black power movement

{{Short description|1960s to 1980s African-American social movement}}

{{About|the 20th century American social movement|other uses and related terms|Black Power (disambiguation)}}

{{Infobox civil conflict

| title = Black power movement

| partof = the counterculture of the 1960s

| image = Black Panther demonstration.jpg

| image_size = 300px

| caption = Black Panther Party members protest a gun control bill in Olympia, Washington, on February 28, 1969.

| date = 1966–1980s

| place = United States

| causes = * Perceived failures of the civil rights movement

Turn towards militancy

| result = *Worldwide spread of Black power ideals

Establishment of Black-operated services and businesses
Decline by the 1980s

}}

The Black power movement or Black liberation movement emerged in the mid-1960s from the mainstream civil rights movement in the United States, reacting against its moderate and incremental tendencies and representing the demand for more immediate action to counter White supremacy. Many of its ideas were influenced by Malcolm X's criticism of Martin Luther King Jr.'s peaceful protest methods. The 1965 assassination of Malcolm X, coupled with the urban riots of 1964 and 1965, ignited the movement.{{Cite web |title=Malcolm X: From Nation of Islam to Black Power Movement |url=https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2018/02/malcolm-nation-islam-black-power-movement-180221085553908.html |access-date=2020-04-24 |website=www.aljazeera.com}} While thinkers such as Malcolm X influenced the early movement, the views of the Black Panther Party, founded in 1966, are widely seen as the cornerstone. Black power was influenced by philosophies such as pan-Africanism, Black nationalism, and socialism, as well as contemporary events such as the Cuban Revolution and the decolonization of Africa.Komozi Woodard, [http://exhibitions.nypl.org/africanaage/essay-black-power.html "Rethinking the Black Power Movement"], Africana Age.

During the peak of the Black power movement in the late 1960s and early 1970s, many African Americans adopted "Afro" hairstyles, African clothes, or African names (such as Stokely Carmichael, the chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee who popularized the phrase "Black power" and later changed his name to Kwame Ture) to emphasize their identity. Others founded Black-owned stores, food cooperatives, bookstores, publishers, media, clinics, schools, and other organizations oriented to their communities. American universities began to offer courses in Black studies, and the word Black replaced negro as the preferred usage in the country. Other leaders of the movement included Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale, founders of the Black Panther Party.

Some Black power organizations prioritized social programs, while others adopted a more militant approach; for instance, the Black Panther Party introduced a Free Breakfast for Children program and established community health clinics, while the Black Liberation Army carried out bombings and murdered police officers. The movement never had a central authority or structure, and its influence was diluted by legislation such as the Fair Housing Act of 1968, the expansion of federally funded welfare programs, and police action against its activists. The Black power movement declined by the mid-1970s and 1980s, as civil rights activists increasingly focused on electing Black politicians over militant struggle, though its legacy has influenced later movements, such as Black Lives Matter.

History

=Origin=

{{multiple image

| total_width = 300

| image1 = Malcolm X NYWTS 4.jpg

| image2 = Huey Newton, portrait photograph by Blair Stapp.jpg

| footer = Malcolm X (left) and Huey Newton, prominent leaders of the Black power movement

}}

The first popular use of the term "Black power" as a social and racial slogan was by Stokely Carmichael (later known as Kwame Ture) and Willie Ricks (later known as Mukasa Dada), both organizers and spokespeople for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee. On June 16, 1966, in a speech in Greenwood, Mississippi, during the March Against Fear, Carmichael led the marchers in a chant for Black power that was televised nationally.{{cite book |author=Hasan Jeffries|title=Bloody Lowndes: Civil Rights and Black Power in Alabama's Black Belt|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=XFWVLK4_PCoC&pg=PA187|year=2010|publisher=NYU Press|page=187|isbn=9780814743065}}

The organization Nation of Islam began as a Black nationalist movement in the 1930s, inspiring later groups.{{cite web|last=Muhammad|first=Tynetta|title=Nation of Islam History|date=14 August 2013 |url=http://www.noi.org/noi-history|access-date=April 17, 2014}} It was strongly influenced by Pan-Asianism, especially with respect to Japan, believing in a unity between non-White peoples.{{cite journal |last1=Deutsch |first1=Nathaniel |title='The Asiatic Black Man': An African American Orientalism? |journal=Journal of Asian American Studies |date=2001 |volume=4 |issue=3 |pages=193–208|doi=10.1353/jaas.2001.0029 |s2cid=145051546 }} Kevin Gaines has argued that in the 1950s, an early version of the Black Power movement was restrained due to Cold War tensions.{{cite book |last1=Gaines |first1=Kelly |editor1-last=Appy |editor1-first=Christian |title=Cold War Constructions: The Political Culture of United States Imperialism |date=2000 |publisher=University of Massachusetts Press |location=Amherst, MA |pages=257–70 |chapter=From Black Power to Civil Rights: Julian Mayfield and African Expatriates in Nkrumah’s Ghana, 1957–1966}} This was done through methods like the restriction of passports.{{cite book |last1=Plummer |first1=Brenda G. |title=Rising Wind: Black Americans and U.S. Foreign Affairs, 1935–1960 |date=1996 |publisher=University of North Carolina Press |location=Chapel Hill}} Figures such as W. E. B. Du Bois, Paul Robeson and Julian Mayfield were part of this and some, including Mayfield, felt forced to emigrate the United States and continue their activism elsewhere, with Mayfield going to Ghana.{{cite book |last1=Gaines |first1=Kelly |editor1-last=Appy |editor1-first=Christian |title=Cold War Constructions: The Political Culture of United States Imperialism |date=2000 |publisher=University of Massachusetts Press |location=Amherst, MA |pages=257–270 |chapter=From Black Power to Civil Rights: Julian Mayfield and African Expatriates in Nkrumah’s Ghana, 1957–1966}}

Malcolm X is largely credited with the group's dramatic increase in membership between the early 1950s and early 1960s (from 500 to 25,000 by one estimate; from 1,200 to 50,000 or 75,000 by another).{{cite book |last=Lomax |first=Louis E. |author-link=Louis Lomax |title=When the Word Is Given: A Report on Elijah Muhammad, Malcolm X, and the Black Muslim World |year=1963 |publisher=World Publishing |location=Cleveland |oclc=1071204 |pages=15–16 |quote=Estimates of the Black Muslim membership vary from a quarter of a million down to fifty thousand. Available evidence indicates that about one hundred thousand Negroes have joined the movement at one time or another, but few objective observers believe that the Black Muslims can muster more than twenty or twenty-five thousand active temple people. }}{{cite book |last=Marable |first=Manning |author-link=Manning Marable |title=Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention |location=New York |publisher=Viking |year=2011 |isbn=978-0-670-02220-5 |page=123 |title-link=Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention }} In March 1964, Malcolm X left the Nation due to disagreements with Elijah Muhammad; among other things, he cited his interest in working with civil rights leaders, saying that Muhammad had prevented him from doing so.{{cite web |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1964/03/09/archives/malcolm-x-splits-with-muhammad-suspended-muslim-leader-plans-black.html |title=Malcolm X Splits with Muhammad |last=Handler |first=M. S. |date=March 9, 1964 |work=The New York Times |access-date=September 22, 2017 |url-access=subscription }} Later, Malcolm X also said Muhammad had engaged in extramarital affairs with young Nation secretaries{{mdashb}}a serious violation of the group's teachings.{{cite book |last=Perry |first=Bruce |title=Malcolm: The Life of a Man Who Changed Black America |year=1991 |publisher=Station Hill |location=Barrytown, N.Y. |isbn=978-0-88268-103-0 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/malcolmlifeofman00perr/page/230 230–234] |url=https://archive.org/details/malcolmlifeofman00perr/page/230 }} On February 21, 1965, Malcolm X was shot and killed while speaking at the Audubon Ballroom in Washington Heights, New York City.{{cite web|url=http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/malcolm-x-assassinated|title=Malcolm X Assassinated|access-date=September 20, 2017|date=2009|publisher=History.com}} Three Nation members were convicted of assassinating him. Despite this, there has long been speculation and suspicion of government involvement. The forty police officers at the scene were instructed to "stand down" by their commanding officers while the shooting took place.{{Cite journal|last=Simon|first=John|date=2005|title=Malcolm X-His Legacy|journal=Monthly Review|volume=56 |issue=9 |pages=25–45|doi=10.14452/MR-056-09-2005-02_3}}{{Cite news|url=https://www.cnn.com/2015/02/17/opinion/ali-malcolm-x-assassination-anniversary/index.html|title=What Really Happened to Malcolm X?|last=Ali|first=Zaheer|date=February 7, 2015|work=CNN}}{{cite web|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1966/03/11/archives/malcolm-x-jury-finds-3-guilty-2-black-muslims-and-3d-man-convicted.html|title=Malcolm X Jury Finds 3 Guilty|access-date=October 2, 2014|last=Buckley|first=Thomas|date=March 11, 1966|work=The New York Times|url-access=subscription }}{{cite web|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1966/04/15/archives/3-get-life-terms-in-malcolm-case-sentenced-for-1965-murder-of-black.html |title=3 Get Life Terms in Malcolm Case|access-date=October 2, 2014|last=Roth|first=Jack|date=April 15, 1966|work=The New York Times|url-access=subscription }}{{Cite news|url=https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation-now/2015/02/21/malcolm-x-anniversary-death/23764967/|title=Quotes: Half a century after his death, Malcolm X speaks|work=USA TODAY|access-date=July 16, 2018|language=en}}

After the Watts riots in Los Angeles in 1965, the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee decided to cut ties with the mainstream civil rights movement. They argued that Blacks needed to build power of their own, rather than seek accommodations from the power structure in place. SNCC migrated from a philosophy of nonviolence to one of greater militancy after the mid-1960s.{{cite web|title=Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC)|url=https://www.britannica.com/topic/Student-Nonviolent-Coordinating-Committee|website=Encyclopædia Britannica Online|access-date=May 6, 2015}} The organization established ties with radical groups such as the Students for a Democratic Society.

In late October 1966, Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale founded the Black Panther Party. In formulating a new politics, they drew on their experiences working with a variety of Black power organizations.Seale, 1970, part I; Newton, 1973, parts 2–3; Bloom and Martin, 2013, chapter 1; Murch, 2010, part II and chapter 5.

=Escalation in the late 1960s=

File:John Carlos, Tommie Smith, Peter Norman 1968cr.jpg and John Carlos raise their fists in a Black power salute at the 1968 Summer Olympics.]]

The Black Panther Party initially utilized open-carry gun laws to protect party members and local Black communities from law enforcement. Party members also recorded incidents of police brutality by distantly following police cars around neighborhoods.Bloom and Martin, 45. Numbers grew slightly starting in February 1967, when the party provided an armed escort at the San Francisco airport for Betty Shabazz, Malcolm X's widow and keynote speaker at a conference held in his honor.Black Panther Newspaper, May 15, 1967, p. 3; Bloom and Martin, 71–72. By 1967, the SNCC began to fall apart due to policy disputes in its leadership, and many members left for the Black Panthers.Fraser, C. Gerald, [https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1310&dat=19681008&id=WNhVAAAAIBAJ&sjid=H-EDAAAAIBAJ&pg=6905,1709713 "SNCC Has Lost Much of Its Power to Black Panthers"], The New York Times news service (Eugene Register-Guard), October 9, 1968. Throughout 1967, the Panthers staged rallies and disrupted the California State Assembly with armed marchers.Pearson, 129. In 1956 the FBI developed COINTELPRO to investigate Black nationalist groups and others.{{Cite web |title=COINTELPRO {{!}} United States government program {{!}} Britannica |url=https://www.britannica.com/topic/COINTELPRO |access-date=2022-04-07 |website=www.britannica.com |language=en}}Stohl, 249. By 1969, the Black Panthers and their allies had become primary COINTELPRO targets, singled out in 233 of the 295 authorized "Black nationalist" COINTELPRO actions. In 1968, the Republic of New Afrika was founded, a separatist group seeking a Black country in the southern United States, only to dissolve by the early 1970s.

At the 1968 Summer Olympics in Mexico City, Tommie Smith and John Carlos, the gold and bronze medalists, respectively, in the 200 meters event, each raised a black-gloved hand as the American national anthem was played during their medal ceremony. Afterwards, Smith stated that: "We are Black and we are proud of being Black. Black America will understand what we did."

By 1968, many Black Panther leaders had been arrested, including founder Huey Newton for the murder of a police officer (Newton's prosecution was eventually dismissed), yet membership surged. Black Panthers later engaged the police in a firefight in a Los Angeles gas station. In the same year, Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated, creating nationwide riots, the widest wave of social unrest since the American Civil War.[http://www.temple.edu/tempress/chapters_1800/2148_ch1.pdf Peter B. Levy] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150924123559/http://www.temple.edu/tempress/chapters_1800/2148_ch1.pdf |date=2015-09-24 }}, Baltimore '68, p. 6. In Cleveland, Ohio, the "Republic of New Libya" engaged the police in the Glenville shootout, which was followed by rioting.{{cite encyclopedia|url=http://ech.case.edu/cgi/article.pl?id=GS1|title=Glenville Shootout – The Encyclopedia of Cleveland History|date=March 27, 1998|encyclopedia=The Encyclopedia of Cleveland History|publisher=A joint effort by Case Western University and the Western Reserve Historical Society|access-date=February 19, 2013}} The year also marked the start of the White Panther Party, a group of Whites dedicated to the cause of the Black Panthers. Founders Pun Plamondon and John Sinclair were arrested, but eventually freed, in connection to the bombing of a Central Intelligence Agency office in Ann Arbor, Michigan, that September.{{cite news|last=Zbrozek|first=C.|title=The bombing of the A2 CIA office|url=http://www.michigandaily.com/content/bombing-a2-cia-office|access-date=April 22, 2013|newspaper=Michigan Daily|date=October 24, 2006}}

By 1969, the Black Panthers began purging members due to fear of law enforcement infiltration, engaged in multiple gunfights with police and one with a Black nationalist organization. The Panthers continued their "Free Huey" campaign internationally. In the spirit of rising militancy, the League of Revolutionary Black Workers was formed in Detroit, which supported labor rights and Black liberation. {{cite web |title=Speech on the League of Revolutionary Black Workers |url=https://www.marxists.org/history/erol/ncm-7/mlp-lrbw.htm#:~:text=The%20League%20was%20part%20of,fighting%20stand%20against%20capitalist%20exploitation. |website=Communist Voice |access-date=June 21, 2023}}

=Peak in the early 1970s=

File:Boston 1970 protest against the Vietnam War.jpg]]

In 1970 the Honorary Prime Minister of the Black Panther Party, Stokely Carmichael, traveled to various countries to discuss methods to resist "American imperialism".Joseph, Peniel E. Waiting 'Til the Midnight Hour: A Narrative History of Black Power in America, Henry Holt and Company, 2007. In Trinidad, the Black power Movement had escalated into the Black Power Revolution in which many Afro-Trinidadians forced the government of Trinidad to give into reforms. Later many Panthers visited Algeria to discuss Pan-Africanism and anti-imperialism. In the same year former Black Panthers formed the Black Liberation Army to continue a violent revolution rather than the party's new reform movements.Marie-Agnès Combesque, [http://mondediplo.com/2005/10/14blackpanthers "Caged panthers"], Le Monde diplomatique, 2005. On October 22, 1970, the Black Liberation Army is believed to have planted a bomb in St. Brendan's Church in San Francisco while it was full of mourners attending the funeral of San Francisco police officer Harold Hamilton, who had been killed in the line of duty while responding to a bank robbery. The bomb was detonated, but no one in the church suffered serious injuries.Van Derbeken and Lagos. [http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/01/23/BAGRKNNFV04.DTL "Ex-militants charged in S.F. police officer's '71 slaying at station"], San Francisco Chronicle (January 23, 2007).

In 1971, several Panther officials fled the U.S. due to police concerns. This was the only active year of the Black Revolutionary Assault Team, a group that bombed the New York South African consular office in protest of apartheid. On September 20 it placed bombs at the UN Missions of Republic of the Congo (Kinshasa) and the Republic of Malawi.Edward F. Mickolaus, Transnational Terrorism: a chronology of events, Westport, Conn: Greenwood Press, 1980, p. 258. In February 1971, ideological splits within the Black Panther Party between leaders Newton and Eldridge Cleaver led to two factions within the party; the conflict turned violent and four people were killed in a series of assassinations.Donald Cox, "Split in the Party", New Political Science, Vol. 21, No. 2, 1999. On May 21, 1971, five Black Liberation Army members participated in the shootings of two New York City police officers, Joseph Piagentini and Waverly Jones. Those brought to trial for the shootings include Anthony Bottom (also known as Jalil Muntaqim), Albert Washington, Francisco Torres, Gabriel Torres, and Herman Bell.{{citation needed|date=October 2014}}

During the jail sentence of White Panther John Sinclair a "Free John" concert took place, including John Lennon and Stevie Wonder. Sinclair was released two days later. On August 29, three BLA members murdered San Francisco police sergeant John Victor Young at his police station. Two days later, the San Francisco Chronicle received a letter signed by the BLA claiming responsibility for the attack.{{citation needed|date=October 2014}} Late in the year Huey Newton visited China for meetings on Maoist theory and anti-imperialism.Revolutionary Suicide Penguin classics Delux Edition" page 352 Black power icon George Jackson attempted to escape from prison in August, killing seven hostages only to be killed himself.{{cite news|title=Attempted Escape At San Quentin Leaves Six Dead|url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=tyw0AAAAIBAJ&pg=1467%2C2414109|agency=UPI|newspaper=Bangor Daily News|location=Bangor, Maine|date=August 23, 1971|pages=1, 3|access-date=October 23, 2010}} Jackson's death triggered the Attica Prison uprising which was later ended in a bloody siege. On November 3, Officer James R. Greene of the Atlanta Police Department was shot and killed in his patrol van at a gas station by Black Liberation Army members.{{cite web|url=http://www.fultonda.org/featuredarticle/30years.htm|title=Fulton Co. District Attorney Report|website=Fultonda.org|access-date= October 25, 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160715141332/http://www.fultonda.org/featuredarticle/30years.htm|archive-date=July 15, 2016|url-status=dead}}

1972 was the year Newton shut down many Black Panther chapters and held a party meeting in Oakland, California. On January 27, the Black Liberation Army assassinated police officers Gregory Foster and Rocco Laurie in New York City. After the killings, a note sent to authorities portrayed the murders as a retaliation for the prisoner deaths during 1971 Attica prison riot. To date no arrests have been made.{{Cite web|url=https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/04/the-untold-story-behind-new-yorks-most-brutal-cop-killing-117207.html|title=The Untold Story Behind New York's Most Brutal Cop Killings|last=Burrough|first=Bryan|website=Politico Magazine|language=en|access-date=2019-06-04 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150424181806/https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/04/the-untold-story-behind-new-yorks-most-brutal-cop-killing-117207.html |archive-date=April 24, 2015}}{{citation needed|date=October 2014}} On July 31, five armed BLA members hijacked Delta Air Lines Flight 841, eventually collecting a ransom of $1 million and diverting the plane, after passengers were released, to Algeria. The authorities there seized the ransom but allowed the group to flee. Four were eventually caught by French authorities in Paris, where they were convicted of various crimes, but one—George Wright—remained a fugitive until September 26, 2011, when he was captured in Portugal.{{cite news|url=http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2011/09/man_who_escaped_from_nj_prison.html|title=Man who escaped from N.J. prison 41 years ago is captured in Portugal|publisher=NJ.com|date=September 26, 2011|access-date=September 26, 2011}} After being accused of murdering a prostitute in 1974, Huey Newton fled to Cuba. Elaine Brown became party leader and embarked on an election campaign.Perkins, Margo V. Autobiography As Activism: Three Black Women of the Sixties, Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 2000, p. 5.

=De-escalation in the late 1970s=

File:Black Panther convention2.jpg in Washington, June 1970]]

In the late 1970s a rebel group named after the killed prisoner formed the George Jackson Brigade. From March 1975 to December 1977, the Brigade robbed at least seven banks and detonated about 20 pipe bombs—mainly targeting government buildings, electric power facilities, Safeway stores, and companies accused of racism. In 1977, Newton returned from exile in Cuba. Shortly afterward, Elaine Brown resigned from the party and fled to Los Angeles.Brown, 444–50. The Party fell apart, leaving only a few members.{{cite journal |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1977/12/14/archives/coast-inquiries-pick-panthers-as-target-murder-attempted-murders.html |title=Coast Inquiries Pick Panthers As Target; Murder, Attempted Murders and Financing of Poverty Programs Under Oakland Investigation | journal=The New York Times |date=December 14, 1977 |first=Wallace |last=Turner }}

MOVE developed in Philadelphia in 1972 as the "Christian Movement for Life", a communal living group based on Black Liberation principles. When police raided their house in 1978, a firefight broke out; during the shootout, one officer was killed, seven other police officers, five firefighters, three MOVE members, and three bystanders were also injured.{{cite magazine

|url=http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,946962,00.html

|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070525103740/http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,946962,00.html

|url-status=dead

|archive-date=May 25, 2007

|title=Nose to Nose: Philadelphia confronts a cult

|date=August 14, 1978

|magazine=Time

|access-date=May 20, 2007}}

In another high-profile incident of the Black Liberation Army, Assata Shakur, Zayd Shakur and Sundiata Acoli were said to have opened fire on state troopers in New Jersey after being pulled over for a broken taillight. Zayd Shakur and state trooper Werner Foerster were both killed during the exchange. Following her capture, Assata Shakur was tried in six different criminal trials. According to Shakur, she was beaten and tortured during her incarceration in a number of different federal and state prisons. The charges ranged from kidnapping to assault and battery to bank robbery. Assata Shakur was found guilty of the murder of both Foerster and her companion Zayd Shakur, but escaped prison in 1979 and eventually fled to Cuba and received political asylum. Acoli was convicted of killing Foerster and sentenced to life in prison.

In 1978 a group of Black Liberation Army and Weather Underground members formed the May 19th Communist Organization, or M19CO. It also included members of the Black Panthers and the Republic of New Africa.{{cite book |title= LEFT-WING EXTREMISM: The Current Threat Prepared for U.S. Department of Energy Office of Safeguards and Security

|year= 2001

|publisher= Oak Ridge Institute for Science and Education: Center for Human Reliability Studies ORISE 01-0439

|location= Oak Ridge, TN

|page= 1

|doi= 10.2172/780410

|url= http://www.osti.gov/bridge/servlets/purl/780410-SHVVvq/native/780410.PDF

|access-date= December 27, 2009 |last1= Karl a. Seger

}}

{{cite news

|title=Terrorist Organization Profile: May 19 Communist Order

|author=National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and the Responses to Terrorism, DHS

|newspaper=National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and the Responses to Terrorism

|date=March 1, 2008

|url=http://www.start.umd.edu/start/data/tops/terrorist_organization_profile.asp?id=3234

|access-date=December 27, 2009

|url-status=dead

|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100607235923/http://www.start.umd.edu/start/data/tops/terrorist_organization_profile.asp?id=3234

|archive-date=June 7, 2010

}} In 1979 three M19CO members walked into the visitor's center at the Clinton Correctional Facility for Women near Clinton, New Jersey. They took two guards hostage and freed Shakur. Several months later M19CO arranged for the escape of William Morales, a member of Puerto Rican separatist group Fuerzas Armadas de Liberación Nacional Puertorriqueña from Bellevue Hospital in New York City, where he was recovering after a bomb he was building exploded in his hands.

=Decline in the 1980s=

Over the 1980s the Black power movement continued despite a decline in its popularity and organization memberships. The Black Liberation Army was active in the US until at least 1981 when a Brinks truck robbery, conducted with support from former Weather Underground members Kathy Boudin and David Gilbert, left a guard and two police officers dead. Boudin and Gilbert, along with several BLA members, were subsequently arrested.[http://www.crimelibrary.com/terrorists_spies/terrorists/brinks/1.html CourtTV Crime Library, Ambush: The Brinks Robbery of 1981] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150209235659/http://www.crimelibrary.com/terrorists_spies/terrorists/brinks/1.html |date=February 9, 2015 }} M19CO engaged in a bombing campaign in the 1980s. They targeted a series of government and commercial buildings, including the U.S. Senate. On November 3, 1984, two members of the M19CO, Susan Rosenberg and Timothy Blunk, were arrested at a mini-warehouse they had rented in Cherry Hill, New Jersey. Police recovered more than 100 blasting caps, nearly 200 sticks of dynamite, more than 100 cartridges of gel explosive, and 24 bags of blasting agent from the warehouse. The M19CO alliance's last bombing was on February 23, 1985, at the Policemen's Benevolent Association in New York City.

MOVE had relocated to West Philadelphia after the earlier shootout. On May 13, 1985, the police, along with city manager Leo Brooks, arrived with arrest warrants and attempted to clear the MOVE building and arrest the indicted MOVE members.{{cite book|last1=Shapiro|first1=Michael J.|title=The Time of the City: Politics, Philosophy and Genre|date=June 17, 2010|publisher=Routledge|isbn=9781136977879|page=108}} This led to an armed standoff with police,{{cite web|url=https://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2005-05-11-philadelphia-bombing_x.htm|title=1985 bombing in Philadelphia still unsettled|website=Usatoday.com|access-date= October 25, 2017}} who lobbed tear gas canisters at the building. MOVE members shot at the police, who returned fire with automatic weapons.{{cite news|last=Stevens|first=William K.|title=Police Drop Bomb on Radicals' Home in Philadelphia|url=http://www.mindfully.org/Reform/MOVE-Phihladelphia-BombNYT14may85.htm|access-date=August 31, 2012|newspaper=The New York Times|date=May 14, 1985|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120612050152/http://www.mindfully.org/Reform/MOVE-Phihladelphia-BombNYT14may85.htm|archive-date=June 12, 2012}} The police then bombed the house, killing several adults and children, and causing a large fire that destroyed the better part of a city block.{{cite magazine|last=Trippett |first=Frank |url=http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,956982,00.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071203032947/http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,956982,00.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=December 3, 2007 |title=It Looks Just Like a War Zone |magazine=Time |date=May 27, 1985 |access-date=May 14, 2013}}

In 1989, well into the waning years of the movement, the New Black Panther Party formed. In the same year on August 22, Huey P. Newton was fatally shot outside by 24-year-old Black Guerilla Family member Tyrone Robinson.{{cite news |title=Suspect Admits Shooting Newton, Police Say |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1989/08/27/us/suspect-admits-shooting-newton-police-say.html |quote=The police said late Friday that an admitted drug dealer had acknowledged killing Huey P. Newton, co-founder of the Black Panther Party |agency=Associated Press |work=The New York Times |date=August 27, 1989 |access-date=May 8, 2013}}

Characteristics

=Education=

The fifth point of the Black Panther Party's Ten-Point Program called for "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 the present day society." This sentiment was echoed in many of the other Black power organizations; the inadequacy of Black education had earlier been remarked on by W. E. B. Du Bois, Marcus Garvey, and Carter G. Woodson.

With this backdrop, Stokely Carmichael brought political education into his work with SNCC in the rural South. This included get-out-the-vote campaigns{{Cite book|last1=Ture|first1=Kwame|last2=Hamilton|first2=Charles V.|date=1992|title=Black Power: the Politics of Liberation in America|location=New York|publisher=Vintage Books|isbn=0679743138|oclc=26096713|page=[https://archive.org/details/blackpowerpoliti00carm_0/page/114 114]|url=https://archive.org/details/blackpowerpoliti00carm_0/page/114}} and political literacy. Bobby Seale and Huey Newton used education to address the lack of identity in the Black community. Seale had worked with youth in an after-school program before starting the Panthers. Through this new education and identity building, they believed they could empower Black Americans to claim their freedom.

=Media=

Just as Black power activists focused on community control of schools and politics, the movement took a major interest in creating and controlling its own media institutions. Most famously, the Black Panther Party produced the Black Panther newspaper, which proved to be one of the BPP's most influential tools for disseminating its message and recruiting new members.

WAFR was launched in September 1971 as the first public, community-based Black radio station. The Durham, North Carolina, station broadcast until 1976, but influenced later activist radio stations including WPFW in Washington, D.C., and WRFG in Atlanta.{{cite web|url=http://mediaandthemovement.unc.edu/tag/wafr/|title=WAFR – Media and the Movement|website=mediaandthemovement.unc.edu|access-date= October 25, 2017}}

Australian Black power

The American Black power movement influenced Aboriginal Australian activists from the late 1960s onwards, especially in Sydney, Brisbane and Melbourne.{{cite journal | last=Trometter | first=Alyssa L. | title=Malcolm X and the Aboriginal Black Power Movement in Australia, 1967–1972 | journal=The Journal of African American History | publisher=University of Chicago Press | volume=100 | issue=2 | date=1 April 2015 | issn=1548-1867 | doi=10.5323/jafriamerhist.100.2.0226 | pages=226–249| s2cid=148914542 }} The term became widely known after the Victorian Aborigines Advancement League (AAL), led by Bruce McGuinness and Bob Maza, invited Caribbean activist Roosevelt Brown to give a talk on Black power in Melbourne in 1968, causing a media frenzy. The AAL was influenced by the ideas of Malcolm X and Stokely Carmichael. The Australian "Black power movement" had emerged in Redfern in Sydney, Fitzroy, Melbourne, and South Brisbane, following the "Freedom Ride" led by Charles Perkins in 1965. There was a small group of people at the centre of the movement known as the Black Caucus.

Bobbi Sykes defined Australian Black power as "The power generated by people who seek to identify their own problems and those of the community as a whole, and who strive to take action in all possible forms to solve those problems", while Paul Coe saw it as the need for Aboriginal people to "take control both of the economical, the political and cultural resources of the people and of the land…so that they themselves have got the power to determine their own future". Activist and later academic Gary Foley later wrote that in Australia, Black power "was essentially about the necessity for Black people to define the world in their own terms, and to seek self-determination and independence on their own terms, without white interference". The Aboriginal Legal Service in Redfern grew out of this activism.{{cite web | title=White Police and Black Power – Part 2 | website=Aboriginal Legal Service (NSW/ACT)| first= Gary|last =Foley| author-link= Gary Foley | url=https://www.alsnswact.org.au/white_police_black_power_2 |date= 16 July 2021| access-date=2 October 2022}}{{cite web| url=https://vuir.vu.edu.au/27009/1/Black%20power%20in%20Redfern%201968-1972.pdf|title= Black Power in Redern (1968–1972) |date= 5 October 2001| first= Gary|last =Foley| author-link= Gary Foley }}

Legacy

File:Quanell X bodyguards.jpg members marching in 2007]]

After the 1970s the Black power movement saw a decline, but not an end. In 1998, the Black Radical Congress was founded, with debatable effects. The Black Riders Liberation Party was created by Bloods and Crips gang members as an attempt to recreate the Black Panther Party in 1996. The group has spread, creating chapters in cities across the United States, and frequently staging paramilitary marches.{{cite web|url=http://www.workers.org/ww/1999/aryana1125.php|title=Workers World Nov. 25, 1999: Black Riders show resistance is possible|website=Workers.org|access-date=October 25, 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190513173905/http://www.workers.org/ww/1999/aryana1125.php|archive-date=May 13, 2019|url-status=dead}} During the 2008 presidential election New Black Panther Party members were accused of voter intimidation at a polling station in a predominantly Black, Democratic voting district of Philadelphia.[https://www.cbsnews.com/news/republicans-push-for-new-black-panther-hearing/ "Republicans Push For New Black Panther Hearing"]. CBS News, July 27, 2010. After the killing of Trayvon Martin Black power paramilitaries formed, including the Huey P. Newton Gun Club, African American Defense League, and the New Black Liberation Militia, all staging armed marches and military training.{{citation needed|date=November 2017}}

Some have compared the modern movement Black Lives Matter to the Black power movement, noting its similarities.{{cite web|url=https://wearemany.org/v/from-black-power-to-black-lives-matter |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150318083539/https://wearemany.org/v/from-black-power-to-black-lives-matter |archive-date=2015-03-18 |title=From Black Power to Black Lives Matter|website=Wearemany.org|access-date= October 21, 2022}} The Movement for Black Lives openly promotes Black power.Author unknown. (Updated 2022.) Black Power Rising. Movement for Black Lives. Retrieved August 20, 2022, from https://m4bl.org/black-power-rising/

Organizations still operating

References

Bibliography

{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=lbvOF1BUT2oC&q=the+east+cooperative+view+from+the+east+kununuana&pg=PA78|title=A View from the East: Black Cultural Nationalism and Education in New York City|last=Konadu|first=Kwasi|date=2009|publisher=Syracuse University Press|isbn=9780815651017}}
Ogbar, Jeffrey O.G. Black Power: Radical Politics and African American Identity (2019), [https://www.amazon.com/Black-Power-Politics-American-Identity-dp-1421429764/dp/1421429764/ref=mt_other?_encoding=UTF8&me=&qid=1598564950/ excerpt and a text search]