-- 2 --

REVOLUTIONARY CONFERENCE FOR A UNITED FRONT AGAINST FASCISM

OAKLAND CALIFORNIA
JULY 18, 19, 20, AND 21 st.

FASCISM THE POWER OF FINANCE CAPITAL ITSELF

THIS REVOLUTIONARY CONFERENCE FOR A UNITED FRONT AGAINST RACISM IS CALLED BY THE BLACK PANTHER PARTY.

THE FREEDOM OF ALL POLITICAL PRISONERS AND POLITICAL FREEDOM FOR ALL PROLETARIAN TYPE ORGANIZATIONS, THE FREEDOM AND POLITICAL WORK OF ALL STUDENTS, FARMER PEASANTS, WORKERS, AND THE LUMPEN MUST BE DEVELOPED INTO A NATIONAL FORCE; A FRONT WHICH HAS A COMMON REVOLUTIONARY IDEOLOGY AND POLITICAL PROGRAM WHICH ANSWERS THE BASIC DESIRES AND NEEDS OF ALL PEOPLE IN FASCIST, CAPITALISTIC, RACIST AMERICA.

IN OAKLAND CALIFORNIA, JULY 18, 19, 20 & 21st REPRESENTATIVES FROM AROUND THE COUNTIES OF ALL ORGANIZATIONS REPRESENTING THE PEOPLE, SOME 5,000 OR MORE REPRESENTATIVES WILL DEVELOP A UNITED FRONT AGAINST RACISM, HEADQUARTERS BLACK PANTHER PARTY OFFICE, 3106 SHATTUCK AVE., BERKELEY, CALIFORNIA, 845-0103 OR 845-0104.

POWER TO THE PEOPLE
PANTER POWER TO THE VANGUARD

-- 3 --

POLITICAL PRISONERS

The pigs of the New York Police Structure are ever pressing their persecution of the Twenty One brothers and sister. The Panthers are unable to get bail because all the bail bondsmen are being intimidated by Pig D.A. Frank Hogan. As a result of this, no amount of money can get the brother out. The city pigs have shipped the brothers and sisters to different jails, they are denied the simple human rights of seeing their families and/or husbands.

They are just off in jail, being held in communacado. Their so-called legal rights are being denied them. Every local move the Attorney makes in their behalf is denied, turned down or just ignored.

-- 3 --

HUEY P. NEWTON NEW YORK PANTHER 21 CONNECTICUT LEADERSHIP

(This interview with the Panthers' lawyer Gerald Lefcourt was conducted by LNS reporter, Mark Kramer just after the unfairly early date of June 10 was set for the trial of the Panther 21, accused of plotting to bomb department stores and the Botanical Gardens.)

LNS: The trial date for the Panther 21, whom you are defending, has been set for June 10. Do you think this was done to influence the Grand Juries which are about to start meeting on both coasts to investigate the Panthers?

GERALD LEFCOURT: It's hard to say. D.A. Hogan, here in New York, has called this the most important case in the country, and they want to get as much from it as they can. An early conviction might serve to suppress action over the summer. It might also influence the Grand Juries if they are still in session.

LNS: How unusual is it for a case to be set for trial so soon after the arrest?

GL: The indictment is now one month old. The average serious felony is tried four months, the earliest, eight months average, and frequently a year after the arrests. We did a survey of "murder one" indictments here in the city, and this is what we found. They are pushing for a quick trial.

LNS: Who is?

GL: Frank Hogan is. And, as I said to the press the day of the arrests, this is coming straight from Washington.

LNS: from the Justice Department?

GL: I think so.

LNS: How seriously will this early date hamper the defense?

GL: The DA's office has been preparing the case for several months. The indictment of 13 counts is a heavy indictment, spanning over a year of time. So by its nature, it's a hard case to prepare for trial. The bails are so high, the defense won't have time to prepare it as it might wish -- the 21 are being held at seven different jails spread all around the city, from Riker's Island to the Bronx. It makes it hard to communicate. And in conspiracy cases, it behooves the defendants to get together.

LNS: Can't you demand that they be brought together for a meeting?

GL: In our writ of Habeas Corpus, we demanded that they be joined, but it was turned down. Everything we've done has been turned down. If you read some of the transcripts of the bail hearings and writ hearings, they're just incredible.

LNS: How good a case do you think the DA has?

"I had access to Panther meetings, and here's what went down," that can be pretty convincing, can convince a jury no matter what the truth is. Also, the DA announces he is ready for trial, while there are still writs pending on bail. In New York City the DA picks his judge. Asst. DA Joe Phillips said in court before his judge how our writs of Habeas Corpus were for the purpose of delay. But they're ready to try to get people out of jail, an action proper for a man's attorney.

LNS: So you and Attorneys Kunstler and Turco are under tremendous pressure now?

GL: Yes we are. We are responding to a multiple count indictment, in a multiple defendant case, a complex one with the charge the harsh crime of conspiracy.

LNS: How much time did you ask for?

GL: We asked for 3 months to make time for motions, and an additional 2 months to prepare for trial.

LNS: Can you give us some examples of these motions?

GL: One attacks the Grand Jury as unrepresentative of the community, because it excludes the young, poor and black. Another protests wiretapping for evidence and another asks that the search warrants be suppressed, both because they are not based on probable cause, are fourth amendment violations. Still another motion would dismiss the indictment on the grounds of the bad faith of the prosecution. We contend that the DA operates with bad faith to destroy a political party, that he took to the TV to inspire fear in the hearts of all -- you remember that he called a press conference at 11 a.m. the morning of the arrests. And five or six other motions too. So this morning, the judge calls the trial conference, and sets the trial date for June 10, and gives us only until the end of the month of May to make all our motions.

LNS: Do you have any other recourse for changing the trial date?

GL: We'll pursue every means to get more time.

LNS: Doesn't all this rushed and biased procedure increase chances for a successful appeal?

GL: Big deal. Yes, I mean, it does, but a man could sit in jail for 2 years waiting for appeal.

LNS: How has this indictment affected the Black Panther Party in general?

GL: It's clear that when they busted 21 people, they didn't affect those joining the organization at all. Two days later, there was a large increase in people wanting to join the Panthers. For every one they arrest, they make lots more angry. Repression only breeds a more enlightened, sophisticated and committed movement.

-- 3 --

NATIONWIDE MOVE BY POWER STRUTURE TO SUPRESS BLACK PANTHER NEWSPAPER

In recent months Branches and Chapters of the Black Panther Party have failed to receive their Black Panther Newspaper. The Black Panther Newspaper is published weekly and mailed out accross the nation. Subscribers outside the country have failed to receive their papers. Daily Black Panther Newspapers are returned to national distribution marked address unknown.

The Black Panther Party ships its distribution newspapers via United and TWA Airlines. These airlines accept the contract to ship the papers then deny the fact that they were ever received. On more than one occasion Branches and chapt. have reported that when; they receive their papers the boxes have been opened, the papers soaked with water and the boxes resealed. Shipments are coming up short in number. Shipping containers are often received crushed and multilated.

The Black Panther Newspaper is a Black Community News Service. It has developed since its publishing began. Its distribution raises weekly which means that the people are being educated and they are relating to it.

The paper is printed in San Francisco by a company by the name of HowardQuian. This company has received bomb threats. It has been investigated by agents of the FBI and some of its employees persuaded into quitting rather than to work on any part of the Black Panther Newspaper.

Reliable sources report that bundles of the Black Panther Papers are being ripped off by the pig FBI agents. It has also been reported that the layout flats are being read by the pigs before they are photographed by the printers. All of these things are part and parcel of the pigs attempt to destroy the Black Panther Party and suppress its organ for educating the people.

Dynamite

-- 4 --

CHICAGO PANTHERS SERVE THE PEOPLE

CHICAGO -- When the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense made its debut in Oakland two years ago, its military organization and ministerial titles were taken by many left intellectuals as a kind of pompous nationalism a la Marcus Garvey who used to march through Harlem with his uniformed nurse corps and air force (sans aircraft).

Even after a series of violent shootouts with Bay Area cops, the Presidential campaign of Eldridge Cleaver and the extensive publication of Huey P. Newton, Bobby Seale and Cleaver, intellectual radicals found it difficult to grasp that the Black Panthers were not just a passing phenomenon, but a permanent, serious attempt to organize a revolutionary party to serve and protect the black community and in coalition with other groupings to overthrow capitalism by force if necessary.

This failure to assess the true significance of the Panthers stems largely from the media's portrayal -- including the radical press -- of the Panthers as a series of shootouts, charismatic leaders and rallies with lots of shouting "right ont" Little or no attention has been given to the more significant mass work, ideological education and careful building of a revolutionary party structure. Only by studying the party at the local level can this be seen.

ILLINOIS PANTHERS FOUNDED

The Illinois Chapter of the Black Panther Party was founded in June 1968 by four local black revolutionaries -- Jewel Cook, Bobby Rush, Fred Hampton and Billy Brooks. Hampton, who was to become the Deputy Chairman, had spent two summers leading militant demonstrations in the Chicago suburb of Maywood, and had a long list of prosecutions pending against him. Rush, who became the Deputy Minister of Defense, went to California to establish contact with the National Office. In October, the rapidly expanding Illinois cadre was recognized by the National Headquarters, and a state Chapter Office was opened November 1.

The Illinois Chapter set out at once to implement the National Party's analysis and program; America is imperialist and racist; the black community is an internal colony, the revolutionary struggle of the black colony will be the vanguard of the class struggle; and struggle requires the leadership of an armed revolutionary party.

Huey P. Newton's conception of the Party was two-fold. First that it was highly disciplined and practiced democratic centralism. Second that the Party as a whole was to engage in exemplary action. The black community in general would learn by observing the actions of the Party in the community, it was reasoned and everything the Party did was educational. By leading and serving real needs of people, the community as a whole would become revolutionary. Such conceptions are hardly novel to revolutionary theory. What was strikingly new in the American context was that the Party actually began to do it.

Applying the doctrine of Chairman Mao that every enemy of my enemy is my friend, the Illinois Chapter sought to build working coalitions with a number of black street gangs. But a number of these groups were more into shaking down the community and Washington's Office of Economic Opportunity than into revolution. Eventually coalitions were built with the Black Disciples and the Congress Lords. A large number of Panthers were also recruited from the Black Student Associations in the Chicago high schools and junior colleges.

The Illinois leadership is the first to admit it made mistakes at the inception, chief among these being, "We were racist" At one point, the whole central staff sat down for two weeks of study and reevaluation. In their eventual formulation of a class analysis they were assisted by two factors; first, the presence of Ray "Masai" Hewitt from the National Staff, and second, their practical experience with the Young Patriots. The Patriots are a group of revolutionary young white Southerners in Chicago's uptown community. They wear berets with a "Free Huey" button on one side and a confederate flag on the other, and many are veterans of the now-dissolved JOIN Community Union. It was the reports from-section leader Bob Lee on the Patriots that made real to many Panthers the idea of a working coalition with working-class whites.

Today, the Illinois Chapter has formal coalitions with both the Young Lords Organization (Puerto Rican) and the Patriots. The Panthers stress the coalition with the Patriots is not just symbolic. "We don't engage in symbolic activity". Rather, the Panthers believe that groups like the Patriots can "by-pass" the racist hangup of white Americans and deliver the revolutionary message to whites who would not listen to a black revolutionary.

The Panthers push their multi-racial class analysis aggressively, even though, as they freely admit, it doesn't help them in the black community to have whites coming to their office. But as they point out, you don't fight fire with fire and you do fight racism with class solidarity. The Panthers will stand behind their coalition partners. "The next time the pigs kill some chicano brothers, they're going to have to kill some Panthers".

In a synthesis of the Cuban and Chinese experience the Panthers are neither a political party with a subordinate military arm nor a partyless military force. Rather the Panthers are simultaneously a military and political organization with leaders holding both military and political ranks. Section leaders are sergeants and subsection leaders are corporals. Branches are directed by captains and lieutenants. The State Central Staff -- deputy ministers and field secretaries -- are majors. Some officers are field (or line) officers, others are operations officers.

The requirements of individual Party members are demanding. Each member must (1) attend three two-hour political orientation classes a week, (2) read two hours a day to keep abreast of current developments, (3) sell at least 75 Panthers newspapers a week (many members sell 400 a week), (4) own and be proficient in the use of two guns, (5) obey all Party rules, and (6) do constant political work among the masses. Party members who do not fulfill these requirements are expelled. Deputy Chairman Fred Hampton is merciless in his castigation of Party members who are good "rally" Panthers but who don't attend political classes or do mass work. Members of the Party have also been expelled for speaking in the name of the Party without authorization.

THE PANTHER PROGRAM

The principal political programs of the Illinois Chapter are the free breakfast program, free health clinics, liberation schools and a community police patrol. But the Party is careful to project the programs in the order in which the community will accept them. Thus, the breakfast program is well under way and the health clinics are next, since "everybody eats and everybody gets sick." Programs which are possibly confrontational like the police patrol are delayed until a mass base is developed to guarantee success. "We move people at the level they can go. We don't intend to skip any stages." Like the guerrilla who carefully stages his battles so as to win every one so the Panthers stage their political programs. The police patrol will begin "only when the community is armed and a gun sticks out of every window every time the pigs stop someone in the community."

The breakfast program, begun April 1, is now feeding well over 500 children a morning at three locations in Chicago. The program is directed by a 20-year-old woman named Barbara Sankey, who grew up on Chicago's West Side and was first attracted to the Panthers by Newton's trial. She and other Panthers have done a remarkable job of assembling the needed resources. Since there is no money, most food is donated. One meat company gives 50 pounds of sausages a week. The Joe Luis Milk Co, gives 500 cartons of milk each week. A typical breakfast menu consists of milk, sausage or bacon, scrambled eggs and toast. There is cold cereal on Wednesday and pancakes and syrup on Friday.

So far, the Party has moved slowly on political work with children and parents. While it is clear to the children who is feeding them, they have not yet been exposed to Panther songs or propaganda talks.

MILITARY TRAINING

As Deputy Minister of Defense in Illinois. Bobby Rush is responsible for the military training of the membership, the defense of the community and the security of the office.

Security is pretty impressive. After being buzzed in through the heavy street level door, the visitor looks up a long narrow stairwell into two large blinding flood lights. Half-way up the stairs is a heavy wire mesh gate. Suspicious persons are searched before being admitted to the inner office. Outside windows are covered with heavy plywood, and two large dogs are tethered on the roof of the building. An "outside man" watches things out on the street.

Daily security is under supervision of an officer of the day (OD) 24 hours a day. No loitering is permitted in the office; one is either there on business or escorted out. And in contrast to most "movement" offices, the Panther office is neat and clean. Trash is emptied and floors are mopped. The walls are decorated with newspaper clippings and Chinese posters.

The military program of the Party is disciplined and not adventuristic, "We are not reactionaries. We don't react to situations, we create them," says Rush. Rush constantly speaks about the need to ignore police provocations and avoid aimless street fighting and premature confrontation. "Any battle we enter we're going to win".

Rush also defends the very public posture of his avowedly revolutionary organization. "We are not a so-called underground organization, organizing ground hogs. How can you be the vanguard of the people if the people can't even find you?"

The internal education program is directed by Billy "Che" Brooks. Born in Mississippi 20 years ago, he grew up on Chicago's West side and was a member of the Black Liberators before he joined the Party. "Education is the backbone' of the Party", says Che. At present, he directs an educational of about 15. The cadres educate section leaders throughout the state, who in turn are responsible for the education of the membership.

The basic reading lists consists of 12 books: "Quotations from Mao Tse-tung", "Essays from the Minister of Defense (Huey P. Newton) "The Wretched of the Earth," "Selected Military Writings of Mao Tse-tung", "State and Revolution" "On Practice (Mao), "The Communist Manifesto", "Autobiography of Malcolm X", "Malcolm X Speaks", "The Last Year of Malcolm X (George Brietman)", "Long Live the Victory of People's War (Lin Piao)", and "Red Star Over China". Every Party member is required to purchase some of the works, but only the educational cadre go through every one in detail.

Discussing the problem of education. Minister Che said, "The majority of new members come in here for one reason -- to kill. Our job is to educate them to the correct methods of political struggle". To stress education and put new members in their place, the introductory classes are taught by a chubby 14-year old boy whom everyone calls, `Little Mao'. Little Mao can rip off the 10-point Platform

-- 5 --
and Program and the 26 rules faster than most people can read. He tells new recruits that they will learn the program by heart before they leave or he will kick their ass.

Education is stressed from the word go. New recruits line up before the "recruiting sergeant" in the outer office. He gives them an application form to fill out, asks them if they now own a gun, and begins to tell them how each Party member must read for two hours a day. The Party isn't interested in people who are unwilling to learn.

The Deputy Minister of Information is Rufus `Chaka' Walls. Now 28, Chaka spent five years in the army and then worked for CORE. He is a student at Malcolm community College (formerly the Crane Campus of the Chicago City College), where he is Chairman of the Black Student Association. Chaka, with a staff of about 20, handles the distribution of the Black Panther newspaper, leaflets, press conferences and speaking engagements. The Party sells 8,000 papers a week in Illinois at 250 a copy and expects to boost that to 15,000 in a few months. All this requires a carefully worked out distribution system.

Ronald `Doc' Satchel is the Deputy Minister of Health, Doc, who is only 18 and a dropout from the University of Illinois, has full responsibility for a two part medical program. First he is training a medical cadre of about 10 in daily classes. The group includes a nurse and ex-army medical corpsman. They are expected to handle all emergency medical needs of the Party. The second phase is the projected opening of a free health clinic. According to Doc, the only hangup is getting enough doctors to volunteer time to staff the clinic on a reasonable basis. Drugs and other supplies have already been donated. In the interim the medical cadre is publishing a propaganda newsletter on problems of medical care, for use in the community.

WOMEN'S LIBERATION

Although one sister in California recently wrote in the Black Panther newspaper that she and other women in the Party were tired of being "Pantherettes" or "desk Panthers" in the office, women's liberation is not perceived as a problem in the Illinois Chapter. There are a number of women in responsible positions on the central staff, and there is a woman section leader, a woman field secretary and a woman on the security staff. About 15% of the Party membership in Illinois are women.

Until recently Yvonne King was Deputy Minister of Labor. This position has been temporarily abolished and she is currently a field secretary. In her early 20 s, Miss King came to Chicago very recently and joined the Party. While the Labor Ministry was functioning it attempted to aid several strike actions by giving technical assistance and advice. The Party hopes to reconstitute the Labor Ministry if and when resources become available to do a successful job, but right now the Party does not consider the organization of black workers in the workplace as a priority program.

The Illinois Chapter in the last six months have faced more than 60 criminal prosecutions with total bail in excess of $200,000.

The Illinois Chapter continues to grow and its membership is now "well in excess of 1,000" -- that is, well in excess of 2,000 guns.

Ann Campbell is the Communications Secretary. With a staff of three, she handles all communications between the office and the sections, as well as reports to the National Office. Along with handling the daily mail, she acts as kind of an office manager.

More news to free Fred Hampton
next issue.

-- 5 --

PIG CONSPIRACY AGAINST CONN. PANTHER'S

Ericka Huggins, acting Deputy Chairman and 7 other Party members of the New Haven, Connecticut Chapter of the Black Panther Party have been arrested and charged with a so called conspiracy to commit murder and/or murder it self. Most of the Party's leadership have been busted in the same manner that the New York Panther Party 21 was busted. What manner is that? Simple, it's the pig power structure's attempt to wipe out the Black Panther Party organization, which has spread accross the nation. The same as the brothers in New York, the connecticut Chapter was just beginning to implement the Free Breakfast For School Children before they got busted, and had become a very organized disciplined Chapter in Connecticut. The Party leadership had just expelled a provocateur agent, Jose Gonzales.

Ericka Huggins as most people know was the wife of John Huggins, who was murdered by Karanga's US organization nigger pigs. Alprentice `Bunchy' Carter and John Huggins, Ericka's husband was only part of the constant escalation that the pigs are waging against the Black Panther Party. It is clear if there was really someone who has been killed, then it's got to be the CIA, FBI and local pigs who killed this person, or it's just some one killed that the pigs want to blame on the Black Panther Party as a means to charge the Connecticut Panther leadership with a capital crime. To try and keep the brothers in jail without bail so they can't educate the public to the real program of our party.

-- 5 --

BLACK YOUTH MURDERED BY PIGS

In Newark New Jersey black people took to the streets in anger as the results of a pig murdering a black youth for no reason. Newark is one of the east coast cities that was taken over by federal, state and local pigs who shot up and burned its black communities in 1967.

Newark is also the site of the Algeria Motel where pigs shot down and murdered in cold blood three black brothers. The pig that did it was turned loose a few days ago by the racist courts of New Jersey.

The entire city pig force vamped on the black community and imposed a curfew, treating the people like slaves.

-- 5 --

KLANSMEN ACQUITTED

MERIDIAN, Miss. (LNS) -- A white jury in Meridian, Mississippi, acquitted three Klan members in the 1966 murder of Vernon Dahmer, a black leader.

A mistrial was declared for 7 other white defendants in the case.

The 10 men were being tried for conspiracy to "intimidate, coerce and threaten" Dahmer. Dahmer was killed when a group of white men fire bombed his home north of Hattiesburg.

-- 5 --

ONE MORE STUDENT KILLED

SPRINGFILED, Ohio (LNS) -- John C. Lobach, 21, is dead. A campus cop shot him on May 10, John had a girlfriend who lived in a dormitory, and went to see her when he wasn't supposed to. Somebody caught him climbing into the dorm. When he tried to escape, Chester Phillips, a campus police man, shot "at his legs." The bullet his him in the back and killed him.

-- 5 --

PIGS OPEN WAR ON NORTH CAROLNA A AND T COLLEGE

On May 20th 1969 the pig power structure of rascist Greensboro, N.C. called in National Guard troops with tanks, planes and helicopters. The pigs killed one student. They shot up the campus and sprayed gas and chemicals all over the campus and surrounding communities.

Five pigs were wounded in the gun battle. The brothers defended themselves. One National Guardsman was wounded also. The pigs of this rascist town are so bent on killing off black people that they used volunteers from the rascist communities who are probably too old to join any pig force.

The student who was killed was shot in the back. He was found on a street near the campus; "Not on the campus." This rascist town was erupted by the pigs in February of 1960 when students tried to buy coffee at a dime store lunch counter. They simply walked into F.W. Woolsworth and asked to be served. As a result the jails of Greensboro were packed with black people.

-- 6 --

PRIEST VISITS HUEY

(Father Taylor is a priest of the Steubenville, Ohio, Diocese.)

OAKLAND -- It was rather clear, that day in September when I approached the white-faced Alameda County jail. I didn't know quite what to expect -- of the sheriff, or of Huey (if I would get to see him) or of my own reaction.

My mind was hazy about the facts of Huey's case. A carfull of police (locally called `pigs') stopped a car of Black Panthers. Words and shots ensued. One policeman was killed, another wounded. Two Black Panthers were wounded, one of whom was Huey Newton (founder of the Panthers) who was accused of murder.

One thing was true and will be true right on into eternity. The police hated the Panthers in general and Huey in particular. The feeling was quite mutual.

I happened to be a black priest, visiting the Bay Area. Talk of Huey and his fate seemed to fill Oakland, Berkeley, Frisco, the nation. Strangly enough. I felt what happened to him happens to Black Everyman. Visiting him, it was like visiting myself in jail.

How would Huey take me, a black Catholic priest, serving quite obviously under a white power structure, pope and bishop and all? Had he read what we black priests observed in Caucus -- that "the Catholic church in the United States is primarily a white racist institution, has addressed itself primarily to white society and is definitely a part of that society"?

These were the thoughts that crossed my mind as I rode the elevator to the jail on the 10th floor of the courthouse building. Then, too, would the sheriff allow our meeting?

Surprisingly, clergy credentials were sufficient for the sheriff to grant the visit. So I waited in a small glassed-in room for Huey to be "delivered". I expected an angry and bitter young man, probably because I would have been such in his case. I expected a suspicious, mean, defensive air and little initiative to sustain a conversation with me, In short, the case and all its details made me await a man uptight and in a state of stage.

After a few minutes, a medium sized, 26-year-old, reddish-brown skinned lad appeared, wearing a white uniform. As the deputy left him at the door, he smiled warmly and shook my hand like I was an old buddy. He told me that he expected the visitor to be his attorney since few individuals are allowed private sit-down sessions with jail "guests" (and especially with him, I thought).

Every greatonce-in-a-while in a person's life, he meets someone who is CLEAR. It's hard to define a clear person. It's somewhat like that September day on which we visited.

As one thing led to another in our conversation, several items emerged. I was encountering a person who was really at peace, at one with himself. He wasn't smoldering beneath the skin, repressing his hatred against the Man, the "pig", mankind in general. If anything at all, he smoldered with a rare, almost uncanny understanding of the black movement, himself, and the racist society that put him there.

"We're against the oppressor", he said, "whether he be white or black".

He spoke about his friendship with Stokely Carmichael and how the Panthers had "drafted" Stokely away from SNCC to be their Prime Minister at large.

He went on in detail about the shoot-out, and about the injustices of the trial.

He explained to me the 10-point Program of black liberation. "We want an immediate end to police brutality and murder of black people". Is Point No. 7 and first on their agenda for implementation.

There wasn't a bit of self-pity in Newton. Somehow his speech revealed how he transcended all the things he had to endure. Many times he must have cried within times he must have cried within himself. Yet he didn't let this load get the best of him. One could tell that his body was jailed, but his spirit was free.

Over and beyond all worry for himself it was most obvious that the future of the black movement was his overriding concern. Black people must one day be free… Black people must one day be free. Freedom won't come automatically. It must come through a radical program of liberation. And the Black Panthers was one party with such a program.

Above all, Huey Newton revealed himself to me fully a man, a man standing high among men. He didn't look backwards or dwell in the past. Instead, he continued to dream dreams and see visions of liberation one day -- and he shared them with me.

Somewhat clumsily, I blurted how I empathize with him and how I see out of his eyes, and that, so far as I was concerned, it mattered little whether or not he was actually guilty of killing -- because I so well understood the situation, considering the backdrop of the whole black-white absurdity. (And besides, Huey was I and I was Huey and Huey became Black Everyman in my eyes.)

Huey laughed with me at my empathy. "I sure appreciate your feeling like that…but, you know Father, really I DIDN'T do it. I don't know whose bullet did hit that cop", I believed him. Remote as I was from any direct evidence either way. I believed him. 'Blaise Pascal once observed how the heart of man has its reasons which reason itself doesn't grasp.

The name of Huey P. Newton will never let me forget Oakland where he was in jail. There was scarcely a block in the Bay Area where you didn't see a `Free Huey' sign. Or other signs, like "Panther Power", or "Free Huey or the Sky's the Limit" -- all of which are geared to rouse black men from their state of stupor and brainwash, and white men from their cool, clam non-challenge of letting white "law and order" do in Huey.

Pardon me, Huey. The last thing I'd want to do is to stuff you unwillingly in the Christian bag. In Cathollic circles they talk about the "anonymous Christian." One who claims that he's never really met Christ and yet acts as his disciple is an anonymous Christian. Again, pardon me, Huey, but I do think that your black thing is deeply Christian.

I showed Huey how we Catholics give the hand-and-shoulder embrace at mass. It's called the Kiss of Peace, I told him.

We exchanged this sign of brotherhood. We told each other to "keep on pushing", I left. by Rev. Gus Talor, Jr.

-- 6 --

DOMESTIC LAW INTERNATIONAL ORDER

The police department and the armed forces are the two arms of the power structure, the muscles of control and enforcement.

Which laws get enforced depends on who is in power. If the capitalists are in power, they enforce laws designed to protect their system, their way of life. They have a particular abhorrence for crimes against property.

The police do on the domestic level what the armed forces do on the international level: protect the way of life of those in power. The police patrol the city cordon off communities, blockade neighborhoods, invade homes, search for that which is hidden. The armed forces patrol the world, invade countries and continents, cordon off nations, blockade islands and whole peoples; they will also overrun villages, neighborhoods, enter homes, huts, caves, searching for that which is hidden. The policeman and the soldier will violate your person, smoke you out with various gases. Each will shoot you, beat your head and body with sticks and clubs, rifle butts, run you through with bayonets, shoot holes in your flesh, kill you. They will not rest until you surrender or are killed. The policeman and the soldier will have the last word..

Both police and the armed forces follow orders. Orders. Orders flow from the top down. Carrying out orders is a job, a way of meeting the payments on the house, a way of providing for one's kiddies. In the armed forces it is also a duty, patriotism. Not to do so is treason.

POLICE BRUTALITY: From one end of the country to the other, the new war cry is raised.

In their rage against the police, against police brutality, people lose sight of the fundamental reality: that the police are only an instrument for the implementation of the policies of those who make the decisions. Police brutality is only one facet of the crystal of terror and oppression. Behind police brutality there is social brutality, and political brutality.

What is true on the international level is true also at home, except that the ace up the sleeve is easier to detect in the international arena. Who would maintain that American soldiers are in Viet Nam on their own motion? They were conscripted into the armed forces and taught the wisdom of obeying orders. The soldier in the field in Viet Nam…is only following orders, carrying out a policy and a plan. He hardly knows what it is all about…All he knows is that he has been assigned to carry out a certain ritual of duties. He is well trained and does the best he can. He does a good job…

Same for the policeman…He is not there on his own. They have all been assigned.

The police are the armed guardians of the social order. It is not solely a matter of trigger-happy cons, of brutal cops who love to crack beads. Mostly it's a job to them. It pays good. And there are numerous fringe benefits. The real problem is a trigger happy social order.

Excerpts from "Soul On Ice", by Eldridge Cleaver. Minister of Information, Black Panther Party

-- 6 --

P&F TO ARM AGAINST FASCISM

The Peace and Freedom Party of Alameda County in meeting assembled this 20th day of May 1969, declares that fascism has become the policy of the existing government in California for smashing movements of the people.

The people of California no longer may rely solely upon the electoral and judicial processes for redress of grievances, for the securing of their rights, for securing a more perfect union, for establishing justice, for ensuring domestic tranquility, for providing a common defense, for promoting the general welfare, or for securing the blessings of liberty for ourselves and our posterity; rahter.

The people should in our opinion consider arming themselves as a people for self-defense against the murderous policies and forces of the existing government, which on Thursday, May 15, showed itself to be completely the instrument of force and violence and murder in the interests of the wealthy capitalists by its gunning down of scores of the unarmed people of Berkeley and their guests; the resulting toll of maiming and deaths is yet to be know.

The Peace and Freedom Party of Alameda County urges all of the people as individuals and as civil organizations to consider the necessity of arming themselves with weapons so as to be able to assemble peaceably in their own interests without being helpless targets for the murderous guns of the existing government in California.

We also realize that any attempt at armed confrontation under the present circumstances would be suicidal. The time for armed confrontation is not here, but such confrontation is coming. The rulers know it and are preparing for it. WE. THE PEOPLE. MUST KNOW IT AND PREPARE FOR IT IF WE INTEND TO SURVIVE.

Alameda Peace and Freedom Party

-- 7 --

BERKELEY -- RONALD REAGAN CREATS THE FASCIST STATE

BERKELEY -- Over two hundred people and seventy police were injured Thursday, May 15, in the heaviest battle in Berkeley yet. For the first time, cops used shotguns and rifles against the people. Over a hundred people were hit with birdshot, rock salt, lead pellets from shotguns, and even with lareg-caliber rifle bullets.

The people fought back viciously, throwing rocks, bricks, bottles, and anything else they could get their hands on, but as yet, no police have been shot.

The four hour street battle was fought over a small, vacant piece of land owned by the University of California. The People decided to beautify it and make it into a "People's Park".

A year ago the almost one square block of land was the site of some of the most beautiful old homes in the campus area. The university bought the land for 1.3 million dollars and demolished the homes. For nine months the land was vacant, used only as a parking lot by persons willing to risk having their cars stuck in the mud.

Then the people in the community, sick of the ugly deserted lot, got together and started working on the land. The first Sunday a hundred showed up - students, women, children, hippies, businessmen. Everyone was so eager to work that there weren't enough tools to go around; as soon as someone stopped working someone else asked for the pick, shovel, or rake.

Money was collected and sod was brought in, and a carpet of grass was unrolled. Trees and flowers were planted, a sandbox and swings were put in for the children, and brick walkways were laid.

During the week the park provided a place for people to rap, lie in the sun, play music and cook. Every weekend thousands of people worked in the park, and at the end of the day a "People's Stew" was cooked, and the weary but satisfied workers would sit around and eat together.

The People had a tremendous pride in the park they were building; they saw the park as an example of "socialism in practice…"

Meanwhile, the university was sulking in the shadows. After all, the university had that piece of paper that said it owned the land, and it couldn't let the People intimidate it. So university chancellor Roger Heyns said the land was going to be used for a soccer field (there are already four such fields in the south campus, and no parks).

On May 14 Heyns said he would put a fence around the park "to reestablish the conveniently forgotten fact that the field is indeed the university's and to exclude unauthorized person from the site".

Plans to defend the park were never formalized because the People weren't sure exactly how the university would move. When 400 police moved in Thursday morning at four a.m. to clear and hold the park and the adjacent area, there were only about 50 people in the park. Only 3 people refused to leave, and they were arrested.

Thursday morning found the police lounging in the park, workmen frantically erecting a steel wire fence around the property, and residents and students angrily watching the whole tragedy.

People drifted up Telegraph Avenue, which was blocked off from Dwight way to Channing, awaiting a noon rally on the nearby UC campus.

Around twelve thirty, over three thousand people assembled at the rally, while at least a thousand others had to move back down the avenue. It was the student body president speaking last at the rally who had called for people to march down and "take the park."

At the corner of Haste and Telegraph, half a block from the park, people were met by hundreds of law enforcement officers including Berkeley city police, California Highway Patrol, San Francisco tactical squad, and Alameda County sheriffs.

The inevitable tear gas barrage began. But this was no normal Berkeley street battle. There were at least three thousand people, including many nonstudents, straight people, and even some fraternity guys who had helped build the park, and the intensity of the fighting was greater than ever before. They were fighting for more than a set of demands, but for something they had created.

The police could not disperse the demonstrators with tear gas cannisters. People kept moving and eventually enlarged the battle scene into a 30 square block area. Determined to route the demonstrators, the cops began to escalate their offensive. Alameda county sherriffs, equipped with twelve gauge shotguns filled with birdshot and lead pellets, fired repeatedly into the crowd. Many people in the streets were shot in the backs, others were shot standing on roofs overlooking the scene.

The battle expanded into near by streets, but the bulk of the police force remained to protect the park. The police spread tear gas from specially equipped cars and national guard jeeps. They sped through the streets at very high speeds. Nevertheless, many of the cop cars were pelted with rocks.

A crowd of over a hundred people backed two policemen against a wall, showered them with bricks, and eventually chased them away. People then moved to their car, smashing the window, turning it over, and setting it on fire. Demonstrators liberated the officers' radio, uniforms, and other equipment from the burning vehicle.

The usual ebb and flow of street battles was missing -- the fighting remained intensive until four o'clock. Even in adjacent residential areas the fighting was heavy, as police shot tear gas cannisters into houses and shot people on rooftops. Many residents, both young and old, aided people, offering first aid and the relative shelter of their homes.

The day's casualty figure reflected the intensity of the battle. At least 66 people were treated at local hospitals, including five police, one of whom was stabbed in the chest. Over one hundred people went to the first aid center at the Free Church, and over sixty officers were treated at the police first aid station. Two reporters were injured by shotgun pellets, and at least five people were wounded by thirty caliber bullets.

At six p.m. Governor Reagan, at the request of the city of Berkeley called out the National Guard, and imposed a curfew from ten p.m. to six a.m. Members of the forty-ninth infantry brigade, a select reserve force with experience in riot control, assembled in undisclosed armories.

The governor's declaration also prohibited any public assembly, rally or gathering anywhere in Berkeley. As people began to gather for a noon-time rally on Friday, the highway patrol moved in to clear the steps at Sproul Hall.

Six thousand people then marched to the Shattuck Avenue commercial center of Berkeley. When the highway patrol sealed off that area, they came back to the campus, held a meeting, and decided to return to the streets.

The National Guard stood watch over the marches, but was reluctant to act against the people. When ordered to seal off a street, they moved far more slowly than the cops, leaving people alone for the most part. A revealing incident took place when a good looking girl walked past a Guardsman. A cop yelled to him, "Why didn't you get a little piece as she walked by?" The Guardsman gave the cop the finger.

Despite the Guard and the Governor's prohibitions, almost 4,000 people stayed in the streets. They eventually dispersed, but they promised to return.

-- 7 --

TEAR GAS IN ALBANY

Albany and Thousand Oaks area residents complained yesterday afternoon of suffering the symptoms associated with tear gas.

But Albany police and National Guard spokesmen could find no immediate reason for the outbreak of at least a score of cases of irritated eyes, vomiting and respiratory effects in children. (We know they can't)

Residents at Albany Village, University of California-owned married students housing in Albany, reported the effects of tear gas in the southern part of the project at about 3:15 p.m.

An ambulance from the Albany City Police Dept. arrived to attend to several children who were suffering from respiratory problems.

Kaaren Pactwa, 1127 A 9th St., Albany, reported her six-year-old daughter Mary on her way home from Cornell School with several other children came running to her crying: "Mommie, I can't breathe, I can't breathe! My eyes are burning".

Her daughter had vomited, and Mrs. Pactwa took her indoors and washed off her face.

The son of Mrs. Susan Witting of 1051 Monroe St. said he felt the effects of the gas on his eye for about two minutes. Another person reported that the effects she experienced lasted about ten minutes.

Malaquias Montoya, 1127 F 9th St., was sawing wood when he lost his breath. His three year old son, Malaquias, had vomited in his wagon, and about ten minutes later his 1 year old son Andreas also "lost his lunch".

Montoya's wife reported that she had gagged.

Claude Hardy of the Bay Area Polution Control District, was called to the Albany Village Children's ren's Center to investigate reports that gas was causing coughing in children and smarting eyes.

He said he knew of nothing in the area that would cause such a problem, but will investigate. Two conflicting reports came into his office. One spoke of "acrid fumes" in the area, and the other called the odor "sweet".

There was an order in the area at 3:45 p.m. when the reporter arrived.

The gas was let off at the National Guard encampment at the Marina. Support for this notion was that the bivouac area is directly downwind from Albany Village.

A first lieutenant there said: "Several people have already come here asking about the gas. One spoke to the commanding officer, who said he had no knowledge of how the gas had come to Albany Village". (Of course he didn't)

The guardsman said there was no way gas released anywhere in the Marina could have gone to Albany Village in concentrated form due to the strong winds that afternoon. (Unless it was by helicopter.)

-- 7 --

THE OPPRESSOR AND HIS FEAR

The sudden reactionary move by the racist power structure is a very clear picture of a man who has lost his head, running in circles to find it. The slave master is not as dominate as he once was, and the slave is in fact becoming the determined source of his doom. The oppressed Black man, the tenant of the Black Colony can no longer be counted upon by the slave master to co-sign his racist exploitation and his proposed genocide. Granted there are still a few puppets and Tom's and traitors of their people who token appeasement continue to co-sign the racist power structure and echo the man's determination of his foot on the neck policy.

We must constantly be aware of the fear of the oppressor and his ever full bag of tricks that he possess to paint the picture of being the oppressed instead of the oppressor.

The courts of the land is one of his main weapons, for when he loses control of the people he must contain them, and he uses the racist judiciary as his lightning rod.

In the Black Colony the man has a problem for the Blackman has analized his Bulls -- t and refuses to be cannon fodder for his imperialistic gain.

Complete Freedom is the will of the people and shall be gained by any means necessary.

ALL POWER TO THE PEOPLE

Donald Campbell
Deputy Minister of Information
Indiana Chapter
Black Panther Party

-- 8 --

-- 9 --

-- 10 --

-- 11 --

-- [12] --

THE BLACK PANTHER PARTY COMES FORTH WE MUST DEVELOP A: UNITED FRONT AGAINST FASCISM

Incipient American fascism is codeavoring to direct the disillusionment and discontent of these masses into reactionary fascist channels. It is a peculiarity of the development of American fascism that at the present stage it appears principally in the guise of an so opposition to fascism, which it accuses of being an "un-American" tendency imported from abroad. In contradistinction to German fascism, which acts under anti-constitutional slogans, American fascism tries to portray itself as the custodian of the constitution and "American democracy." It does not yet represent a directly menacing force. But if it succeeds in penetrating to the broad masses who have become distillusioned with the old bourgeois parties, it may become a serious menace in the very near future.

And what would the success of fascism in the United States entail? For the toiling masses it would, of course, entail the unrestrained strengthening of the regime of exploitation and the destruction of the working class movement.

Under these circumstances, can the American proletariat content itself with the organization of only its class conscious vanguard, which is prepared to follow the revolutionary path? No.

It is perfectly obvious that the interests of the American proletariat demand that all its forces dissociate themselves from the capitalist parties without delay. It must at the proper time find ways and suitable forms of preventing fascism from winning over the broad ciscontented masses of the tollers. And here it must be said that under American conditions the creation of a mass party of tollers, a "Workers' and Farmers' Party," might serve as such a suitable form. Such a party would be a specific form of the mass people's front in America that should be set up in opposition to the parties of the trusts and the banks, and likewise to growing fascism. Such a party, of course, will be neither Socialist nor Communist. But it MUST be an anti-fascist party and must NOT be an anti-Communist party. The program of this party must be directed against the banks, trusts and monopolies, against the principal enemies of the people who are gambling on its misfortunes. Such a party will be equal to its task only if it defends the urgent demands of the working class, only if it fights for LAND

-- [13] --
for the white and black sharecroppers and for their liberatlong from the burden of debt; only if it works for the cancellation of the farmers' indebteedness; only if it fights for the equal status of the Negroes; only if it fights for the demands of the war veterans, and for the interests of the members of the liberal professions, the small business men, the artisans. And so on.

It goes without saying that such a party will fight for the election on it candidates to local offices, to the state legislatures, to the House of Representatives and the Senate.

Our comrades in the United States acted rightly in taking the initiative for the creation of such a party. But they still have to take effective measures in order to make the creation of such a party the cause of the masses themselves. The question of forming a "Workers' and Farmers' Party," and its program, should be discussed at mass meetings of the people. We should develop the most widespread movement for the creation of such a party, and take the lead in it. In no case must the initiative of organizing the party be allowed to pass to elements desirous of utilizing the discontent of the masses which have become disillusioned in both the bourgeois parties, Democratic and Repuglican, in order to create a "third party" in the United States, as an anti-Communist party, a party directed against the revolutionary movement.

(Excerpt from speech delivered at the seventh world congress of the Communist International July 25th, August 20th, 1935 -- by Georgi Dimitroff).

-- 14 --

OPEN LETTER TO RONALD REAGAN

Ronald Reagan you're a FOOL, the people says you're a fool. You've got three to five thousand little fools running around Berkeley with guns even calling you a fool. Now how are you going to deal with that?

There were many people who didn't believe me (and you still don't) when I said I held a Redbook class with your National Guards. They told me seeing was believing. Now they believe, what about you Reagan? Your own little punks are being haunted for knowledge from Chairman Mao Tse Tung's Redbook.

You see Reagan the Black Panther Party will not allow you to bluff us and hinder us from teaching the masses of people the correct principles and ideologies of revolution. Even after receiving your arrogant and narrow minded orders not to accept reading material from the people, well your troops still read our Black Panther Party Newspapers, and other materials. When you own little puppets call on the Black Panther Party to teach them passages from Chairman Mao Tse Tung's Redbook such as Imperialism will not last long, because it always does evil things. It persists in grooming and supporting reactionaries in all countries who are against the people, it has forcibly seized many colonies and semi-colonies and many military bases, and it threatens the peace with Atomic war. Thus, forced by Imperialism to do so, more than 90 percent of the world is rising up in struggle against it. Yet, imperialism is still alive, still running amuck in Asia, Africa and Latin America. In the West imperialism is still oppressing the people at home. This situation must change. It is the task of the people of the world to put an end to the aggression and oppression perpetuated by imperialism, and chiefly by the U.S.. Imperialism. And if the U.S.. monopoly capitalist groups persist in pushing their policies of aggression and war, the day is bound to come when they will be hanged by the people of the world. The same fate awaits the accomplices of the United States. So Reagan my last statement is a warning, our Minister of Defense Huey P. Newton says THE SPIRIT OF THE PEOPLE IS GREATER THAN MAN'S TECHNOLOGY. And the Black Panther Party is going to continue to educate Black people in the black community, the Mexican Americans, Indian American. Chinese and the oppressor country radical, and even your own little fools running around the streets in Berkeley with guns, to Chairman Mao's Redbook, the Party platform and program, and the PEOPLE'S REVOLUTION.

ALL POWER TO THE PEOPLE

A field nigger

-- 14 --

WHAT HAS HAPPENED TO OUR CITY

It has been taken over by the National Guard Pigs, the Tactical Squad Pigs, the Alameda County Sheriff's Pigs, and the Berkeley Pigs. Why? Because some people liberated some land in which to have a people's park. Reagan made a statement the other day that 48 people had signed complaints against the park. What about the hundreds of people who built the park, and who found it a good place in which to bring their children. Who were these 48 people anyway, a bunch of live time Capitalists who felt that their people just wanted a place in which they could congregate. And what did U.C. want the area for? To build a punkish soccer field so a few people could kick a ball around.

Not only did Reagan's lackey destroy the park, they tear gased and beat up a lot of innocent people … yes, innocent people. A helicopter sprayed U.C. campus where the people were disassembling after a rally, leaving peacefully, dig it? The chemical that they used, is the same kind of chemical that the U.S.. Imperialists are using against the Vietnamese people. It wasn't just students that were gassed, it seeped through the windows of U.C. campus and workers were caught up in it too. Willard Junior High School was sprayed, also. The elementary school children are being terrified seeing the National Guards riding around in jeeps with their guns in the air, and helicopters flying over their heads.

What kind of Mayor or Governor for that matter, do we have that would ask for this kind of treatment to be inflicted on the people that they are supposed to be representing? The best thing the people of Berkeley could do, at this point, is for students, parents, teachers, and concerned people, is to refuse to let the schools operate where young people have been the victims of attacks. They should demand that the National Guard and others who have no concern for the people's well-being, leave our community.

And if you think they are not acting against the people, what greater attack can you make than to brutalize and terrorize young people?

ALL POWER TO THE PEOPLE
VAL DOUGLASS

-- 14 --

WHERE IS ELDRIDGE

Sunday, May 25th the local mass media said that Eldridge Cleaver is now residing in Havana, Cuba. The San Francisco Examiner states that Eldridge has an apartment that is reported to be a frequent meeting place for the "Little Colony of Black Panthers in exile there."

The local mass media also stated what books were in the apartment. However, the only statement that the media could get out of Eldridge so they say, was about his beard.

All this information was printed and distributed, then the same media came running to the Black Panther Party for confirmation. This leads this writer to believe that there is another move underway to set up conspiracy charges against the Black Panther Party.

-- Big Man

-- 14 --

GRAPE BOYCOTT

Safeway buys more California table grapes in the west than anyone else - except the U.S.. Department of Defense, which is the largest purchaser in the world (they send them off to Vietnam).

The Albuquerque Friends of Cesar Chavez Boycott Committee organized a caravan of 17 cars to demonstrate at 11 of 13 Safeway Stores in Albuquerque on May 10, the nationwide "International Boycott Day", which was observed in over two dozen states, Canada, Europe, and Latin America.

You can help the grape strikers in Delano by going to your nearest Safeway store and asking to speak to the manager. Tell him that you refuse to shop at Safeway as long as they intend to carry grapes. If enough of us do that, it will begin to make a difference.

-- 15 --

MAY DAY IN L.A

May 1, 1969

Approximately 1,550 people converged on the Los Angeles Federal Building at 300 North Los Angeles Street at 10.00 a.m. to demand that Huey be set Free, Chantsof "Free Huey," "The Revolution has Come", and "No More Brothers in Jail" rang through the downtown Pig Power Complex.

Community and organizational solidarity was shown by the Black Students Alliance, the Black Youth Alliance, the Red Guard (Northern Calif.), the Friends of the Panthers, the Women's Liberation Front, the Maixoim X Foundation, the California Community Alert Patrol, the L.A. Association of Ministers, the United Front, the Communist Party - Marxist-Leninist, representatives from many b.s.u's, the Black Alternative, the Committee for a New University (U.C.L.A.), the Newsreel revolutionary film organization, S.D.S., C.A.S.E, G.I.'s Against the War in Viet Nam, Peace Action Council, Welfare Workers Council, Socialist Workers Party, Young Socialist Alliance, and others.

Elain Brown, Communications Secretary - Southern California Chapter, sang the Black Panther National Anthem.

Don Freed, chief organizer of the Friends of the Panthers, spoke. He said, "The Black Panthers are the life blood, the vanguard of the liberation struggle. They are representatives of the 3rd World in this country. They are a revolutionary Party…(and this) has to do with the struggle for socialism in this country".

Masai, Deputy Minister of Information - Southern California Chapter, also spoke. He stressed the need for strong organization if we really intend to fight against repression in this Police State.

We in Los Angeles had the good fortune to have as principal speaker at our rally. National Field Marshall, D.C. He spoke movingly about political repression of revolutionaries in general, and Panthers and Huey, in particular. He emphasized that we fight fire not with fire, but with water: "We will fight racism with solidarity, capitalism with socialism and socialist programs for the people, and U.S.. Imperialism with proletarian internationalism."

The rally lasted until after 2:00 in the afternoon. Other groups represented at the rally gave messages of solidarity and joined the masses in our demand to "Free Huey".

ALL POWER TO THE PEOPLE

Southern California Chapter Black Panther Party

-- 16 --

INTERVIEW WITH MASAI

EVO: Not long ago, you and Chairman Bobby Seale went on a lecture tour in the Scandinavian countries what can you tell me about this?

Masai: It was quite an educational trip. We found that most whites and blacks had an erroneous set of ideas about the Black Panther Party. Everyone was convinced that we were racists. They didn't understand that we were a political party. They thought that at worst we were a gang, at best a self-defense group. For us the trip was very educational and the reception we received was very good as far as the broad masses were concerned. The governments weren't quite as happy and therefore we had pigs follow us wherever we went. Norway, Denmark, Sweden and Finland. Even though the governments were pretty uptight about our visit, there weren't any overt objections. The US Government did try to prevent the trip by delaying my passport. Even though in the beginning we were being considered a racist bunch of lunatics and strictly a-political, it was worthwhile because people were so misinformed about the Black Panther Party in particular and the struggle of the black people in America in general. They didn't know if there was leadership and weren't aware of the masses having a say at all. The fact that Stokeley Carmichael had been there a month before us and confused things because of his deviations from the Party line, blowing at rampant racism and cultural nationalism. This was especially confusing to the representatives of the various revolutionary groups represented in the Scandinavian countries.

EVO: Isn't Stokeley Carmichael the Prime Minister of the Black Panther Party?

Masai: He is still the Prime Minister and no official steps against him have been taken at yet. The things we learned give some indication that his deviations might be quite serious. An investigation of this is taking place.

EVO: You are talking about the confusion abroad regarding the Black Panther Party's position. Surely you are aware that the same exists here. You are being lumped together with the various cultural nationalists - the Le Roy Joneses, the Karingas, the Muslims. It seems that all too few people are aware of your political stance - to quote Eldridge - "For a black man it is far more important to read Marx rather than learn Swahilli." This is not known to many and I think it is necessary to enlighten people as to exactly where the Black Panther Party stands. At what point did this evolvement occur? Since when was Mao's Red Book quoted as the Party's guideline and your non racist position put forth?

Masai: What you said is correct, from the Party's inception these were our guidelines. We had our 10-point Platform and Program and Chairman Mao's Quotations. Our mottos were taken from the Red Book. We had both long before we had any guns. Through practice we proved that we worked with every group that was willing to work for just causes for the broad masses of people. The inherent contradictions built into the so called Black Liberation struggle weren't quite obvious then to many people. Without study it would be impossible for them to understand it. But the Party studied the Red Book since its inception.

EVO: Would you mind going into the 10-point Program?

Masai: Our's is not a sterile program. We see the need to keep it a living creative thing because it comes from the people. The people's needs and knowledge are constantly progressing to a higher level. Point 1 - we want freedom. We want the power to determine the destiny of our black community.

Point 2 we want full employment for our people.

Point 3 we want an end to the robbery by the white man of our black community. About two months ago tricky Dick Nixon; the punk sissy coward that he is, came up with a little cancerous scheme that he called Black capitalism. Now we are hip to this we ain't going for it either. We want to put an end to the robbery by the capitalists - no matter what his color. Black, white, pink, purple, striped or polka dot. They think they can change the conditions. They are crazy. We are not mechanical, one sided or superficial. Our program is based on realities, on dialectical materialism, the basic needs and desires of the people. We use it that way and apply it in the same manner. When they try to change things around and stick Black capitalism on us, it won't work either. You see one of the places they specifically want to make a bastion of Black capitalism, just happens to be Oakland, Calif. We know this isn't a coincidence either.

Point 4 we want decent housing fit for the shelter of human beings, not underprivileged animals.

Point 5 we want education for our people that exposes the true decadent nature of American society. We want education that teaches us our true history and our role in present day society. This doesn't mean that we are hung up in Black Studies either. That's a new trick bag. We don't mean to get hung up studying Swahilli for the next 16 semesters while we are being oppressed, suffer unemployment, low paying jobs, high taxes, high cost of living, war after war and police brutality. Just because they want to send us to school on a federal grant to get deep off into African studies, which has nothing to do with the hell we catch every day. On our trip we talked with many brothers from Africa, brothers who are actively involved in revolutionary struggles. These brothers are not hung up in Swahilli or Arabic, nor are they running around like 17th century Zulu warriors. These brothers are trying as hard as they can to get deep into Marxism-Leninism and put it into practice. Very few of the African brothers that we met had what could be called a "Natural Head". They just had hair. You couldn't call it one of those custom tailored natural heads. They never spoke Swahilli and every time we told them that there were brothers here studing Swahilli for the revolution, they burst out laughing. To them it was the funniest thing they ever heard. We say we want education that teaches us our true history and our role in society. The only role for a slave is to revolt. The only role for the oppressed is revolution.

Point 6 we want all black men to be exempt from military service. It is not that we only worry about black men. It is just that everybody else is saying. "Hell no we won't go". If there is one thing that the mother country radicals don't need it is help to stay out of the draft. They have already spoken for themselves. Various ethnic revolutionary groups such as the Mexican-American Brown Berets, the Chinese-American Red guards, the Indian-American NARP and others have programs similar to ours because ours is a universal program. Our program was written specifically with the basic needs and desires of the black people in mind, but as I said it is really universal. Everybody who wants it can have it. It isn't the program of the Black Panther Party because we dreamed it up. It is so because it came from the people and as I said this was before we had guns.

EVO: Would you mind going into what became the central local point in the current wave of rebellions in the colleges - namely the demand for Black Studies program?

Masai: The movement toward Black Studies in colleges and other Black cultural programs have become a fixation. At one point in the revolutionary development of our people it was a revolutionary step. Instead of taking it as a beginning step many of the cultural nationalist opportunist bootkicking cowards and freaks have latched on to it. Federally financed culture we don't need. There is hardly going to be a federally financed revolution. Most of the cats that propagate Black nationalism in the streets practice integration between the sheets. They support the worst kind of idealism. They and their society will inevitably become more and more reactionary. The education will not be relevant unless the masses will have community control over the institutions within that community. An outside teacher, no matter how well intentioned or how black oriented, cannot come in and teach the working class anything relevant to their own class struggle. That's what the struggle is, a class struggle, not a race struggle. If a bourgeois grad, a Negro with all the credentials from Fisk and Howard comes in, he cannot tell the field niggers anything about solving their problems. He hardly knows them, let alone help them. Education has to be revolutionary or it isn't relevant. Black Study programs, as approved by the different State school boards is nowhere near revolutionary. As a matter of fact it is a reactionary fixation trying to take the cultural throwback to 200 years ago.

EVO: How do you feel about the psychedelic culture?

Masai: I am opposed to any kind of idealism and metaphysic moonism or spookism. I am opposed to getting caught up in wishes and dreams. I don't think that psychedelic trips kill pigs. One may get loaded every now and then but the Party relates to what the masses relate to. We know that the system propagates psychedelic bullshit like they propagate racism because it is a throwback. It hampers and hinders the masses in their struggle toward a truly revolutionary consciousness. The cats that have the conviction that if everybody gets loaded on acid things will be allright, couldn't be more off base. From practice we have reached the conclusion that things don't necessarily get allright. We don't have the time for it. We experienced it. We got as high as we wanted to but we still knew that we had the bloodsucking businessman, the demagogic politician and the racist pig cop on our backs. Changing our consciousness did not change objective reality. If anything it fucks up one's shooting eye. Therefore for us psychedelics are more of a hang up than help.

I heard a lot of mother country radicals say that they got hip through psychedelics. I say they got hip through nightsticks up at the demonstrations, through being busted for having long hair, through being jailed because of their beards. They got hip through objective reality, through social practice and especially through the practice of class struggle, not psychedelics.

EVO: Do you oppose a man's right to get stoned whenever he wants to, irrelevant of his political ideology?

Masai: No, we wouldn't dispute that right by any means. People's right to get stoned. Just that the Black Panther Party is an organization that demands and must have at all times compact organization and strict discipline. We know that this is impossible on trips. Those out there that want to kill pigs by throwing flowers at them - that's up to them. We have different means and tactics to make the pigs act in a desired manner.

Point 7 we want an immediate end to police brutality and the murder of black people. The reason this is spellied out is that until last year many people throught that we were exaggerating. They said "sure pigs brutalize black people a little bit, but it isn't as bad as you say." But then what went down here in Chicago looked like the charging Light Brigade and this time got the white fellows. And then the shit hit the fan. The middle class was really shook up. There were their sons and daughters getting their heads caved in. It was Sooooo out rageous but it wasn't news to us. We are hip to the educational process.

What you are getting is a cram course. We went through the process for 300 years. Now the white middle class and the intellectual radicals are getting their cram course in instant oppression. It manifests itself in its highest form in pig brutality. As I said before - ours is a universal program and the oppressed white will have to reach the same conclusions as we did - sooner or later. Point 8 we want freedom for all the Blacks held in Federal, State

City and County prisons and jails. Once again we were accused of being one sided, which isn't true. The thing we know is that none of us ever had a fair trial. It is impossible the way the court system is set up. We also know that pretty much of the same applies to the working class whites because this is a class society. Point 9 we want all black people brought to trial to be tried by a jury of their peers, members of their own black community, as defined in the constitution. It might be best to use the paper it is written on as toilet paper so that the whole country can wipe its ass with it. As far as social practice is concerned, it ain't worth shit. Point 10 in summation - we want bread, land, housing, education, clothing, justice and peace. Our main political objective is a UN supervised plebiscite in which only black colonial subjects will be allowed to participate for the purpose of determining their national destiny. If people aren't hip politically they question the word `colonial'. The ghettos are colonies and are occupied by a pig occupying force. They may call it city police or county sheriffs but in reality they all are an occupying army.

We don't need such abstract notions as integration or separation. It is impossible to integrate the slave with the slave master. Neither is it possible to separate the oppressor from the oppressed without destroying the essence of each. If you really want to get rid of slaves - the greatest and easiest way is to kill the slave master.

EVO: Do you consider yourselves as equals with your fellow conspirators?

Masai: No we don't, reality points to that. We take the score and see pigs and Panthers going down. We do see a lot of other people getting locked up but we don't see anybody getting buried. The pig has it in for us. Therefore we think that we are more of a thorn in his side than anybody has been for a long time. There has never been such a concentrated effort to kill off a leadership and the rank and file of an organization such as the one going on against us. Call us Red or Black or vice versa. We dig Chairman Mao, Ho Chi Minh, we have a profound love for Fidel Castro. I am not talking about their own individual ideological lines. We dig what they are doing. They resist and as long as they resist we have a chance to survive. People really get hung up behind the communist thing. To that we say that there are no hard core revolutionaries here. We just hope one day to measure up to Chairman Mao and Ho Chi Minh. As far as the others - the Progressive Labor Party, the Socialist Labor Party, the various breeds of Trotskyites, the SDS, the Yippies, the Hippies, the Sitinners, the Singinners, the Dropouts, the Up Against the Wall Motherfuckers - we don't see any of those on our level. Otherwise they would be going to the cemetary as we do. There is no vanity in me saying all this because we would like a whole lot of people to be on our level. The Vanguard role is not a pleasant one, but we aren't going to back up a bit. While they try to kill us off, we shall hit back as fast and as hard as we can. We are going to do that because that is the people's will. But we don't fool ourselves either that there is anybody for us to really count on now when the shit gets really deep for us.

EVO: A lot of people got uptight behind so called black antisemitism. Where the Black Panther Party stand on this score?

Masai: Black people are not antisemitic. Black people are antilandlord, anti-pig, anti-demagogic lying politicians. That's all there is to it. There are some black so-called leaders who propagate this bullshit to get a little space in the papers and make some money by extorting local businessmen, but you will find that working class people all over hate landlords, pigs and politicians. Therefore we say

"POWER TO ALL THE PEOPLE."
submitted by

Detroit Chapter, Black Panther Party

-- 17 --

TO FEED THE HUNGRY

All over this racist decadent country they call America, hunger-exist to a great extent among the poor and oppressed. The Black Panther Party has implemented a free breakfast for school children, aimed at giving innocent children a decent breakfast that has been deprived them by racist, low-life, snake-in-the-grass, slimey, greasy, razor-back pigs. The Sacramento Branch of The Black Panther Party has made the breakfast program a reality in Sacramento. The breakfast program was begun on Wednesday morning May 7th with 25 children at the Oak Park United Church of Christ at 33rd and 4th Aves.

By the end of the week we were feeding 150 children. The program itself aids in the education of the people in reference to this racist decadent oppressive system and also the contradictions that exist in this class society they oink, (the pigs) about America (pig land) being the land of the free, and the home of the brave, and that everybody body reaps the benefits. This breakfast program is something CONCRETE and not ABSTRACT, that was started to solve one of the people's many problems in the external world (the world in which people live) to insure the survival of the poor and oppressed masses.

ALL POWER TO THE -- DISPOSSESSED
PEOPLE

-- 17 --

PIGS WANT PANTHERS OUT

The Black Panther Party of Vallejo has been under constant pressure from the pig power structure and its running lackey niggers. This pressure began at the starting of our Breakfast Program for Children and many other services the Party serves the community. In the early part of May 1969, the Black Panther Party announced and carried out a boycott against local tyrants, Gus and Pete Lofls, owners of the Food Basket Store, several offices and apartment buildings in which black people are being exploited by high prices.

We had recognized that these avoricous fools have been among the top exploliters and misusers of the Black community for many years. Recognizing this and understanding that the businessmen in our community must serve our community went to them for a donation for our breakfast program. After his denial and the iniation of the boycott rally, the pig government exerted pressure on the Party. The main tactic they are using is an eviction notice to remove the Black Panther Party from the community of Vallejo for being behind in their rent. We had on several occasions talked to the landlords about the financial situation to work out a solution to deal with this situation. The Black Panther Party knows that this whole situation on rent and eviction is being inlated by the businessmen and a handful of bubble-bull nigger opportunists, such as Mel Thompson, Rev. McGrue and the rest of the clique of the Country Club Improvement Association along with the Mayor, the Chief of Police and FBI pigs.

Our position on this situation is that the community is in great need of the Black Panther Party our position is justified by the fact that avaricious businessmen like Gus and Pete Lofis are robbing the black community and it must be stopped. Our position is justified by the fact that, black political fools such as McGrue and Mel Thompson are being used by the city's corrupt officials, to pacify our community with watered down short lived programs and services. Our position is justified and magnified by the fact that hunger prevails in the community of Vallejo and the Black Panther Party's Free Breakfast Program is doing something about that and the breakfast must continue by any means necessary.

The Black Panther Party is an organization that was built by Huey P. Newton through example, exposing problems and dealing with them. Our aim is to serve the community through example, eggs, bacon, grits and waffles are examples of how to deal with an empty stomach. To expose these blood-suckers and sell-outs to the community and the way they weaken the community is an example of how to strengthen the community by denouncing their misleadership.

On June 16, 1969, the Black Panther Party of Vallejo will have a Free Bar-B-Que in the Crest which the whole community is invited to. The purpose will be to have a dedication to a warrior from Vallejo who was murdered by the Vallejo Police Department and to educate the community to what must be done to build our community so we will be abel to resist this cruel power structure and its lackey rumdump niggers who are trying to lead us down the drain. We must unite. We must fight. We will win without a doubt.

HELP SUPPORT THE PEOPLE'S
VANGUARD

ALL POWER TO THE PEOPLE

Black Panther Party
Vallejo Branch

-- 18 --

CAPITALISM THE ENEMY OF THE PEOPLE

capitalism, the enemy of the people

We the citizens of the oppressed communities here in America are forced to place their hopes on the corrupt values and misleading promises of the capitalist class. We who are oppressed are told that our impoverished state of affairs will improve as time goes on. We are appeased by the thought of exercising patience because our problem requires a great deal of time and study. We are inspired to believe that American style capitalism and freedom will eventually reward the entire working class. However, experience teaches us that the only reward for the working class is an illusionary dream world that will never become a reality. The capitalistic political flunkies have tricked the people into believing the lie and counter-lie about the two party system of democracy. One of their main lies is, "If the Demoracts do not help the people, vote for the Republicans." In other words, if one dislikes the oppression of the Republicans, one should vote for the oppression of the Democrats. Brothers of the working class you must ask yourself, why are the capitalists of the United States prepared with a shark's appetite and a tiger's methods, to conquer a lion's share of the worker's profits? We workers recieve a small salary while the capitalists walk off with all of the profits.

There are many illusions in the capitalist system. We members of the Black Panther Party are prepared to deal with the vells of illusions which cover this evil system and prevent the people from understanding why they are oppressed. The Black Panther Party holds to illusions for the people. The Panther Party comprehends what should be done and how it should be done.

If the ruling class wants to bring the people and the country out of decadence and on to the road towards development and progress, it must first andforemostturn the means of production, distribution and exchange over to the people. This foremost first step will bring an end to domestic as well as international imperialism and oppression. This first step will hault domestic as well as international crimes against mankind. This first step will also bring life and hope to the many victims in the community of oppressed people who suffer at the hands of capitalism.

Nullify the white capitalists and their henchmen the black capitalists, if for no other reason than for their contemptuous attitude towards the masses of the people. A contemptuous attitude which manifests itself in the scandalous aspects of profit-making. Everyone understands that profit-making is nothing more than a capitalistic way to rob the people. Therefore the working class takes away the profit for themselves.

When we examine the question of profit and poverty, we can easily see that every poverty program that comes out of Washington, D. C. will never help the oppressed people to become self-supporting. Ask yourself, how can a handful of dollars from Washington, balance off the truck load of dollars that are taken from the workers every minute of the day? How can a first full of dollars correct the robbery we face everytime we walk into a store? How can a meaningless gift from the class enemies really justify class exploitation? To cover their wretched behavior, the capitalists bring out the vells of contradictions such as, Black people are poor because they are black, or white workers catch bell because they did not attend college. Latin-Americans are accused of having under-developed economies, while Vietnamese are told that they have problems because of the communist elements in their country.

We the people of the Black Panther Party are disgusted with the contradictions and counter-contradictions, lies and counter-lies that are promoted by the capitalists. The truth of the matter is, all oppressed people of the working class are forced to function in a bigoted, hard stubborn arrogant system of human exploitation. A system which makes little effort to meet the needs of the people. A government which can never over-come the class conflicts.

The Black Panther Party has abandoned all hopes for the success of capitalism. We Panthers have abandoned the capitalist system which threatens the workers with police powers. We Panthers reject this government because of the atrocities committed by the ruling class. We Panthers oppose Americans capitalism because its leaders have killed more people than any government in the history of mankind.

The Black Panther Party is united with the working class. We are class brothers. As class brothers we must agree: 1. Capitalism is an inferior system. 2. Capitalism never rose except to pillage, because it is controlled by a group of power freaks. 3. Capitalism is the inferior monster which has over-run everything the people, the nation, the reason and the science. 4. We class brothers must remain united against the injustice of oppression. Now we agree that we have an inferior form of government, it becomes easy to see that the national, the state and the local capitalists officials are also inferior. Did you ever ask yourself why the Black Panther Party calls for freedom and the power to allow the people to control their destiny? Why? Because we know that capitalism is an inferior form of government. The Black Panther Party is aware of the fact that national, state and local capitalists are not interested in the well being of the people. According to author Frantz Fanon in "The Wreched Of The Earth", "The state which by its strength and discretion ought to inspire confidence and lull everybody to sleep, on the contrary seeks to impose itself in spectacular fashion. It makes a display, it jostles people and bullies them thus intimating to the citizen that he is in continual danger."

Certainly Fanon is correct. The life of every man, woman and child is endangered by capitalism. There is the danger of world war, the danger of poverty, the danger of oppression and many other dangers. We Panthers knows that the inferior CAPITALIST SYSTEM CANNOT HALT THE PROGRESS of its own dangers and contradictions. Pick any capitalist country, be it America, England, France, Germany or Spain, the contradictions will be the same. Any man who has seen the ghettos of Paris, France, has seen one of the highest forms of mans inhumanity to man. Any man who has walked through the ghettos of London or Madrid should know that capitalism kills. In every capitalist country one will find a ruling class exercising abnormal and savage control over the birth, the life and the death rate of the working class. Thus do our brothers and sisters of the working class decay, driven to death in mills, in the mines and in the ghettos of the capitalists. We are driven, robbed and despised in the factory; betrayed, and slaughtered on the battlefield; voiceless in the control of industry, voiceless in the capitalist political conventions, vioceless in the judiciary, voiceless in the state and national executive councils, ridiculed by `high society', scorned everywhere. We must defend ourselves. We must seize the power to control and defend our class everywhere.

Brothers, if you have minds exercise them for your own class; if you have pride, show it for your class; if you have loyality, prove it for your class; if you have power use it in defense of your class. If you can climb, unite with your class and together we will climb out of this hell of capitalism. Unite for Panther Power, Unite for Peace and Freedom, Unite for POWER TO ALL THE PEOPLE.

Ed Williams
Illinois Chapter, Black Panther
Party

-- 18 --

SAN DIEGO PANTHER MURDERED BY PORK CHOP PIG'S

FRIDAY, MAY 23, 1969

At about 3:30 p.m., Lt. John Savage was murdered on 30th and Imperial Avenue. The brother was accompanied by Lt. Jeffery Jennings.

The brothers and myself were headed back to the office, after taking the Defense Captain and a sister to John's house to get some rest. Enroute to the office, I let the brothers off on the corner of 30th and Imperial, parked on the opposite side of Imperial in front of S & M Drug Store was a member of the US organization.

The present situation here in San Diego was getting very touchy every day. Shortly after John and Bunchy were murdered members of the US organization forcibly entered the office, 14 strong with guns drawn, and talked in terms of peace and unity, under those conditions in which we were confronted. And afterwards, there were a series of confrontations, from which nothing went down as a result of all this.

And on Malcolm's birthday, at a rally at Mountain View Park, several members of the party were there. One of the sister's of the party was asked to speak to the masses.

When the sister was speaking, about birth-control pills and their purpose and the effects of stumblers, which so many of the people are handling. While the sister was talking, the freaks of the US organization, not only did they pull their guns on the masses that were at the park paying tribute to Brother Malcolm, they also had their pices pointed at the brothers and the sister talking on the platform, they told the brothers to make it. Then followed up by telling the sister quote, "Get down and get on bitch," unquote. All this time this was going on the pigs were digging on this from a distance with long range glasses. Early Friday morning four chops had jammed Lt. Jennings, while he was on his way to the pad.

Friday evening, the brothers were passing this chop "Tambuzi" and they evidently wasn't moving fast enough for the chop. The mother fucker got out of the car he was sitting in and told the brothers to get on. As they were walking away, the chop grabbed Lt. Savage by the shoulder and jammed a .38 automatic into the back of his neck and murdered him. At this moment, we don't know if the pigs have caught the sissy. But we of the Black Panther Party will not accept the cold blooded murdering of not only our brothers here in San Diego, but we will not allow the murderers of all the warriors of the Vanguard to continuely be perpetuated against us.

Panther Power
Lt. Chairman
Mo. Meran

-- 19 --

PREMIER SHOWING OF THE MOTION PICTURE Z JUNE 7

Two hour motion picture. Story of a political ASSASSINATION.

This two - hour film which exposes fascism for what it is, will be shown in the Bay Area and three major U.S.. cities to raise funds to develop a UNITED FRONT AGAINST FACISM and to defend political freedom and political prisoners.

Free Huey, Free the N.Y. Panther 21, Free Erica Huggins and 7 Panther leaders, Free all political prisoners.

JUNE 7TH ONE DAY ONLY SATURDAY S.F OAKLAND BAY AREA

Everybody
see this two-hour Motion Picture `Z'
Recently won at the Cannes Film Festival
in Paris, France

Premiere showings in America
Presented by

The Black Panther Party
Internat'l Liberation School
Other showings in U.S. cities: June 6th Friday
Los Angeles

June 7th, Sat.
S.F. Bay Area

June 8th, Sun.
New York City

June 9th, Mon.
Chicago

-- 20 --

REPRESSION AND HARASSMENT OF L.A. PANTHERS STEPPED UP

The Los Angeles Pig Power Structure, in accordance with national plans, has stepped up its program of repression of the L.A. Panthers. In a less than one month period (late April to mid May) 42 Panthers in L.A. were arrested a total of 56 times. So far, over $100,000 bail has been set for the 42 brothers. Through competent lawyers and a lot of hassle over bail money, bails have been reduced and most of the brothers are out of jail. Also, many have had their obviously phony charges dropped. But, the Party funds are being drained and worthwhile programs slowed down.

In addition to arrests on phony charges, brothers and sisters homes have been raided by the pigs, apartments that Panthers had rented have been burned just prior to occupancy. The Ashgrove (a forum for radical and revolutionary art) was mysteriously burned 2 days before the beginning of a singing engagement there by our Communications Secretary, and several rooms of the First Unitarian Church were burned a week before our announced Conference with the Friends of the Panthers. The Watts office has been raided twice in the past month and burglarized at night. Since that time, it is no longer necessary to open the door of the Watts office, you can climb through the completely broken 2 front windows or walk through the former glass door. The Westside office also has been raided twice in that period, and burglarized. (It should also be noted that harassment by the pigs has in fact extended to the members of the newly organized Friends of the Panthers. One female member was mysteriously pushed down a flight of stairs outside her home; and one of the men's car was recently burglarized and vandalized.)

This type of repression and harassment only serves to draw the lines more clearly to the People. With each Panther office raided or arrest made, more people come out to observe and protest. The people realize more clearly that the pig is present to oppress and to serve the pig power structure

ALL POWER TO THE PEOPLE

Southern California Chapter
Black Panther Party

-- 20 --

A MESSAGE OF REALITY TO OPPRESSED PEOPLE

The minority peoples of white America must rise within themselves. Awake from the long lethal sleep they have been forced to live with. Clear your minds and become aware of the situation plauging yourselves and your families. You're the victims of a nation which has chosen many years ago to annihilate you through years of oppression.

White America continues to spread her lethal forces or perhaps elements to harm oppressed peoples of America and abroad, America will see you starve because you are starving now. She'll throw you in her correction institutions which is incorrect for political prisoners of oppressed people of white America. Never the less she deems this a necessity to protect the affluent society, who in turn free wheelingly butchers you before your very eyes…so get the sleep out of your eyes fast, and support the vanguard speak out against those who try to destroy the truth. Give your heart and thoughts to the vanguard. We need the support of the oppressed masses, Black, Brown, Red, Yellow and even those whites who have nothing.

America has used her color of white to trick poor whites into believing that they are just poor. You really better wake-up and realize she'll kill you as fast as she'll murder blacks. I know white America has blinded your souls with prejudiced feelings toward all minority groups: especially blacks and Latin-American speaking people. So you too must awake from that dead sleep, and cry out against her ways of treachery. Support the vanguard, may it be the Black Panther Party, SDS, Young Lords, Young Patriots and all other Parties involved in the immediate liberation of oppressed peoples.

You see America doesn't really stand for democracy she is a serpeant who uses her fangs to poison your real soul. America believes in the following only: Affluent Society Adultress, Minority Murders, Economical Expansion For The Rich Who Control Political Wigs, Incrimination And Distorting The Consciousness Of The Oppressed Americans, in white America. That speels America - she has proven these conditions over and over again.

Carlo Henderson
BLACK BROTHER
Bronx, New York

-- 20 --

BEAT TO DEATH

The Black Panther Program was developed by the people and point number seven states "We want an immediate end to police brutality and murder of black people". The following incident shows the necessity for this point and destruction of the pig police force.

On May 1, 20-year-old Charles Cox was murdered by the pigs. Brother Charles had been arrested on a disorderly conduct charge and accused of threatening several people whit a knife in a neighborhood tavern. No complaints or charges were pressed by those who were supposed to have been threatened.

Charles Cox was arrested at 6 p.m. after waiting for the pigs to come and get him, his family was not notified of his arrest and death until 7:45 a.m. Wednesday when Charles' brutally beaten body lay in the pig morgue.

The pig head doctor in charge of the pig morgue had done an autopsy on the head and chest of the body. Knowing they (the pigs) murdered poor Charles, the pigs then sent out a pig mortician who wanted charge of the body.

The family grew very suspicious because of the pig mortician's insistance on handling the body and the difficulty of picking up the clothes Charles had worn that night. When the family mortician was called in, he discovered bruises all over the body. The doctor employed by the family said, the cause of death was two blows on the head. THE PIGS BEAT HIM TO DEATH.

So far this pig power structure has not taken any steps towards bringing the true nature of this crime to the people.

The people have to understand that murder of innocent, oppressed people will continue as long as the pig power structure determines the will of the people

ALL POWER TO THE PEOPLE
PANTHER POWER TO THE VANGUARD

Cheryl Peterson & Capt. Willie
Calvin
Illinois Chapter
Black Panther Party

-- 20 --

THE POLITICS OF REFORM

Reform is, at best, a superficial alteration of the American capitalist system. It is nothing more than a token effort to dilute the revolutionary powers that now hold the structure in a state of crisis and to counter organized efforts towards complete liberation. Its advocates are capitalist politicians and profiteers, which, by their affliations, are counter-revolutionary elements.

The constituency of reformation is such that it is, in fact, a profitable business venture. Private enterprise, which, of social factions that involve themselves in the practice of reform, is the majority, receives government subsidies as a result of their efforts to increase the incomes of the lower class. The American government itself allots financial aid annually to non profit organizations and governments abroad in an effort to, in reality, buy time. The foreign recipients of these financial allocations are obliged to import American made arms and other sundry products to assure the capitalists that they will not lose money. The conditions under which non-profit organizations are to utilize federal funds makes total liberation, as a result of this utilization, impossible.

I feel obliged, now to make it crystal clear that I wholeheartily endorse the alleviation of severely detremental economic conditions. But, as a result of my love for the people, I cannot truly regard this as an end within itself. It is imperative that reform be cited, as it truly and most assuredly is, a suppressive working of the capitalist machinery. It is a tool of American liberalism. It is initially a gift. The people have not seized the results of reform with their own hands. In this, they are drained of the human incentive to completely liberate themselves.

Also, as if the previous is not enough, it is the Marxian concept and my belief that man lifes in his work. Human creativity is the avenue of self-expression. Life is human expression. Man, while forced to sell his human energies to sustain the existance of himself and his family, has been drained of his human creativity, his expression through that creativity and, consequently, his life. As a result of reform, the capitalist machinery is newly-oiled and efficient in its human alienation.

Man cannot completely liberate himself if not given the opportunity to overcome his dominance by capital. Man cannot truly approach his natural state of peace and joy while he is a cog in the capitalist machinery. Reform cannot bring the results of total revolution. Liberation is inevitable. POWER TO THE PEOPLE

Larry Jones

-- 21 --

October 1966: Black Panther Party Platform and Program

What We Want
What We Believe

1. We want freedom. We want power to determine the destiny of our Black Community.

We believe that black people will not be free until we are able to determine our destiny.

2. We want full employment for our people.

We believe that the federal government is responsible and obligated to give every man employment or a guaranteed income. We believe that if the white American businessmen will not give full employment, then the 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 white man of our Black Community.

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 was 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 Germans are now aiding the Jews in Israel for the genocide of the Jewish people. The Germans murdered six million Jews. The American racist has taken part in the slaughter of over fifty million black people; therefore, we feel that this is a modest demand that we make.

4. We want decent housing, fit for shelter of human beings.

We believe that if the white landlords will not give decent housing to our black community, then the housing and the land should be made into cooperatives so that our community, with government aid, can build and make decent housing for its 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 a man does not have knowledge of himself and his position in society and the world, then he has little chance to relate to anything else.

6. We want all black men to be exempt from military service.

We believe that Black people should not be forced to fight in the military service to defend a racist government that does not protect us. We will not fight and kill other people of color in the world who, like black people, are being victimized by the white racist government of America. We will protect ourselves from the force and violence of the racist police and the racist military, by whatever means necessary.

7. We want an immediate end to POLICE BRUTALITY and MURDER of black people.

We believe we can end police brutality in our black community by organizing black self-defense groups that are dedicated to defending our black community from racist police oppression and brutality. The Second Amendment to the Constitution of the United States gives a right to bear arms. We therefore believe that all black people should arm themselves for self-defense.

8. We want freedom for all black men held in federal, state, county and city prisons and jails.

We believe that all black people should be released from the many jails and prisons because they have not received a fair and impartial trial.

9. We want all black people when brought to trial to be tried in court by a jury of their peer group or people from their black communities, as defined by the Constitution of the United States.

We believe that the courts should follow the United States Constitution so that black people will receive fair trials. The 14th Amendment of the U.S.. Constitution gives a man a right to be tried by his peer group. A peer is a person from a similar economic, social, religious, geographical, environmental historical and racial background. To do this the court will be forced to select a jury from the black community from which the black defendant came. We have been, and are being tried by all-white juries that have no understanding of the "average reasoning man" of the black community.

10. We want land, bread, housing, education, clothing, justice and peace. And as our major political objective, a United Nations-supervised plebiscite to be held throughout the black colony in which only black colonial subjects will be allowed to participate, for the purpose of determining the will of black people as to their national destiny.

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 unsurpations, 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.

-- 22 --

SOUL OF ICE?

"IT IS ONLY A MATTER
OF TIME UNTIL
THE QUESTION OF
THE PRISONER'S
DEBT TO SOCIETY
VERSUS SOCIETY'S
DEBT TO THE
PRISONER IS INJECTED FORCEFULLY INTO NATIONAL AND STATE POLITICS,
INTO THE CIVIL AND HUMAN RIGHTS STRUGGLE, AND INTO THE
CONSCIOUSNESS OF THE BODY POLITIC. IT IS AN EXPLOSIVE ISSUE
WHICH GOES TO THE VERY ROOT OF AMERICA'S SYSTEM OF JUSTICE,
THE STRUCTURE OF CRIMINAL LAW, THE PREVAILING BELIEFS AND
ATTITUDES TOWARD A CONVICTED FELON." (SOUL ON ICE, P.59)

Eldridge Cleaver made the decision to politically exile himself November 27th, on the basis that the Adult Authority made an outlaw decision, and that he has been denied his constitutional right to due process of law.

The revocation of Cleaver's parole was illegal, because no parole violation was committed.

The Adult Authority parole board has tried to maintain that Cleaver violated his parole by having a rifle in his possession, and by associating with individuals of bad reputation. This contention, we will show, is false. The Adult Authority version contradicts the Superior Court order itself:

"…Cleaver's only handling of a firearm (the rifle) was in obedience to a police command. He did not handle a hand gun at all. There was nothing one way or the other to show a conspiracy or a situation calling for the application of the doctrine of aiding and abetting. Hence, nothing supported either the possession of a firearm or the assault charge.

As to the charge of association with individuals of bad reputation, the report indicated that two or three of those named had "police records," but nothing to show whether any had been convicted of anything, or whether Cleaver knew of their arrest record." (Superior Court c.t. 137, 138, 140, 141.)

Parolee Cleaver was denied due process of law by being denied opportunity to present his case.

Why was Cleaver returned to prison as a parole violator if documented evidence to the contrary had been presented in his defense? To answer that question, one must examine the Adult Authority. This board has the right to arbitrarily revoke or suspend parole on any individual. At the same time, the Adult Authority maintains -- falsely -- that Cleaver has the opportunity to defend himself at a hearing. This is how it works:

"A parolee is served with violation charges, is interviewed, is given a hearing (before the Adult Authority itself, the charging party) at which the parolee may `plead' to the parole violation charges, and is afforded an opportunity to present his defense."

"At the `hearing' a parolee is denied the right to counsel, may not have an independent and impartial officer to conduct the hearing and make decision." (Petition for Hearing in the Supreme Court, p. 17)

Not only does the Adult Authority hold secret hearings, but it also refuses to notify persons under its jurisdiction of its procedures, or of its variable definitions of what constitutes a parole violation. This secrecy and vagueness is in direct violation of federal law which requires agencies to publish their procedures "for guidance of the public."

"Petitioner (Cleaver) is immediately and seriously prejudiced by the Adult Authority's unlawful refusal to publish its regulations, since he is to be imprisoned by virtue of an action which the Adult Authority still seeks to garb in this `veil of secrecy.' (Petition for Hearing in the Supreme Court, p. 12)

Yes, the Adult Authority acted unjustly and illegally. Its decision was an outlaw decision. Cleaver had no chance of obtaining "justice" from these Star Chamber proceedings. Why then wouldn't the U.S.. Supreme Court hear Cleaver's case? There are, we believe, three reasons why the case wasn't accepted. The first is that any fair minded court would obviously have released Cleaver, thereby setting a precedent. The second is that thousands of cases of alleged parole violation from all over California and other states would be subject to reversal. Thirdly, the illegal functioning of the Adult Authority would come under attack. The U.S.. Supreme Court just couldn't afford to consider the Cleaver case during this turbulent period.

Eldridge Cleaver is a victim of naked, shameless political persecution. As Judge Sherwin puts it:

"…The uncontradicted evidence presented to this court indicated that the petitioner had been a model parolee. The peril to his parole status stemmed from no failure of personal rehabilitation, but from his undue eloquence in pursuing political goals, goals which were offensive to many of his contemporaries. Not only was there absence of cause for the cancellation of parole, it was the product of a type of pressure unbecoming, to say the least, to the law enforcement paraphernalia of this state."

Cleaver is in political exile because a man of his convictions cannot get justice here. Indeed, if we are to give more than lip service to the concepts of freedom and justice we must support him. The work to get him discharged from parole must continue. An intense publicity campaign is necessary now to bring to the public the legal defense and arguments which were carried to the courts with no satisfaction. We must all work together to focus attention of this case. This is not an issue of one man's freedom, but a broad struggle which affirms the right of all of us to speak out politically in this country. If Cleaver is not allowed his freedom, it is just a matter of time until all our freedoms are further reduced. His is not a personal struggle but a political one. SPONSORS
Julian Mayfield
LABOR
Maria Jolas

(partial )
Emile Capouya
Jim Lennon
Denis Berger

WRITERS
Tana de Gamez
Sidney Lens
Joby Fanon

Bertrand Russell
Muriel Rukeyser
PROFESSORS
Mrs. Betty Shabazz

James Baldwin
Arthur Waskow
Hans Koingsberger
Stokely Carmichael

Murray Kempton
Carlos Monsivais
Ashley Montagu
Carl Oglesby

Allen Ginsberg
George Hitchcock
Conor Cruise O' Brien
ATTORNEYS

Herbert Gold
Tillie Olsen
Douglas F. Doud
Harr Nier

Kay Boyle
Jean Paul Sartre
D.F. Fleming
Len Holt

Oscar Lewis
Mrs. Richard Wright
Mal Burnstein

Terry Southern
Christiane Rochefort
C. Wade Savage
Paul Halvonik

Norman Mailer
Julia Wright Herve
Donald Kalish
Sherwin A. Shayne

LeRoi Jones
Daniel Guerin
Howard S. Becker
Eugene Deikman

Lawrence Ferlinghetti
Yves Loyer
Maurice Zeitlin
M. Lafue-Vcon

Andrew Kopkind
Gerard Chaliand
Sidney M. Peck
M.R. Plasson Stibbe

Dwight MacDonald
Mourad Bourboune
Noam Chomsky
Giscle Halimi

Donald Duncan
J. Semprun
Richard Lichtman
John Thorne

Barbara Garson
Juliette Minces
J.B. Neilands
PHYSICIANS

Maxwell Geismar
David Welsh
Montgoemry Furth
Oscar Rambo, M. D.

John Gerassi
THEATRE, FILMS, ARTS
William Lindner
Philip Shapiro, M. D.

John Gunther
Godfrey Cambridge
Stephen Smale
Carlton Goodlett, M.D.

Paul Jacobs
Jules Feiffer
Donald B. McLeod
Robert E. Greenberg, M.D.

Jessica Mitford
Ossie Davis
Cyril Epstein
EDITORS

Richard Gilman
Malvina Raynolds
Roger Dittmann
Angus Cameron

Julius Lester
Ruby Dee
A.K. Bierman
Irving Beinin

Robert Crichton
Shirley Clarke
O. Revault d' Allonnes
Arthur Wang

D.W.
Saul Landau
Madeleine Riberioux
Aaron Asher

Edgar Friedenberg
Ed Bullins
Laurent Schwartz
Joe Fox

Marcus Raskin
Gil Turner
A. Soboul
Richard Huett

W.H. Ferry
Open Theatre
Staughton Lynd
J.R. Talbo

Jack Newfield
Elsa Knight Thompson
MUSIC
Marilyan Mecker

Nat Henthoff
John Carpenter
David Amram
Leo Huberm In

Susan Sontag
Robert Brustein
POLITICS
Carey McWilliams

Robert Lowell
Richard Schechner
Reles Lopez Tijerina
Robert Silvers

Jane Jacobs
Saul
Jesse Gray
John J. Simon

Hortense Calisher
Delphine Seyrig
Floyd McKissick
Theodore

Harvey O' Connor
Roger pic
James Forman
POLITICAL PRISONER

Truman Nelson
Dugald Stermer
Julian Bond
HUE NEWTON

Charles V. Hamilton
R. G. Davis
Tom Hayden

Stanley Kunitz

Stanley Kaufman

-- 23 --

RULES OF THE BLACK PANTHER PARTY

CENTRAL HEADQUARTERS
OAKLAND, CALIFORNIA..

Every member of the BLACK PANTHER PARTY throughout this country of racist America must abide by these rules as functional members of this party. CENTRAL COMMITTEE members. CENTRAL STAFFS, and LOCAL STAFFS, including all captains subordinate to either national, state, and local leadership of the BLACK PANTHER PARTY will enforce these rules. Length of suspension or other disciplinary action necessary for violation of these rules will depend on national decisions by national, state or state area, and local committees and staffs where said rule or rules of the BLACK PANTHER PARTY WERE VIOLATED.

Every member of the party must know these verbatum by heart. And apply them daily. Each member must report any violation of these rules to their leadership or they are counter-resolutionary and are also subjected to suspension by the BLACK PANTHER PARTY.

THE RULES ARE:

1. No party member can have narcotics or weed in his possession while doing party work.

2. Any party member found shooting narcotics will be expelled from this party.

3. No party member can be DRUNK while doing daily party work.

4. No party member will violate rules relating to office work, general meetings of the BLACK PANTHER PARTY, and meetings of the BLACK PANTHER PARTY ANYWHERE.

5. No party member will USE POINT, or FIRE a weapon of any kind unnecessarily or accidentally at anyone.

6. No party member can join any other army force other than the BLACK LIBERATION ARMY.

7. No party member can have a weapon in his possession while DRUNK or loaded off narcotics or weed.

8. No party member will commit any crimes against other party members or BLACK people at all, and cannot steal or take from the people, not even a needle or a piece of thread.

9. When arrested BLACK PANTHER MEMBERS will give only name, address, and will sign nothing. Legal first aid must be understood by all Party members.

10. The Ten Point Program and platform of the BLACK PANTHER PARTY must be known and understood by each Party member.

11. Party Communications must be National and Local.

12. The 10-10-10-program should be known by all members and also understood by all members.

13. All Finance officers will operate under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Finance.

14. Each person will submit a report of daily work.

15. Each Sub-Section Leader Section Leader, Lieutenant, and Captain must submit Daily reports of work.

16. All Panthers must learn to operate and service weapons correctly.

17. All Leadership personnel who expel a member must submit this information to the Editor of the Newspaper, so that it will be published in the paper and will be known by all chapters and branches.

18. Political Education Classes are mandatory for general membership.

19. Only office personnel assigned to respective offices each day should be there. All others are to sell papers and do Political work out in the community, including Captains, Section Leaders, etc.

20. COMMUNICATIONS -- all chapters must submit weekly reports in writing to the National Headquarters.

21. All Branches must implement First Aid and/or Medical Cadres.

22. All Chapters, Branches, and components of the BLACK PANTHER PARTY must submit a monthly Financial Report to the Ministry of Finance, and also the Central Committee.

23. Everyone in a leadership position must read no less than two hours per day to keep abreast of the changing political situation.

24. No chapter or branch shall accept grants, poverty funds, money or any other aid from any government agency without contacting the National Headquarters.

25. All chapters must adhere to the policy and the ideology laid down by the CENTRAL COMMITTEE of the BLACK PANTHER PARTY.

26. All Branches must submit weekly reports in writing to their respective Chapters.

-- [24] --