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S.A.F.E. (Seniors Against A Fearful Environment) Protect Our Senior Citizens

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Editorial: FREE DAVID HILLIARD!

On last Sunday, June 10th, Bobby Seale visited with David Hilliard at Vacaville (Medical Facility) Prison. (See box on page 3.) It was a joyous occasion for both.

On this visit, the first since the recent Oakland municipal elelctions, Bobby came to David with the ballot endorsement of nearly 45,000 Oakland residents; some 37 percent of the city's total voting population, and, we suspect, a much larger percentage of its non-voting population.

The election campaign spearheaded by Bobby Seale and Elaine Brown was supported, participated in and on many levels led by, The Black Panther Party, which demonstrated to the world that Bobby Seale and his colleagues are responsible, able, dedicated and hard working members of the Oakland community. The country's media as well as Mayor John Reading were compelled to admit this.

David Hilliard, although incarerated, is a member of that community. He is a close colleague of Bobby Seale and Elaine Brown, he is a leading member of the Black Panther Party. Consequently, there is absolutely no basis on which the California Adult Authority can justify its refusal to grant David Hilliard parole on grounds he represents "a dangerous threat to society".

Those 45,000 Oakland residents, neighbors and friends of David Hilliard, who voted for Bobby Seale as Mayor of Oakland on May 15th, by that vote, also consciously identified themselves with the demand for the immediate release of David Hilliard on parole. They know that neither David Hilliard nor his colleagues are a dangerous threat to society.

Let the California Adult Authority, the California Department of Corrections and the Governors' office be forewarned: this visit signals the beginning of a concerted effort to secure the just and speedy release on parole of David Hilliard. David's return to the community is clearly in the best interest of the community. Those who stand in the way of his return display their contempt for that community and must therefore accept full responsibility for the consequences.

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LETTER TO THE EDITOR

Dear Editor:

"For me, a Canadian high school student many miles from the Base of Operations in Oakland, the progressive movements of the Black Panther Party since its inception seven years ago have never failed to inspire me.

"Certainly your weekly news reports have increased the consciousness of me and my friends by continually revealing the hypocrisy, the racism and malice that those in high places exhibit in their endless drive to drain human and natural resources while lining their own pockets with cash and greedy profits.

"Perhaps what inspires me most is the love and dedication with which the Panthers serve the people despite the fact that, for their service and dedication, they are greeted by so-called representatives of government with insult and slanderous abuse and then later, when nobody appears to be watching, with police raids and ambushes. Panthers are thrown into `medical facilities' because the oppressor fears for his wallet and his life, but mostly, because the Panthers are serving the people and establishing solidarity in the community.

"While blatant attempts at genocide continue, the so - called `workers' party can do little more than spout elite theory and outdated rhetoric in an attempt to draw support for their bureaucratic doctrines.

"The theories of Huey P. Newton do not sit wasted on the shelves of

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some college library; they find their translation in the streets because it was in the streets that the theories were born.

"The other political parties are only concerned with wielding power and care little for the citizens whom they claim to represent. In Oakland, California, the only real democrats are Bobby Seale, Elaine Brown, David Hilliard and Huey P. Newton and all the others who serve the community.

"This message, the message of the Black Panther Party will someday echo throughout all communities and then the white middle-class will come to the realization that they have been deceived and robbed by their `leaders'; they will see that their `American Dream' is as plastic and artificial as Disneyland and that the only real truth lies in the pages of newspapers such as this one."

Sincerely,
Kevin Murphy
Ottawa, Ontario
Canada

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“OPERATION GEMSTONE: THE GREAT WATERGATE CONSPIRACY”

The Watergate conspiracy is just a small scheme of an immense, clandestine plot by the Nixon Administration to establish absolute power. The overall plan, which Nixon and his coconspirators still plan to carry out if they can maneuver around this scandal's exposure is designed to insure the status quo -- fascism.

"Operation Gemstone: The Great Watergate Conspiracy", is a book being composed by the radical Citizens Research and Investigating Committee (CRIC), from Beverly Hills, California, THE BLACK PANTHER has been given exclusive advance publication rights to print excerpts from the work.

We know that by the Spring of 1971, almost a year before then Attorney General Mitchell became President Nixon's campaign manager, Mitchell personally controlled a secret fund set up to finance Operation Gemstone's intelligence gathering operations against the Democrats. The fund, which fluctuated between $350,000 and $700,000, and possibly reaching as high as $1.3 million, was kept in cash in the safe of Maurice H. Stans, the former Secretary of Commerce who became finance chairman for the Nixon campaign. Stans, Mitchell, deputy campaign director Jeb Stuart Magruder, and Herbert Kalmbach, Nixon's personal attorney and leading Republican fundraiser, had authority to approve dispersals from the fund.

By the summer of 1971, a team of operatives had been recruited. In early July, special Presidential counsel Charles Colson hired former CIA agent E. Howard Hunt as a $100 a-day consultant. Colson also tapped G. Gordon Liddy, former FBI agent and aide to Presidential advisor John Erlichman, as White House coordinator for the team. The team was to have a dual function. One was "Operation Gemstone", the political espionage and intelligence operation under Colson's direction. The second function was counter-intelligence, the main aim of which was to plug security leaks within the Administration. In June of 1971, the Pentagon Papers had been leaked to the New York Times, exposing the lies and deceptions foisted on the American public regarding the war in Vietnam by the preceding four national administrations.

Egil (Bud) Krogh, a deputy to John Erlichman, was tapped by Erlichman to head the "plumbing" squad which was to plug these leaks. Colson recruited

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Hunt and Liddy for this supposedly legal counter-intelligence opration to serve as a cover for the illegal clandestine political espionage operation, However, before long the counter - intelligence operation was completely entangled in illegal activity.

An early instance of the political espionage activities of the team was directed against Senator Edward M. Kennedy. At Colson's direction, Hunt began working up a dossier on Senator Kennedy, then regarded as the strongest contender against Nixon in the 1972 election. Special attention was to be given the 1969 Chappaquiddick automobile accident. Sometime in July of 1971, the same month he was hired by Colsen, Hunt traveled to Providence, Rhode Island, to try to recruit a government employee to aid this investigation. Using the alias Edward Warren, Hunt had a two-hour meeting with Clifton DeMotte, a civil service employee with the General Services Administration. DeMotte, who had some familiarity with the activities of the Kennedy family dating back over a decade when he worked in Hyannis Port, Mass., was asked by Hunt to help investigate the Chappaquiddick incident and also to try to dig up scandalous material on Kennedy's personal life. DeMotte turned him down.

Also during the summer of 1971, G. Gordon Liddy gave some foresha-dowing of his penchant for electronic eavesdropping when he proposed to the Justice Department that they bug the office of the New York Times in order to determine who gave the Pentagon Papers to the newspaper. Liddy made the proposal to some Justice Department attorneys, who, when they determined he was serious, stopped dealing with him. Nevertheless, Liddy and Hunt went ahead on their own with the plan, supervising the wiretapping of two New York Times reporters. The taps were authorized by John Mitchell and Assistant Attorney Robert C.Mardian.

As early as 1969, President Nixon had been angry about leaks to the press, and had ordered taps on the telephones of several reporters and White House aides. J. Edgar Hoover, then FBI director, was wary of this operation, and agreed to do it only after Attorney General John Mitchell gave him written authorization. When pressures on the Administration mounted later to oust Hoover from his FBI post, he used threats to disclose these embarrassing taps to counter this pressure. When the White House later decided to engage in similar wiretapping activities over the Pentagon Papers release, Mitchell was reluctant to ask Hoover to do it again, thus leading White House aides to set up their own spying operation. In 1971, Hoover found that his records on the taps had disappeared. When a Hoover aide asked Assistant Attorney General Robert Mardian who was responsible for this "bag job", Mardian replied, "Ask the President. Or ask Mitchell."

Echoes of old conspiracy can be heard as Colson and Hunt began their

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work on the Pentagon Papers project: Hunt told Colson that the intelligence cables relating to the assassination of Vietnamese President Diem were missing. Colson took the occassion to instruct Hunt to cut, paste, and forge cables that would link President Kennedy to the CIA activity in Saigon in November of 1963.

(But where were the missing cables from 1963? They had been missing, too, when the McNamara task force set about writing the original Pentagon Papers in 1967. And there were many papers missing from the last National Security Council meetings in August, September and October of 1963, just before the President was assassinated in Dallas.)

Throughout the fall of 1971, Liddy and Hunt continued to divide their attention between investigations relating to the Pentagon Papers release and building a political espionage effort for the coming Presidential elections. On June 28, 1971, Daniel Ellsberg was indicated for releasing the Pentagon Papers to the New York Times. On September 3, 1971, in another foreshadowing of Watergate, Hunt and Liddy burglarized the office of Ellsberg's Beverly Hills psychiatrist, Dr. Lewis Fielding.

CONTINUED NEXT WEEK

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State of California

GOVERNOR'S OFFICE

SACRAMINTO 95014

RONALD REAGAN
GOVERNOR

November 8, 1972

Miss Exilda Groux
National Association of Laity
Box 333
Hudson Heights, Quebec

Dear Miss Groux:

I am in receipt of a copy of your letter to the California Adult Authority regarding the release of David Hilliard. I am applied at your lack of understanding and comprehension of the seriousness of Mr. Hilliard's crimes. I am particularly insulted as a Catholic that you would endorse Mr. Hilliard as a man of stature, and on official letterhead.

Mr. Hilliard was convicted for his participation in a shoot out with police officers, which ultimately resulted in the death of several persons. In light of this, any close association with the Black Panther Party on behalf of legitimate Catholic organizations are not only inappropriate but incomprehensible as well. I would commend for your reading a treatise written by Pope Pius XII, entitled "Crime and Punishment", in 6th Catholic Lawyer 92 (1960).

I am not so concerned whether or not Mr. Hilliard obtains a parole. This is a decision well rested in the judgment of the California Adult Authority. My concern is that what purports to be a reputable Catholic organization has placed itself in the position of defending a man for acts which are indefensible both morally and legally. Your actions in this case are at the least misguided.

My comments in this matter do not reflect upon the Governor, as they are my own personal comments to a situation which I find reprehensible and embarrassing. As a Catholic, I must protest.

Sincerely,
James D. Garbolino
Assistant Legal Affairs Secretary

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CA. OFFICIAL “APPALLED” BY CATHOLIC SUPPORT FOR DAVID HILLIARD

The letter reproduced above has recently come to the attention of THE BLACK PANTHER. In the name of the Community of Concern for David Hilliard, copies of this letter, together with a covering letter, have been sent to a long list of Catholic organizations and individuals who identified themselves with the groups' efforts to obtain a speedy parole for David Hilliard.

The text of the covering letter follows:

June 5, 1973

Dear Friends:

Attached is a copy of a letter we believe will interest you.

On official stationary of the Governor of California, James D. Garbolino, Assistant Legal Affairs Secretary, takes to task Miss Exilda Groux of the National Association of Laity, Quebec, Canada, for daring to associate her organization with the world-wide demand for the release on parole of our comrade, David Hilliard.

In his letter Mr. Garblino accuses David of participating in a shootout with police resulting "in the death of several persons." He is in a position to know better, raising questions in our minds as to the intent of this damaging distortion of fact. Only one person died as a result of the incident for which David Hilliard was convicted, and that was the 17 year-old Lil' Bobby Hutton, killed by the police. Evidence contributing to David's conviction was given by the renegade Eldridge Cleaver, who himself skipped bail to avoid prosecution.

More reprehensible is the use by Mr. Garbolino of official letterhead stationary of the Governor, payed for by the citizens of the very community from which David comes and to which he must be returned, to, by his own admission, express his personal comments -- the very act for which he chastizes Miss Groux.

Your own association with the demand for the release of David Hilliard prompts us to call this matter to your attention. We are confident that you will act on this information in the best interest of justice and good sense.

All Power To The People
David G. DuBois, member
Community of Concern
For David Hilliard

The recent refusal of the California Adult Authority (parole board) to act favorably on an application to push forward the scheduled December, 1973, hearing for David Hilliard on medical grounds, points up the determination of the Authority and the California penal system to continue to ignore the demands of the people for the release of David.

A chronic ulcer condition plagues David and grows worse. The oppressive, inhumane and violence-ridden atmosphere and conditions, the ignorant, racist and sadistic guards and the inadequate and medically dangerous

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diet David is forced to subsist on, all threaten David's very life.

Petitions for the immediate parole of David Hilliard containing more than 50,000 signatures from around the country are in the hands of the Adult Authority. A giant folder containing hundreds of letters making the same demand from political, religious, professional and community leaders from across the country and around the world, is also in the Authority's hands.

As David's condition grows worse and threats to his life increase, the Community of Concern for David Hilliard, which now includes a constituency of some 45,000 Oakland residents who voted on May 15th to place Bobby Seale in the Mayor's seat at Oakland City Hall, grows more and more aware of real intent of the California Adult Authority and those it represents concerning David Hilliard -- to let him rot in jail.

The people shall not forget or forgive such callous disregard for a proven, dedicated and committed leader of his people. A people's justice will, in the end, be done.

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BOBBY SEALE VISITS DAVID HILLIARD

Last Sunday, June 10, Bobby Seale, a leading member of the Black Panther Party, was allowed in to Vacaville (Medical Facility) to visit David Hilliard, also a leader of the Black Panther Party, for the first time since his incarceration. This decision was made after inquiries were made by lawyers to the prison authorities there.

The two long-time friends and brothers-in-struggle saw each other for the first time in over 6 months, since David's sister's funeral. They talked in-depth about many things: revolutionary politics, the Black Panther Party's development and the recent campaign in Oakland, California. Both Bobby and David were enthusiastic about this meeting. They talked for 5 ½ hours, seriously analyzing poor peoples situation in this country, laughing, or just getting to know each other again.

Hopefully through the Community of Concern for David Hilliard there will be another effort made to secure David's release on parole in the coming months. Then Bobby Seale and the entire Black community will have him home again with them where he belongs.

FREE DAVID HILLIARD

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OAKLAND REDEVELOPMENT AGENCY APOLOGIZES TO THE BLACK PANTHER PARTY

Protests against verbal insults directed at the Black Panther Party at a recent Oakland City Council meeting have resulted in a letter of apology to Huey P. Newton from John Williams, Executive Director of the Oakland Redevelopment Agency.

On May 22nd, the Oakland City Council, meeting in joint session with the Oakland Redevelopment Agency (ORA), approved a plan to expand the City Center Project in the heart of downtown Oakland from six square blocks to fifteen square blocks. This approval, however, came following a wide variety of speakers, many of whom represented or belonged to local civic organizations, presented a variety of serious reservations, questions and problems arising from the construction of the City Center Project. Issues such as citizen participation, citizen ownership, jobs, increased taxes, environmental concerns and most important, housing, were raised. The answers provided by the ORA were insufficient and a citizen's committee was created to attempt to solve these many problems.

At that City Council meeting Attorney Fred J. Hiestand, representing the Black Panther Party and the East Bay Legislative Council of Senior Citizens, presented a series of powerful arguments centering around the housing issue. Concluding his presentation, Attorney Hiestand asked if there were any questions. What followed, first from a racist member of the ORA, and later from John Williams, who is Black and the Executive Director of the ORA, were veiled insults and snide remarks regarding Attorney Hiestand's client, the Black Panther Party.

THE BLACK PANTHER reprints below the apology sent by John Williams to Huey P. Newton of the Black Panther Party at Attorney Hiestand's request, and Brother Huey's response.

Mr. Huey P. Newton
Black Panther Party

Dear Mr. Newton:

"It has come to my attention that you are concerned that some remarks made at the joint public hearing of the Oakland City Council-Redevelopment Agency on the Central District Urban Renewal Plan (City Center Project) cast dispersion upon your organization and were in your opinion unnecessary and unwarranted.

"May I take this letter as a means of assuring you that we had no intention of demeaning your organization in any way. It is my sincere hope that we may work together in a spirit of cooperation to resolve some of the issues that are raised by this project. This can only be done, as I am sure you are aware, in an atmosphere of mutual respect and assistance…"

Sincerely,
John B. Williams

Dear Mr. Williams:

"I am in receipt of your letter of apology dated May 31, and want you to know that the Black Panther Party accepts your apology.

"We too are hopeful that our conerns, and those of other community groups, can be adequately dealt with before any money is spent on the Center. Elaine Brown, our Public Information Officer, has been designated as a representative of the Party to attend the ad hoc citizens group meeting. She and other community members will, of course, confer regularly with me and my attorney, Fred J. Hiestand, on the progress we are making toward resolving the problems surrounding City Center.

"Again, we appreciate your letter and look forward to working with you."

Very truly yours,
Huey P. Newton

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OTHO GREEN SHOWS HIS COLORS

We print below a letter that Mr. Otho Green sent to Bobby Seale shortly after the recent Oakland Mayoralty elections. Green, together with several other candidates, was soundly beaten by Bobby in the primary on April 17th. Bobby polled 37% of the city's vote in the run-off against Mayor John Reading. Although Mr. Green broke his pre-primary promise to support whomever won the run-off position against Mayor John Reading, he saw fit to author these words:

May 19, 1973

Bobby Seale
Black Panther Party

Dear Friend,

After several days' reflection, I decided to follow my first impulse after the run-off election and forward to you my well meant thoughts as expressed below. I do hope that at this point you will, perhaps, be willing to listen.

Probably the worst thing that can happen to a man who considers going into politics is to suffer under the self-delusion to be a leader when there is only a small following flattering the supposed leader on grounds of sheer egotistical motives.

Secondly: Please, my friend, consider seriously going back to school and learn the basics of how to speak English correctly; it could and may help for better personal relationships with your fellow men.

Sincerely,
O. Green

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PHILLY 14 TRIAL BEGINS: CHARGES FROM 1970 POLICE RAID

(Philadelphia, Pa.) - Fourteen Black men and women will come to trial on June 18, in Philadelphia City Hall on charges of assault with a deadly weapon, assault with intent to kill, possession of illegal weapons and conspiracy to commit murder. The trial follows, by three years, avicious and unprovoked raid - murder attempt upon these brothers and sisters by the Philadelphia police under the coordinating guidance of the FBI. They are alive today because they defended themselves and they now facecharges because they did.

On the morning of August 31, 1970, five hundred police and FBI agents converged upon three Black Panther Party community information centers in Philadelphia. The whirring sound of many patrol car's flashing lights revolving, the hum of engines and errie red illumination flickering through the windows woke alert Black Panther Party members in each of the offices. As the heavily armed attack forces took up positions, the Panthers quickly moved from bed-to bed shaking their sleeping brother's and sisters into consciousness.

Through the windows of the wooden frame building on Wallace Street,

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where William Brown used to serve hot breakfasts' daily to school children, he now saw machine guns and magnum shotguns being switched from the "safety" to the "fire" position.

Donna Howell, a Black Panther Party member from Boston, saw the high-powered rifles used by Philadelphia "Stake-Out Squad" officers being distributed to the attackers along Columbia Avenue, in the city she'd been in less than twenty-four hours. The fourteen had been among hundreds who were preparing to hold a Plenary Session for the Revolutionary People's Constitutional Convention held in Washington, D.C.

Allegedly looking for stolen hand granades (they never found), the police unleased the full fury of their armed might upon the fourteen defenders. Machine-gun fire tore through the roof of the North Philly office from a helicopter gunship above. In West Philly, a Korean War veteran who lived down the street was fearfully awakened by what he thought was the Korean War. Chips of plaster and dust fell into the hair and eyes of two-year old Malik McGriff as bullets ripped into the wall, inches above his crib. His mother crouched by the window defending his life with her own against the scores of uniformed "peace officers" who would murder her and her child.

Within an hour the defenders left their homes and surrendered. In West Philadelphia, the six Party members and two residents of an apartment above the office were forced to strip naked in the street at gunpoint. In North Philadelphia, the defenders were forced to walk backwards from the building in the broken glass-strewn street, dressed as they'd been when the attack awoke them at 5:00 a.m. All of the brothers and sisters were forced to submit to a degrading and perverted "search", although they wore only underwear or less. Within days, (then) Police Chief Frank Rizzo admitted there had been no evidence to justify the raid. Its real purpose was to attempt to stop the Plenary Session. It was an unsuccessful attempt.

Now the Philly 14 are coming to trial. Set at 9:00 a.m. in Room 446 at City Hall, the trial is like many held around the country (in New Orleans, Detroit, New York, etc.) in which the Black Panther Party defendants had to be released. However, the last six political trials held in Philadelphia all resulted in life sentence terms. Support the Philly 14! Come out and show your support on Monday, June 18.

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BOBBY SEALE'S MESSAGE TO THE CHICAGO CONFERENCE

Last week Bobby Seale flew to Chicago from Oakland, California, to attend the June 1st and 2nd Community Control of Police Conference sponsored by the City-Wide Campaign for Community Control of Police, held at the University of Illinois, Circle Campus.

Bobby took the place of scheduled speaker, Brother Huey P. Newton, who was unable to attend. Handreds of Chicago residents took part in the conference workshops, and overwhelmingly resolved to begin organizing to end police brutality and murder of Black and poor people through establishing community control of the Chicago Police Department.

On being introduced, Bobby received a standing ovation. The following is excerpted portions of Bobby Seale's message to the conference participants:

"Power to the People…I want to say first, that Brother Huey P. Newton sends you his love, care and respect. He said he's very sorry he couldn't be here and I came to take hisplace."

Bobby then explained the organizing tactics of the people's campaign in Oakland, California, placing emphasis on methods of voter registration

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that were used and called attention to Chicago's voter registration regulations:

"Here in Chicago…when it comes down to registering people to vote… if I'm not mistaken, you have to go down to the courthouse to register to vote or some other local institution of government, and you have to line up and wait. That's the state laws here. In California, we have a different situation. We can deputize registrars in a matter of 1 hour. If we can put together 30 people, 50 or 100 people inside of a church, the Alameda County Board of Registrar's office will come down and teach a class for 1 hour and have everybody raise their hand, swear the people in, and make them deputy registrars.

"They can then go out into the community and knock on the doors and actually solicit people to register to vote. You do not have that here and that is a problem.

"On the one hand you're talking about, here in Chicago, placing a proposition, measure or initiative on the ballot for community control of police. But you need a state referendum, measure or proposition to allow for people in the community to become deputy registrars so that they can go out into the community and in fact register people to vote, so that people in the community can participate in the political process, in the electoral process.

"Now this method of making the people go to the courthouse to register to vote is an old, fascist, racist method from the South to the North to the East to the West. It's been used on Black people consistently in the South, where you have to first go to your courthouse, police station, or fire station and register to vote. If people don't go down there they can't participate in the electoral process. If we hear any politican talk about government and our people participating in government, and that we have a democracy and that the word democracy means government by the people. If they talk that, then it's necessary for you, the community, move on them to support the fact that you the people should have the right to organize non - partisan and partisan groups and have people become deputy registrars in the thousands to be able to go in the community and register millions of people.

"They cannot talk about government of the people, by the people, for the people, they cannot talk about the word democracy, or democrat or a people's republic or whatever, without recognizing the fact that millions of people in this country do not even participate because of the restraining framework."

Bobby then turned his speech toward the police:

"…Their real power is manifested in the organized guns and force. But we're saying that the people in this community, the people in this country, don't have any control over that organized guns, force and power. We're saying that the capitalist, the racist, and others have the control over it. And we're saying that we want to change it, that we want to revolutionize it, turn it over into the hands of the people, for a new process to occur. We're saying we want community control.

"So what you're doing when you put the initiative on the ballot is unifying so many people in opposition to the corruption of this system, in opposition to the brutality, in opposition to all the exploitation. If that isn't our goal, I don't know what is.

"I say this is humanity, we are part of humanity, we're going to be significant to it, we're going to have to involve the masses of the people. You do not gain power to the people, you do not gain government of the people, by the people and for the people, until the people start to learn how to control those institutions of government, be it the police department or whatever, until we make it function for ourselves. We are not going to survive, we are not going to live long enough unless we begin to change things and we better participate for the next 4 years, for the next 6 years, for the next 10 years, because the movement has a job… We have a job of implementing people power in Chicago and this country. All Power to the People and thank you very much."

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“COMMUNITY CONTROL OF AMERICA”

BOB RUSH, DICK GREGORY, FANNIE LOU HAMER,
OTHERS, SPEAK AT CHICAGO CONFERENCE

(Chicago, Ill.) - Chicago's Community Control of Police Conference, held on June 1st and 2nd, attracted more than a thousand Chicago citizens of varied ethnic background who participated in workshops in order to set up a structure by which control of Chicago's police could be achieved.

Also, the conference was highlighted by an impressive array of speakers who had come to Chicago from near and far. They included: Bobby Seale, leading member of the Black Panther Party; Fannie Lou Hamer, southern activist; Dick Gregory, comedian - activist; mayor of Gary, Indiana, Richard Hatcher and many others.

The conference was moderated by Bobby Rush, Coordinator of the Illinois Chapter of the Black Panther Party and a campaign organizer for Chicago's City-wide Campaign for Community Control of Police. Bobby Rush set the tone for the successful two-day conference when he addressed conference participants assembled at the University of Illinois on June 1st. He provided some background on the control of police movement in Chicago:

"I want to give you a breakdown -- some history -- in regards to community control of police", Rush began.

"Back in August of 1972, we initiated a conference for community control of police which was held at Holy Angels Church, on the southside of Chicago. Over 5,000 poor people attended. At that conference we gave away 5,000 bags of groceries, 3,000 pairs of brand new children's shoes and administered Sickle Cell Anemia tests. This was a conference that escaped the attention of the establishment media, but it happened.

"Also, at that conference we took notes, synthesized them, and came up with a basic ordinance, some basic principles for community control of police…

"We decided that December 4, 1972, was a strategic time (Chicago police murdered Fred Hampton and Mark Clark, two members of the Black Panther Party, on December 4, 1969) to officially launch the campaign, with a memorial service for Fred and Mark."

Bobby then described other points in the development of the control of police campaign and called attention to the importance of the scheduled workshops.

Renault Robinson of the Afro-American Patrolmen's League (AAPL) also spoke. Robinson is a member of the Chicago Police Department, who, after seeing from the inside police corruption and policies toward Black and poor people, formed the AAPL. He has been harassed, threatened and even arrested on occasions by the Chicago Police Department, which is trying to fire him and other members of the AAPL.

He answered the questions of the conference participants with undisputable knowledge. In reply to a question about Chicago's traffic court, Robinson said:

"Let me tell you something about that traffic court. Last year they turned over $34.5 million. That supports the entire court system -- all those folks that walk around there in little jackets, shuffling and carrying on. And that money is not anywhere in the city budget. That ($34.5 million) goes into the `slush fund'.

"Now you know why you get stopped when you're riding down the street. Now you know why they have ticket quotas, because they've figured out with a computer: `If we give so many people tickets, at the end of the year we'll have made so much cash money'…$34.5 million -- and 99% of it is coming out of your pockets."

Sister Fannie Lou Hamer, a Black southern community activist who has long been involved in her people's struggle, was also on hand, giving her support. In her address she said:

"…We can start right here in Chicago and make this a city that's decent for people…When I hear about the corruption that's going on here in Chicago and other cities…(I know that) this is a sick country. America is on the critical list.

"We must make this a decent place

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for all of us, because until it's made better, it's not a safe place for any of us. All of our children…suffer because of the things that are going on now.

"It's good to organize. It's good to try to get some control. But it certainly means that you're going to have to gain some political power. One of the places not to ignore…(is the church). The Church is a moving force. That minister can move a lot of people in your direction. This will be a powerful force in keeping people from being shot. It will keep police from walking into buildings and just shooting people down…"

The audience also heard Brother Dick Gregory, who brought some hard truths to them. He spoke of police turning their backs on certain crimes committed in poor ghettos:

"At five years old in the Black ghetto of St. Louis, Missouri, I knew what a hustler looked like and I knew what a dope pusher looked like. And at five years old I just could not believe I was that much more smarter than the police.

"At six years old, I saw the copstanding on the corner, laughing and joking with the pimps. At six years old, I saw the cop stick his head through a car window where the dope pushers were sitting, and they held a jolly conversation. I'm not six anymore, I'm 14 years old, and I keep hearing white folks in American saying to Black folks, `Why don't you have respect for your local police?'. That's the first time I realized white folks was crazy.

Brother Gregory perhaps summed up everything as best anyone could when he said:

"When you look at the police structrue in America, I hope you see more that the police -- (I hope) you see America. Today you're talking about community control of the police; tomorrow we've got to talk about community control of America…"

Organizations that support the City-wide Campaign for Community Control of Police include the NAACP, the Illinois Black Political Caucus, the American Indian Movement (AIM), Operation PUSH (People United to Save Humanity), the League of Black Women Voters and the National Defense Organization (which includes more than 700 political and social organizations from across the United States).

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ALABAMA: MORE BRUTALITY AT HOLMAN PRISON

A brother, a prison inmate of Holman who wishes to remain anonymous, managed to forward the following account of what actually occurred at the prison on May 21st, to THE BLACK PANTHER. We are printing this brother's letter with the hope that it will help dispel foolish notions of America's prisons being something other than concentration camps. The letter follows:

"In the media it was reported that four Black convicts overpowered a guard, and after putting a knife around his neck, made certain demands. Later, the guard identified who it was said had cut him. But lets go back some what. This certain guard, Red Daniels, had been the one to feed the abusive ways which caused most of the convicts here to dislike him. There are more, but Red Daniels is of primary importance for his acts of repression on this day, May 21, 1973.

"Three brothers in isolation had been constantly trying for a transfer to somewhere less intimidating than the atmosphere at Holman Prison. In the Alabama penal system, that would be hard to do, however, Red Daniels was so persistent in his harassment, abusing, cussing and beatings of these brothers, that they decided to try and transfer to one of the other two maximum security camps… Their requests for transfer were constantly denied and the higher officials would show no concern for the brothers…

"At any rate, Red Daniels went to feed the brothers today, and as today is a day designated for isolation inmates to draw a certain amount from their accounts, Brother Tommy Dotson asked Red Daniels if he was going to allow himself and others in isolation to draw from their accounts. Daniels stated to Brother Dotson, `Hell no, nigger, and you better not give me no head running!'

"The brother, knowing how such prison situations are, remained silent. Red Daniels couldn't take that. He wanted the brother to give him a reason for which he and his guards could beat him up. He cussed for a while and stated… `I'm going to whip that nigger's ass', to one of the guards with him. He opened the door to Tommy's cell and attempted to assault him. Tommy -- after the repression, abuse by sadistic guards -- couldn't hold back any longer.

"He bested Red Daniels, taking his billy club and a pocket knife from him, and also the keys to the cell doors. The partner guard ran away. He then made Red Daniels open the cells so the two other brothers could get out.

"Mind you, this was not some plan by the brothers, but a release of hostile action induced by one of the repressive guards.

"The other guard who had run at the start of the trouble had run to alarm other guards and got re-enforcements to help Red Daniels… In time, some highway patrolmen came with riot gear, and even one of the guards here, who is head of laundry, had his personal shotgun inside the prison…

"The three brothers demanded that they be transferred away from Holman Prison because the guards were forever harassing them for their political views. The three brothers were: Tommy Dotson, Edward Ellis and Robert Orr. A fourth brother came on the scene because Dotson, Ellis and Orr demanded that he be transferred also. The guards had been repressing Brother Jessie Clancey as intensely as the other three brothers, and he wanted a transfer from Holman Prison. The brothers were later captured and at this time they are at Mt. Meigs, the middle district of the maximum security camps. As for their conditions… we don't know.

"The news media did not relate this aspect of the situation; they made it seem that the guards were doing everything in their power to restrain the `crazy men'…

"The news media related that the lack of guards causes these situations or allows them to happen. However, regardless of the number of guards, when there is repression, there will be resistance.

"The media is supposedly the people's access to events, but when the media doesn't bring forth the truth or seek information objectively, it has reneged on its duty to the public.

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"The slave insurrection of May 21, 1973, will be frequently repeated at Holman if there is not a change toward total reform; from a slave system to one for human beings."

THE SLAVE

(NOTE: In the June 8, 1973, issue of the San Francisco Chronicle, there appeared a barely noticeable article headlined `Prisoner Wounded'. The article said that a knife-wielding inmate was wounded Wednesday by a guard abroad a bus transporting prisoners from Holman Prison to the Mt. Meigs State Medical and Diagnostic Center.

The questions that come to mind are: How could a Holman prison inmate manage to smuggle a knife aboard a prison bus, when all inmates are thoroughly searched when transported from one prison to another? Could the wounded inmate's name be either Dotson, Orr, Ellis or Clancey, and if so, was the attack upon the inmate an act of fascist vengeance on the part of one or more Holman guards?

These questions demand immediate answers… those answers should be interesting.)

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WATERGATE LOWLIGHTS

(Washington, D.C.) - Former Attorney General John N. Mitchell personally chose three sites, including the Watergate complex, for electronic bugging of the Democrates in 1972, according to information that former presidential aide John D. Ehrlichman said he gathered for the President earlier this year. The information was supplied to him by Jeb Stuart Magruder, who was second in command of the Committee for the Re-election of the President.

President Nixon approved a plan for expanded domestic intelligence gathering in July 1970, after being cautioned that parts of it were "clearly illegal" and involved "serious risks" to his administration if the operations were ever discovered, according to White House documents. (The latter half of 1970 saw repeated police raids, break-ins and armed assaults against Black Panther Party facilities around the country.)

Former Nixon campaign treasurer Hugh W. Sloan, Jr. testified last week that he told federal prosecutors last July that top Nixon re-election committee officials attempted to persuade him to commit perjury and cover up cash payments made to the Watergate bugging team.

The Washington Post and the New York Times both reported last week that former presidential counsel John W. Dean has told federal investigators that he discussed the Watergate coverup with President Nixon on at least 35 occasions between January and April of this year. This story was killed on Voice of America (VOA) broadcasts around the world after government officials instructed VOA news staff not to broadcast Watergate disclosures that are attributed to unidentified sources.

Copies of secret Nixon campaign "Gemstone" files on political bugging and espionage were directed to former Attorney General Mitchell, Robert A. Reisner, a former campaign aide testified last week. Reisner said he had put the sensitive materials in a file folder being readied for a strategy meeting with Mitchell in the week or two before the June 17 Watergate arrests.

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CANNERY WORKERS FIGHT DISCRIMINATION AND UNION BIAS

The Mexican-American and Black workers in the giant food processing canneries in California have long been the victims of discriminatory hiring practices, exploitative wages and racist promotional policies. The Cannery Workers Committee, based in Northern California where most of the state's canneries are, is a large organization of Chicano workers presently fighting to halt the actions of canneries and the Teamster's Union which collaborates with them.

The chairman of the Cannery Workers Committee, Reuben Reyes, is a strong leader who has long fought against racism in the canneries. He was suspended from his job at a Sacramento plant because of his organization work. While in Oakland to begin organizing the Bay Area canneries, Brother Reyes came by the office of THE BLACK PANTHER to supply us with information concerning their struggle.

Though between forty to fifty percent of all workers in canning goods plants are Chicano, we learned that they hold less than two percent of the better paying jobs. There are very few Black workers in canneries, comprising less than five percent of the work force.

The discrimination is so overt that officials constantly hire whites with no previous cannery experience and make them foremen while Chicano workers, who may have been working at the plant for over 15 years and are highly qualified, remain ignored.

Brother Reyes states, "Almost all Chicanos are bunched at the bottom, cleaning up and working in the cookroom with hoses, sweeping the floors. The arbitration system doesn't exist. The grievance system doesn't exist. You can constantly present grievances without any action being taken and there is plenty to grieve about. Safety conditions for workers are extremely bad, consumer fraud is rampant."

However, one of the main reasons that these oppressive conditions, continue to exist is the Teamster's Union, which 98% of all cannery workers have to belong to. The racist Teamsters, who are also working to repress the United Farm Workers Union, engage in "sweetheart" contracts with the canneries, contracts that the canneries don't have to adhere to. (The Teamsters are the main union with which the canneries sign contracts.) Mexican-Americans hold few decision-making positions in the union locals, and illegal and often violent acts are used to stop the election of any Chicanos to union offices.

Teamster officials are paid by canneries not to enforce contracts which would provide better pay, conditions and promotions. In fact, union monies paid by cannery workers has been used to hire men to harass Mexican-American farmworkers and union funds were used heavily last year to help finance Nixon's re-election campaign in California.

Discrimination in the canneries has been investigated by several state and federal regulatory agencies, many producing reports that clearly charge discrimination. However none of these agencies, which include the State Fair Employment Practice Commission, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and the U.S. Justice Department, have filed suit or taken any actions to correct the train of abuses that the Chicano workers are suffering.

"So finally we've come to the conclusion

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that we can't wait for the government, the state or anybody else to do something about the situation", states Reyes. "It's up to us. We're going to have to struggle anyway that we can, taking over these union locals and organizing our people so that we will have a strong voting bloc. If we take over some of the offices we can negotiate from a position of strength. This is our goal. We've been working at it 4 ½ years, but remember that we are just cannery workers who had had no experience in organizing. We had no expertise supplied by anybody. It's just been a cold hard struggle for four and one-half years. It's all been an education. Now we've come to the point where we're saying we are going to begin to do now what we should have been doing all along, organizing in a very proficient manner. We are now certain of victory."

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NIXON PROPOSES CUTBACKS IN VETERAN'S ASSISTANCE

While Nixon honors ex-POWs, he proposes massive cutbacks in veterans' assistance funds in the federal budget. A recent article in Winter Soldier, official organ of the Vietnam Veterans Against the War, exposes Nixon's duplicity and outlines the proposed cutbacks:

1) Veteran's medical care is being cut back by reductions in the average daily patient census in Veteran's Administration hospitals. The difference between the Congress mandated patient census for this fiscal year (85,000 patients) and the Nixon administration proposal for the coming fiscal year (80,000 patients) is the equivalent to closing ten 500-bed V.A. hospitals.

2) Nixon has scheduled a 1.8% reduction in medical employment for the V.A., although V.A. hospitals are already vastly understaffed.

3) Medical research funds are being decreased by $6 million, or 7.5% even though an increase of $5 million is required to maintain the present level of research.

4) Hospital construction has been slashed by $81 million.

5) Nixon wants a $160 million reduction in disability payments to disabled veterans.

6) Veterans' Cost of Instruction Grants are not provided for in the new Nixon budget. This program provides financial assistance to colleges which engage in outreach efforts to recruit Vietnam veterans as students and provide special remedial programs for brothers who need tutoring. Nixon's Office of Management and Budgets has already impounded $25 million meant for this program during the current fiscal year.

7) Finally, Nixon proposes to cut $1 billion from the Public Employment Program (PEP) under the Emergency Employment Act. 38% of the people in the various PEP programs are Vietnam veterans.

On the other hand, the Senate has passed several mesures that would benefit America's 29 million veterans. One is a Health Care Expansion bill with provisions for peacetime veterans and dependents that are currently ineligible for treatment at V.A. hospitals. This bill is also intended to increase the staff-patient ratio at V.A. hospitals where needed. House action is pending.

Another bill mandates V.A. administrators to set up comprehensive drug and alcohol abuse programs.

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PEOPLE'S PERSPECTIVE

SAN QUENTIN SIX HARASSED

(Marin County, Ca.)- The six San Quentin Adjustment Center prison inmates (The San Quentin Six) charged with the murder of two prison guards and three inmate trustees during the assassination of George Jackson by prison authorities, were thrown out of court recently. Brother David Johnson was badly beaten following the eviction of the Six for protesting a guard's harassment of Hugo Pinell. One observer, Pentagon Papers co-defendant Anthony Russo, compared the courtroom's police-state atmosphere to guinea pigs in a cage.

WORLD OIL PRICE RAISED

(Geneva, Switzerland) - The world's major oil-exporting countries have decided to increase the price of crude oil by 11.9%. The additional cost will amount to millions of dollars more on oil from Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Iran, Iraq, Abu Dhabi, Qator, Libya and Nigeria. The price increase is meant to offset the recent devaluation of the U.S. dollar.

WOUNDED KNEE TREATY BROKEN

(Washington, D.C.)- White House aide Leonard Garment, counsel to Richard Nixon, refused to honor the U.S. Oglala Sioux Nation Treaty of 1868 on behalf of the U.S. government. Garment rejected out-of-hand to even negotiating the treaty, and offered only a suggestion that the Sioux Tribal Constitution be amended to permit abolution of the U.S. - controlled Tribal Council. Native-American leaders had called for the abolition of the council and negotiations on the 1868 Treaty. They say they will reply to the U.S. violation of the Wounded Knee truce agreement, possibly through a march on Washington.

POLICE END ANTIOCH SHUT-DOWN

(Yellow Springs, Ohio) - Sheriffs' deputies and police recently enforced a court injunction to open Antioch College here, which has been shut down by students whose education has been disrupted by school financial aid cutbacks. The fund cuts may curtail the learning of poor students who came to the school under the deception that they would receive the necessary funds to continue.

ISRAEL PROTESTS U.S.-ARAB DEAL

(Washington, D.C.) - The recent U.S. decision to sell over 30 high-speed Phantom fighter-bomber jets to Saudi Arabia and Kuwait has provoked three visits to White House aide Henry Kissinger by Israeli Ambassador Simcha Dinitz. Dinitz and his overlords fear that the two Arab states may use the new weaponry against them by attempting to assist the Palestinian people's liberation struggle.

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SUPREME COURT RULES: PAROLEES GAIN RIGHT TO COUNCIL

(San Francisco, Calif.) - A May 19th U.S. Supreme Court decision that gives prison parolees a long-denied constitutional right has upset California prison authorities. The new ruling states that indigent parolees must be provided with attorneys at all hearings involving possible violation of their paroles. Some 18,000 California parolees are effected by the decision.

The decision calls for an attorney to be present at proceedings in the area where the alleged violation occurred and the parolee taken into custody. Then an attorney must be present at hearings before the State Adult Authority Board, the Youth Authority Board, or the Women's Board of Prison Terms and Paroles.

Annually, the state parole board returns some 3,000 paroled prisoners to state institutions after unconstitutional hearings. However, state authorities were not prepared to give parolees any rights and the machinery has virtually grinded to a halt. (The new ruling does not affect prisoners who can provide their own attorneys, a state parole spokesman said). Administrative Officer for the State Adult Authority, Joseph Spangler, said his office is now working on the complex machinery needed to comply with the Supreme Court order. The cost is estimated at $3 million a year, he said.

The Adult Authority is seeking emergency funds from the legislature to put some interim program into operation. The Authority is also preparing legislation to give it the authority and the funds for a permanent program. Spangler said the delay hurts the parolees themselves principally.

Spangler also said that contracting with country public defender's offices is being considered. Also, under consideration is creation of a staff of Adult Athority attorneys to represent parolees. This new process, according to state prison officials, will also call for the presence of deputy attorney generals to represent the state.

Spangler said it has been Adult Authority policy to allow an apparently stable and productive person to go free pending his hearing. However, in grave cases, such as a parolee being charged with a crime of violence, he is usually held until his hearing. The courts action, in a case from the Wisconsin courts, "hit us right out of the blue", Spangler said.

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IN MEMORIUM: JOSEPH WADELL

On June 13, 1972, Brother Joseph Waddell fell victim to the barbarity of North Carolina's Central Prison. The leading organizer at Central Prison, Joe Dell, as he was known by fellow members of the Black Panther Party, died allegedly from a heart attack. Joe Dell was 21 years old. At a visit two days before his death, he was strong and well. His family could not have an autopsy performed because his captors had cut out all his vital body organs before the family could claim his body.

We carry his spirit, forever, to victory.

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REVOLUTIONARY SUICIDE: “THE WAY OF LIBERATION”

BY HUEY P. NEWTON

Oppression and exploitation are the reactionary conditions which twist and distort our lives, our communities, our dreams. Early in life we learn the bitter fact that we cannot escape their influence; that these conditions form our reality.

In our continuing series of excerpts from Huey P. Newton's latest book, REVOLUTIONARY SUICIDE, Huey in the introduction, "The Way of Liberation", answers for us a critical question which, like oppression and exploitation, lives in our hearts: "What's the use?" What is the use of struggling against seemingly overwhelming forces? Why try?

Huey P. Newton's answer "Revolutionary Suicide", becomes a clarion call for all humankind who demand to live with respect and dignity, for all people who understand the power of hope and faith.

For twenty-two months in the California Men's Colony at San Luis Obispo, after my first trial for the death of Patrolman John Frey, I was almost continually in solitary confinement. There, in a four-by-six cell, except for books and papers relating to my case, I was allowed no reading material. Despite the rigid enforcement of this rule, inmates sometimes slipped magazines under my door when the guards were not looking. One that reached me was the May, 1970, issue of Ebony magazine. It contained an article written by Lacy Banko summarizing the work of Dr. Herbert Hendin, who had done a comparative study on suicide among Black people in the major American cities. Dr. Hendin found that the suicide rate among Black men between the ages of nineteen and thirty-five had doubled in the past ten to fifteen years, surpassing the rate for whites in the same age range. The article had - and still has - a profound effect on me. I have thought long and hard about its implications.

The Ebony article brought to mind Durkheim's classic study, Suicide, a book I had read earlier while studying sociology at Oakland City College. To Durkheim all types of suicide are related to social conditions. He maintains that the primary cause of suicide is no individual temperament but forces in the social environment. In other words, suicide is caused primarily by external factors, not internal ones. As thought about the conditions of Black people and about Dr. Hendin's study, I began to develop Durkheim's analysis and apply it to the Black experience in the United States. This eventually led to the concept of "revolutionary suicide".

To understand revolutionary suicide it is first necessary to have an idea of reactionary suicide, for the two are very different. Dr. Hendin was describing reactionary suicide: the reaction of a man who takes his own life in response to social conditions that overwhelm him and condemn him to helplessness. The young Black men in his study had been deprived of human dignity, crushed by oppressive forces and denied their right to live as proud and free human beings.

A section in Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment provides a good analogy. One of the characters, Marmeladov, a very poor man, argues that poverty is not a vice. In poverty, he says, a man can attain the innate nobility of soul that is not possible in beggary; for while society may drive the poor man out with a stick, the beggar will be swept out with a broom. Why? Because the beggar is totally demeaned, his dignity lost. Finally, bereft of self-respect, immobilized by fear and despair, he sinks into self-murder. This is reactionary suicide.

Connected to reactionary suicide, although even more painful and degrading, is spiritual death that has been the experience of millions of Black people in the United States. This death is found everywhere today in the Black community. Its victims have ceased to fight the forms of oppression that drink their blood. The common attitude has long been: What's the use? If a man rises up against a power as great as the United States, he will not survive. Believing this, many Blacks have been driven to a death of the spirit rather than of the flesh, lapsing into lives of quiet desperation. Yet all the while, in the heart of every Black, there is the hope that life will somehow change in the future.

I do not think that life will change for the better without an assault on the establishment, which goes on exploiting the wretched of the earth. This belief lies at the heart of the concept of revolutionary suicide. Thus it is better to oppose the forces that would drive me to self-murder than to endure them. Although I risk the likelihood of death, there is at least the possibility, if not the probability, of changing intolerable conditions. This possibility is important, because much in human existence is based upon hope without any real understanding of the odds. Indeed, we are all-Black and white alike - ill in the same way, mortally ill. But before we die, how shall we live? I say with hope and dignity; and if premature death is the result, that death has a meaning reactionary suicide can never have. It is the price of self-respect.

CONTINUED NEXT WEEK

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OAKLAND - A BASE OF OPERATION!: PART 47: S.A.F.E.: TO SERVE AND PROTECT OUR SENIOR CITIZENS

On December 4, 1972, an unusual and highly singnificant press conference took place. Seated in front of the Satellite Senior Homes in West Oakland, Mrs. Isabel Van Frank, founder of the East Bay Legislative Council for Senior Citizen's and the state of California's Outstanding Senior Citizens for 1971, and Brother Bobby Seale, co-founder of the Black Panther Party an then-candidate for Mayor or Oakland, jointly announced the formation of a new social service, trnasport-escort program, designed to meet the needs of the elderly, Serniors Against A Fearful Environment (SAFE) -- People's Power and Senior Power formally and officially joined hands.

SAFE, a non-profit corporation, was begun by the Black Panther Party at the request of a group of senior citizens for the purpose of preventing muggings and attacks upon the elderly, particularly when they go out to cash their meager social security or pension checks. Prior to approaching the Black Panther Party, the seniors had gone to the Oakland police Department to request protection. There the seniors were told, to their dimay and outrage, that they "should walk close to the curb" in the future. Mrs. Van Frank, commenting on the dangers experienced by the senior citizens, has remarked:

FEAR ENGENDERED

"The fear engendered among us old people by these muggings almost makes us prisoners in our own homes."

A section of a recent funding proposal for the SAFE program substantiates these claims. A comparative crime study was done over a period of six weeks (August 21 to October 1, 1972) and details conclusively that the age of the victim does bear a definite relationship to the type of offense committed. Of the combined total of 249 victims of strongram robbery and pursesnatching, 48% of the victims (118) were over the age of 50. During this same period, only 13% of complainants in armed robbery cases fell into the senior citizen category. The conclusion then, is that an elderly person is more likely to be physically attacked whereas the younger, more agile person, who is more able to defend his or herself, will more likely be the victim of an armed assault. The fact has also been established that 33% of all "crimes" committed in the city of Oakland are committed against senior citizens.

NEEDS OF THE ELDERLY

Funding for the SAFE program is particularly crucial to the program's ability to serve the needs of the elderly. Presently the program functions at the beginning of each month, offering free transportation and escort services to the residents of the Satellite Senior Homes, a residence complex exclusively for the elderly, located at 540-21st Street in Oakland. This is far from the goal. As the SAFE funding proposal outlines, the program's development will be quite extensive:

"1. To provide round-the-clock transportation services (to senior citizens) in Alameda County, at no cost to low-income elderly residents who otherwise would have no means of transport…to do vital shopping, to keep medical appointments and other necessary committments…

"2. Provide delivery services of life-sustaining food, medical prescriptions and medicines…

"3. Provide assistance in moving household furnishings within Alameda County at no cost to low-income persons…

"4. Provide and escort for senior citizens as they walk to and from recreational, entertainment and social facilities and activities, in order to prevent assaults against, and robberies of, elderly persons.

"5. Encourage a spirit of respect for, and concern about, the special needs of the elderly through the presentation of

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educational programs and the distribution of educational and scientific materials…"

The SAFE program also aims to unite Black and poor communities by actively recruiting and hiring a number of our youth to help implement these much-needed services. Both drivers and escorts will be recruited from among the young and unemployed in our community; a strategy which, at the same time, will cut down the number of youth who would consider snatching a pocketbook just to get a little change. (The unemployment rate in Oakland for minority youth between 16 and 21 years of age is a staggering 41%, more than three times the national average. Undoubtedly this fantastically high number of unemployed youth is the major factor contributing to crimes against the elderly.) In addition, drivers and escorts will be given extensive training in their respective fields, with both groups receiving intensive safety and first aid instruction.

LOCAL FUNDING

State, federal and local funding of the SAFE program will also mean additional transportation, at least five vans with a seating capacity for 12 persons each, plus the hiring of a full-time program director and assistants. All totaled, the proposed annual budget for the SAFE program comes to slightly less than $200,000 ($195,530).

Efforts to acquire funds for the SAFE program have not yet been successful. A formal proposal has been presented before Oakland Model Cities, a federally-funded poverty program, but that agency has made no commitment. A portion of Oakland's $4.5 million in Revenue Sharing funds has been suggested for the SAFE program, but the city administrators have been typically mum. Complete and adequate funding for the SAFE program was, in fact, an integral part of the Seale-Brown 14 Point Program to Rebuild Oakland and, far from being abandoned, will be included in future ballot initiatives and referendums.

ARGUMENT FOR PROTECTION

The SAFE funding proposal, like the program itself, is an argument for our protection, instead of our abuse, by public service agencies which "theoretically" function in our behalf. SAFE is a simple but basic program, designed to help and secure the lives of a very important, yet often forgotten, segment or our communities, the older people. It was established and structured to do many creative and worthwhile things that would benefit our elderly. The city of Oakland spends over 41% of the City Budget, close to $32 million, on "public safety", $55,000 was wastefully spent on a new police helicopter; yet, as Bobby Seale has put it, "They have a new helicopter flying around in the sky while senior citizens are being mugged on the ground."

SAFE cannot only provide invaluable social services, it can also practically aid in uniting our communities. The sacrifices and blood-struggles of our old folk have sustained us in a thousand different ways. A fully developed SAFE program, by providing necessary comforts and peace of mind when our elderly have reached the twilight of their years, will tell them that their fight was not in vain.

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BLACK PANTHER PARTY PROGRAM MARCH 29, 1972 PLATFORM

WHAT WE WANT, WHAT WE BELIEVE

1. WE WANT FREEDOM. WE WANT POWER TO DETERMINE THE DESTINY OF OUR BLACK AND OPPRESSED COMMUNITIES.

We believe that Black and oppresed people will not be free until we are able to determine our destinies in our own communities ourselves, by fully controlling all the institutions which exist in our communities.

2. WE WANT FULL EMPLOYMENT FOR OUR PEOPLE.

We believe that the federal government is responsible and obligated to give every person employment or a guaranteed income. We believe that if the American businessmen will not give full employment, then the technology and means of production should be taken from the businessmen and placed in the community so that the people of the community can organize and employ all of its people and give a high standard of living.

3. WE WANT AN END TO THE ROBBERY BY THE CAPITALIST OF OUR BLACK AND OPPRESSED COMMUNITIES.

We believe that this racist government has robbed us and now we are demanding the overdue debt of forty acres and two mules. Forty acres and two mules were promised 100 years ago as restitution for slave labor and mass murder of Black people. We will accept the payment in currency which will be distributed to our many communities. The American racist has taken part in the slaughter of over fifty million Black people. Therefore, we feel this is a modest demand that we make.

4. WE WANT DECENT HOUSING FIT FOR THE SHELTER OF HUMAN BEINGS.

We believe that if the landlords will not give decent housing to our Black and oppressed communities, then the housing and the land should be made into cooperatives so that the people in our communities, with government aid, can build and make decent housing for the people.

5. 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 THE PRESENT-DAY SOCIETY.

We believe in an educational system that will give to our people a knowledge of self. If you do not have knowledge of yourself and your position in the society and the world, then you will have littele chance to know anything else.

WE WANT COMPLETELY FREE HEALTH CARE FOR ALL BLACK OPPRESSED PEOPLE.

We believe that the government must provide, free of charge, for the people, health facilities which will not only treat our illnesses, most of which have come about as a result of our oppression, but which will also develop preventative medical programs to guarantee our future survival. We believe that mass health education and research programs must be developed to give all Black and oppressed people access to advanced scientific and medical information, so we may provide ourselves with proper medical attention and care.

7. WE WANT AN IMMEDIATE END TO POLICE BRUTALITY AND MURDER OF BLACK PEOPLE, OTHER PEOPLE OF COLOR, ALL OPPRESSED PEOPLE IN SIDE THE UNITED STATES.

We believe that the racist and fascist government of the United States uses its domestic enforcement agencies to carry out its program of oppression against Black people, other people of color and poor people inside the United States. We believe it is our right, therefore, to defend ourselves against such armed forces, and that all Black and oppressed people should be armed for self-defense of our homes and communities against these fascist police forces.

8. WE WANT AN IMMEDIATE END TO ALL WARS OF AGGRESSION.

We believe that the various conflicts which exist around the world stem directly from the aggressive desires of the U.S. ruling circle and government to force its domination upon the oppressed people of the world. We believe that if the U.S. government or its lackeys do not cease these aggressive wars that it is the right of the people to defend themselves by any means necessary against their aggressors.

9. WE WANT FREEDOM FOR ALL BLACK AND POOR OPPRESSED PEOPLE NOW HELD IN U.S. FEDERAL, STATE, COUNTY, CITY AND MILITARY PRISONS AND JAILS. WE WANT TRIALS BY A JURY OF PEERS FOR ALL PERSONS CHARGED WITH SO-CALLED CRIMES UNDER THE LAWS OF THIS COUNTRY.

We believe that the many Black and poor oppressed people now held in U.S. prisons and jails have not received fair and impartial trials under a racist and fascist judicial system and should be free from incarceration. We believe in the ultimate elimination of all wretched, inhuman penal institutions, because the masses of men and women imprisoned inside the United States or by the U.S. military are the victims of oppressive conditions which are the real cause of their imprisonment. We believe that when persons are brought to trial that they must be guaranteed, by the United States, juries of their peers, attorneys of their choice and freedom from imprisonment while awaiting trials.

10. WE WANT LAND, BREAD, HOUSING, EDUCATION, CLOTHING, JUSTICE, PEACE AND PEOPLE'S COMMUNITY CONTROL OF MODERN TECHNOLOGY.

When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume, among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal: that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. That, to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; that, whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute a new government, laying its foundation on such principles, and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness, Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and, accordingly, all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But, when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object, evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security.

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Intercommunal News: Africa In Focus

(Washington, D.C.) - Secretary of State William P. Rogers told Liberian President William R. Tolbert last week that now that the U.S. is "winding up" its role in the Vietnam war, "our interest will turn more and more toward Africa." Rogers was toasting the Liberian leader at a State Department luncheon as part of the West African leader's current visit to the U.S. The prospect is ominous.

(Nairobi, Kenya) - President Jomo Kenyatta on April 17th, appointed a Kenyan, Dedan Njuguna Gichuru, to replace an Englishman as Commander of the Kenyan Air Force, thus putting control of the three services of the Kenyan armed forces under Kenyan commanders. The Kenyan President described this as "the first time in our history".

(United Nations, N.Y.) - The Special Committee on Apartheid (racial separation) approved May 29th a recently revised draft of a convention designed to outlaw apartheid as a crime against humanity. The draft will go before the United Nations General Assembly next fall.

(United Nations, N.Y.) - The U.N. Council for Namibia (South-West Africa) will visit Africa and Europe from the 4th to the 26th of June. It will hold consultations with Zambia, Botswana, Zaire, Tanzania and Sweden, and with U.N. specialized agencies in Geneva, Rome and Paris. The Council will also be in touch with Namibian representatives. Topics will include aid, training programs and travel facilities for Namibians.

(United Nations, N.Y.) - U.N. Secretary General Kurt Waldheim returned here last week following a trip to Africa which included an address to the 10th anniversary summit meeting of the Organization of African Unity (OAU) in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. A United Nations spokesman described the African visit -- which also included Zambia and Tanzania -- as "very interesting and important" for the Secretary-General as it brought him together with several African leaders for the first time. It also gave him the chance to renew past acquaintances.

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SUDANESE LEADER EXPLAINS HIS COUNTRY'S GROWTH

The Sudan is going through a dynamic process of developing new institutions and political organizations designed to involve the people in political decision-making at grass roots. The Sudanese Socialist Union (SSU) has been developed from bitter experience with various political regimes after independence in 1956. Mr. Ahmad Abd al-Halim, who is responsible for political education and ideology as member of the Political Bureau of the SSU, talks to Africa corresponent:

AFRICA: Those who favor one party regimes tend to say that such systems should generally be applied in countries with acute problems of economic development on the grounds that any inter-party strife, if permitted to develop, will dissipate the energies of the nation. You have been experimenting with your system of kind of "people's democracy" for a year or so now. What concrete evidencehave you to show that such system really brings resykts when it comes to details of administration and development?

ABD AL HALIM: It is surely no exaggeration to say that it is for the first time now that the Sudanese people have been given an opportunity to share in the responsibility of government, from village to national levels. Our political organization, the SSU, is not only a source of political decisions which are subsequently formalized by government authorities concerned. It is also the vehicle by means of which the necessary public support can be mobilized so that any measure that has been adopted will in fact be carried our in practice…

It is important to emphasize that all the executive bodies of the ogranziation, at village, district, regional, provincial and natinoal levels, are elected by rank and file membership, by secret ballot.

AFRICA: This is an important point since no other political organization in the country is allowed to exist. Yet what is the position now of the members and Communist Party on the extreme left?

ABD AL HALIM: The SSU has opened its doors wide open to all men of good will. Indeed, most of those who had in the past been trying to achieve something positive for the country by working with traditional political partties now actively participate in the work of the SSU. Yet the plain fact must be faced that the old political parties had not really been interested in development, whilst we, on our part, regard our human resources as the main factor when it comes to realizing our national aspirations…

AFRICA: People in northern Sudan are known to have often been looking northwards, to Egypt and other Arab countries, for political inspiration. But southern Sudanese have had different traditions and looked rather southwards… Will this difference be reflected in any way in the new political organization?

ABD AL HALIM: There can be no question of having a separate or different SSU organization in the South. Indeed, the SSU, as we see it, is an important instruments of national unity, and its charter spells out very clearly our obligations to both the Arab nation and the African continent. At all events, one is glad to say that it is difficult to see where Arab and African influences start or end in the Sudan.

Our struggle is an integral part of both the Arab and African peoples… While the Sudan remains one country, organized by a single political movement, the SSU, the way now has been paved for further strengthning of the ties between north and south and a coherent policy is being framed for economic development of the united nation. Henceforth the Sudan will look both northward and southward for political inspiration and, indeed, participation. The new circumstances should make it easier for the Sudan to take part effectively and decisively in Arab and African revolutions.

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CAMBODIA'S SIHANOUK RECEIVES WARM WELCOME IN AFRICA

The legitimate head of the Cambodian Government, Samdech (Prince) Nordom Sihanouk, recently visited five African countries and received warm welcomes in each. During the visits to Senegal, Guinea, Mali, the People's Republic of the Congo and the Republic of Zambia, the people there showed their sympathy and admiration for Samdech Sihanouk and the Cambodian people and their support for the cause of Cambodia's independence. The visit was significant in that it demonstrated the militant solidarity between the Asian and African peoples.

While in Guinea from May 13th to 16th, Samdech Sihanouk had talks with President Sekou Toure, attended a grand mass rally, and took part in the celebrations in commemoration of the 26th anniversary of the founding of the Guinean Democratic Party. Sihanouk also met with President Kerekou of Dahomey who was in Guinea. During the visit, President Toure announced Guinea's "unreserved recognition of the Cambodian Government and full solidarity with all its struggles against imperialism".

While in Mali from May 16th to 19th, Samdech Sihanouk had talks with President Traore. A joint communique was published explaining the two countries views on strengthening their bilateral relations and the development of present events in Asia, Africa and the Middle East.

At the official reception in Bamako, Mali's capital, President Traore told his Cambodian guests: "We are confident in the victorious outcome of your struggle, because history tells us that no foreign army, however strong it is, can conquer and dominate a people united and determined to defend its independence, freedom, dignity and culture."

Sihanouk visted the People's Republic of the Congo from May 19th to 23rd. In Brazzaville, the capitol, he was invited to report on the current situation in Cambodia before a plenum of the Central Committee of the Congolese Party of Labor. During his stay, he and President Marien Ngouabi held talks on questions concerning relations between the two countries and on international problems. In a public speech President Ngouabi declared, "We consider as incomprehensible and inadmissable an attitude of neutrality before the heroic struggle of your people against Yankee barbarity".

Support for Cambodia was also found in Zambia where Samdech Sihanouk visited May 23 thru May 26th. He held important talks with Zambia President Kenneth Kuanda and visited the famous Copperbelt Province and a copper mine. As he had done in the other countries he visited, Sihanouk time and again pledged that the Cambodian people supported the African people's struggle against imperialism, colonialism, neo-colonialism and racism.

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Features: ATTORNEY EXPOSES U.C.L.A. “VIOLENCE CENTER”

PSYCHOSURGERY PLOT UNFOLDS

PART 3

Psychosurgery is the performance of a surgical operation to remove part of the brain, to alter thought-patterns and therefore behavior. American prisons have recently taken to studying and even performing these operations as a means of controlling their victims, the prisoners.

These operations, for from being humane procedures carried out for the good of humankind, are horrific experiments similar to the sinister manipulations of the mad scientist or outer-space invaders of a science fiction movie. The "patients" often end up as mindless vegetables, suicides or helpless psychopaths as a result of these operations.

We present here Part III of Attorney Fred Hiestand's investigation of a deceptive proposal to begin such "research" at the U.C.L.A. campus. His testimony, presented to the California Senate Health and Welfare Committee, follows:

It seems clear, however, that despite repeated denials by Dr. Louis West of any involvement by Dr. Ervin in the UCLA proposal, that Dr. Ervin himself, consistent with the aforementioned facts, intends to be very much involved.

In spite of Dr. Ervin's intentions, it would not surprise me that when the facts I have laid before you are made public he may personally be excised from the UCLA center for reasons of political expediency. But the removal of one man from the project at this stage will not alter the basic character of the Center. What is that character?

Again, the Center proposes, as did the Boston Project, to make an "epidemiological study of individual violence", focusing on genetic, endocrinal, psychological and neurophysical causes. Under genetic, both proposals mention studying persons, including children, who possess the so-called XYZ chromosome defect. Under the subject heading of endocrinal causes of violence, both proposals talk about correlating expressions of violence by individual women with their menstrual cycles. The neurophysical component is, of course, the most disturbing, perhaps only because it has received the most publicity. (The psychiatrists who will testify following me intend, I understand, to give evidence that many of the other less known components of the Center are actually equally, if not more, dangerous than the neurophysical.) The neurophysical field is, in any event, one with which psychosurgery is connected; and Frank Ervin's life work has been psychosurgery. One of the experiments in which he participated along with his colleague Vernon Mark is explained by them in the Journal of Nervous and Mental Diseases. A summary of this particular experiment is provided by Dr. Peter Breggin, a practicing psychiatrist and member of the faculty of the Washington School of Psychiatry, who is an outspoken critic of psychosurgery. I quote at length from Dr. Breggin's description:

"Vernon Mark, Frank Ervin and their colleagues (1970) have also operated on the thalamus, in this instance upon a woman who is in `chronic intractable aggitated depression.' This is frank, undisguised psychosurgery, for there is no preoperative indication that the woman had any brain disease whatsoever… The authors admit that the patient and her mother are `frankly antagonistic to each other', and they describe her mother as `rigid, insensitive and dominating' but they do not comment on their observation that the mother, along with the patient, `insisted that something be done'. Nor do they comment on the fact that the patient brought poison into the hospital with her prior to surgery, the poison her deceased fatheir had (kept).

She was operated on with heat coagulation of her anterior thalamus in an area in which, when stimulated, caused the patient to look `drawn' and to cry out `Don't do that, Don't do that!' After this coagulation, she showed gross brain damage: an acute brain syndrome marked by `confusion', severe `recent memory loss' and `mood swings from near euphoria to severe depression'. Soon she responded to a confrontation with her neurosurgeon `with bristling hostility, and her anger spread to others including the psychiatrist'. Her mood swings remained unpredictable and she was operated on a second time by means of an indwelling electrode. After surgery, she continues to be hostile and the authors tell us she is `definitely paranoid'. She refuses further surgery and even refuses to see her neurosurgeon over again. She expressed `wishes that someone might cut her throat'. She continues to suffer from obvious symptoms of severe postoperative brain damage. Her recent memory is `quite impaired', as well as her remote memory; she has periods of 'confusion, cannot find her way around, cannot recall names and suffers wide mood swings. When she is in a high period, clearly associated with the brain damage induced euphoria, the authors blithely quote the mother -- this hostile, dominating mother (who had her daughter committed) -- as saying `she is her old self again!'

In December, forty days after surgery, she has finally recovered from the trauma sufficiently to become `concerned with reality problems'. Her `spirits are good' and she seems to be improving, and she was given a pass to go shopping on the 44th day after surgery. She goes to a phone booth, calls her mother to say `goodbye' and kills herself with the poison she had stashed away four months earlier." (Breggin, Psychosurgery for the Control of Violence: A Critical Examination of the Work of Vernon Mark and Frank Ervin (Paper 1972) (A condensed version of the same operation is contained in the February 1973 Ebony article, along with other experiments.)

CONTINUED NEXT WEEK

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SUPPORT THE SAMUEL L. NAPIER INTERCOMMUNAL YOUTH INSTITUTE

The Samuel Napier Intercommunal Youth Institute is a school designed to help our childern think. It is located in the Oakland Bay Area and it points out through example that other schools have provided only the most basic courses; courses that hae little relevance to the survival of poor people. We are trying to expand the concept that the whole world is the childern's calssroom.

The Youth at Samuel Napier receive instruction in language arts, mathematics science, health, physical education, political education and people's art. All of these courses are geared to the development of a well-rounded human being.

We need the help of all interested people in making our school run smoothly. Since its inception in 1970, its enrollment has rapidly increased. We need more instructors; instructors with everchaning ideas to cope with the everchanging ideas of the children.

If you have teaching skills and can donate some of your time, please contact the Black Panther Party at 8501 East 14th Street, Oakland, California; or phone 638-0195. The children, our youth, are our future. Without their growth, we, as a people, cannot survive.

ALL POWER TO THE PEOPLE

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A PROGRAM FOR SURVIVAL

Free Breakfast Program

Provides children a free, hot breakfast every school morning.

People's Free Food Program

Provides free food to Black and other oppressed people.

Liberation Schools

Provides free educational facilities and materials to Black and other oppressed children to promote a correct view of their role in the society.

Intercommunal Youth Institute

Provides Black and other oppressed children with a scientific method of thinking and analyzing things, basic skills for living in the society and a concrete alternative to established learning institutions.

Legal Aid Educational
Program

Provides full legal assistance to those involved in legal problems, as well as legal aid classes.

Free Busing to Prisons
Program

Provides free transportation to prisons for families and friends of incarcerated men and women.

Free Commissary for Prisoners
Program

Provides imprisoned men and women with the funds to purchase necessary commissary items inside the prison.

David Hilliard People's Free
Shoe Program

Provides free shoes to the people made at the David Hilliard Free Shoe Factory and elsewhere.

Seniors Against A Fearful
Environment (S.A.F.E.) Program

Provides free transportation and escort service for senior citizens to and from community banks the first of each month.

People's Free Community
Employment Program

(Being Implemented)

Provides free job-finding services to poor and oppressed people who cannot find work.

People's Free Medical Research
Health Clinics

Provides free medical treatment and preventative medical care for the people.

People's Free Plumbing and
Maintenance Program

Provides free plumbing and repair services to improve people's housing conditions.

Community Cooperative
Housing Program

(Being Implemented)

Provides decent housing, cooperatively owned and managed by the resident families.

People's Sickle Cell Anemia
Research Foundation

Instituted to test and establish a cure for Sickle Cell Anemia, to create better educational programs around Sickle Cell Anemia and maintain an advisory committee of doctors already researching Sickle Cell Anemia.

People's Free Clothing Program

Provides new, stylish and quality clothing free to the people.

Intercommunal News Service

Provides news and information about the Black and other oppressed communities throughout the U.S. and the world.

Free Pest Control Program

Free household extermination of rats, roaches, ants and other disease carrying pests and rodents.

People's Free Ambulance
Service

(Being Implemented)

Provides free, 24-hour speedy transportation to people in need of emergency medical care.

People's Free Dental
Program

(Being Implemented)

Provides free dental check-ups and treatment for the people, as well as an educational program for dental hygiene and preventative dental care.

People's Free Optometry
Program

(Being Implemented)

Provides free eye examinations, treatment and eye correctional equipment (glasses, etc.) for the people.

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