Background to the Formation of the Black Power Movement - Essay Sample

Introduction

Willie Ricks who later on adopted the name Mukasa Dada and Stokely Carmichael who later on came to be known as Kwame Ture is considered to have brought into widespread use the term "Black Power". The two were both the spokespeople and organizers of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee. Thus, come the 16th of June 1966, Stokely Carmichael led marchers in a chant for black power which was televised nationally. The march happened in a speech in Greenwood, Mississippi during the March Against Fear.

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Additionally, during the late 1960s, Black Power openly emerged in the representation of the need for more prompt aggressive action inclined towards countering American white supremacy. Most of the ideas behind the movement were influenced by Malcolm X's criticism of the peaceful methods of protest that Martin Luther King Jr had proposed. In the year 1965, Malcolm X was assassinated and also beginning the previous year of 1964 to 1965, there was a series of an urban uprising. As a result, the Black Power Movement was ignited. More so, the movement received comprehensive support from new organizations that were supportive of the Black Power philosophies ranging from Black Nationalism, socialism and the Black Panther Party, thus growing gaining more prominence.

Educational Focus of the Black Power Movement

The fifth point among the Ten-Point Program by the Black Panther Party called for the education of African Americans within an education system that exposes the real nature of the profligate American society. The Party demanded for an education system that opened the truth about the history and the present role at the time of the Africana Americans. The opinion went ahead to receive more acceptance in most Black Power Organizations. Previously, Carter G. Woodson, Marcus Garvey and W. E.B. Du Bois had already aired their remarks about the insufficiency of the black education.

Moreover, having realized the shortfall of black education, Stokely Carmichael provided political enlightenment into his work with SNCC in the rural south. The works by Stokely Carmichael included political literacy and got out to vote campaigns. Huey Newton and Bobby Seale used education in airing out the lack of identity within the black community. Before starting the Panthers, Seale had been working with the youth in an after-school program. Therefore, the new system of education, as well as the identity building, were primarily used by Black Power Movement leaders in empowering African Americans as a step towards claiming their freedom.

Black Power Movement Operations in the Late 1960s

To protect local black communities and party members from law enforcement, the Black Panther at first used the open carry gun laws. Members of the movement also recorded scenarios of police brutality that was done through distantly pursuing police cars within their neighborhoods. The year 1967 was characterized by a series of disruptive rallies by the Panthers aimed to the California State Assembly which was conducted through armed marches. To counter the activities of the movement, the Federal Bureau of Investigations established COINTELPRO that was mainly obligated to carry out investigations on Black Nationalist groups as well as leaders of other civil rights movement. Hence, by the year 1969, Black Power Movement leaders, together with their allies, had been placed on the COINTELPRO target list.

Besides, the year 1968 was marked with the formation of the Republic of New Afrika. In essence, the Republic of New Afrika was established by a separatist group pursuing a black nation in the south of the United States of America. However, the republic did not last long and come the early 1970s; the republic had already collapsed. As at the year 1968, most Black Panther leaders had been detained inclusive of the critical founder Huey Newton. The founder of Black Panther; Huey Newton had been convicted of assassinating a police officer even though later on his case was dismissed. Then on the same year of 1968, Black Power Movement members confronted the police in a firefight in a gas station located within Los Angeles. More so, Martin Luther Jr was killed in the same year thus culminating into a nationwide strike that is described to be the vast social unrest ever experienced by the United States of America since the American civil war.

Surprisingly, in the same year of 1968, there emerged a White Panther Party. The White Panther Party was mostly a group of white individuals who were committed towards the cause of the Black Panthers. Conversely, the founders of the White Panther Party; John Sinclair and Pun Plamondon were seized by the police even though they were later on freed. Towards the end of the year 1969, the Black Power Movement began a series of removal of its members which had been brought about by the fear of law enforcement permeation thus engaged in gunfights with the police several times. Despite the restrained relationship with the police, the movement still proceeded with its "Free Huey" call on a global scale. Therefore, in a highly spirited and rising militancy environment, the League of Revolutionary Black Workers was established in Detroit. The focal point of the League was to advocate for labour rights and African American liberation.

Black Power Movement at Its Peak (the 1970s)

The Black Power Movement hit its climax of operation during the 1970s epoch. For instance, during the beginning of the year 1970, Stokely Carmichael who was the acting Honorary Prime Minister of the Black Panther Party at the time went around the world visiting various countries to champion the message of ways of resisting American imperialism. For example, in a country such as Trinidad and Tobago, the Black Power Movement had given birth into the Black Power Revolution whereby most Afro-Trinidadians compelled the Trinidad government to consider reforms. Later on, several Panthers travelled to Algeria to find a way out as far as American anti-imperialism and Pan-Africanism were concerned. Again, the same year of 1970 saw the formation of the Black Liberation Army by former Panthers. The army was established to push on with a violent revolution rather than embracing the new reform movements of the party.

As a consequence, on the 22nd of October 1970, the Black Liberation Army is strongly believed to be the mastermind of the St. Brendan's Church bombing in San Francisco. At the time of the incidence, the church was filled to the brim with mourners who had come to pay their last tribute to Harold Hamilton, who was a San Francisco police officer. Harold Hamilton had been gunned down in the line of duty while responding to a bank robbery. Fortunately, even though the bomb was detonated, close to nobody in the church sustained any severe injuries.

The Black Power Movement in the 1970s

Towards the end of the 1970s, a rebel faction that had been named after one of the movement's killed prisoner created the George Jackson Brigade. The Brigade engaged in bank robbery more than seven times and also blew up more than 20 pipe bombs. The target of the pipe bombs was primarily government buildings, Safeway stores, electric power facilities and companies singled out to be racist. Come the year 1977; Newton cam...