College Huey Newton met Bobby Seale who would soon become Hueys co-founder of the Black Panthers. The initial friendship between Huey and Bobby served as a productive one. For they both shared the frustrations of social injustices towards the Black community. As the death of Malcolm X saddened many blacks nation-wide, it was this question of the non-violent movements focus which Huey arrives at the idea for blacks to carry weapons. This idea would be soon to serve as a founding principal within the Panthers, inspired by Malcolm Xs philosophy for self-defense. Fed up with the increasing police brutality towards African Americans Huey Newton and Bobby Seale decided to form an organization to monitor police behavior in black neighborhoods and protect the rights of African Americans. This my friends, was the Black Panther Party. The Panthers broke into American history in 1966 when Huey P. Newton wrote the platform for the party. The platform made an aggressive call for power to determine the destiny of our black community. The platform put an immediate emphasis on the need to end police brutality. Black Panthers first action was to follow Oakland Police cars, either on foot or in cars, while dressed