Malcolm X and the Black Panthers

Some Legislation Civil Rights Act of 1964- Signed by Lyndon Johnson and effectively (legislatively) speaking, ends segregation. Voting Rights Act of 1965- As a result of the successful Selma campaign, Lyndon Johnson pushed this act through as well. It eliminated all the tricks that Southern states were using to stop African Americans from registering to vote.

But all in not well…. De facto Segregation- Not “organized” or “legal,” but just happens. This is pretty much the entire North. This is harder to get rid of than “de jure” segregation (segregation by law), because it is a social problem, not a legal problem.

Great Migration and White Flight. As thousands of African Americans flocked to Northern cities, thousands of whites fled the Northern cities to the suburbs. This is called “white flight.” By the 1960’s, lots of “inner-city” neighborhoods were mostly people of color, and mostly in decay. Schools were bad, unemployment was high, and they were policed by a mostly white police force.

MLK tries to change Chicago In 1966, MLK led 30,000 marchers in Chicago to protest the de facto segregation. Protesters threw rocks and a mini riot broke out. MLK ended up leaving, not making much of the progress he had planned.

Race Riots Throughout the country, even right after the Voting Act in 1965 was passed, race riots broke out as angry African Americans were protesting their low economic status. Most whites couldn’t understand why black Americans were so angry after they had won some many victories in the South and with new legislation.

This opens up the movement to a different, more violent voice. Malcolm X emerges around this time as a leader in the movement. He does not share the same outlook as MLK, mostly in regards to the issue of using nonviolence. Malcolm X had gone to jail when he was 20 (burglary) and converted to Islam, and specially began following the Nation of Islam, an organization made up of black Muslims. He was an energetic speaker who believed the teachings of Elijah Muhammed, specifically that whites were the cause of black suffering and that blacks should separate themselves from whites.

A pilgrimage changes his tune….. In 1964 he takes a pilgrimage to Mecca, and learns that Islam preaches the unity of all races, and he prayed alongside Muslims of all ethnicities, including white. He returns to America more softened in his rhetoric, and he breaks away from the Nation of Islam. This puts him in danger because members of the group were often told they would/should be members for life. On February 21, 1965, he was assassinated while giving a speech in Harlem. He was 39.

The Civil Rights Movement Splits James Meredith, the man who integrated the University of Mississippi, planned a march from the Tennessee border to Jackson, Mississippi, called the “walk against fear.” He was shot on the way, and unable to continue. Three different groups, the SCLC (MLK), CORE (Floyd McKssick), and SNCC (Stokely Carmichael), pick up where Meredith left off.

Division. It soon becomes clear that CORE and SNCC are much more “militant” than the SCLC, and that they were chanting slogans similar to those of the Nation of Islam. MLK (leader of SCLC) tries to calm them by getting his followers to sing “We shall overcome,” but the CORE and SNCC people sing “We shall overrun!”

Origins of “Black Power.” Carmichael gets arrested and beaten by police. He returns to the crowd, after his stint in jail, and fires up the crowd with these words… “This is the 27th time I have been arrested- and I ain’t going to jail no more….We’ve been saying freedom for six years- and we ain’t got nothin’! What we’re going to start saying is BLACK POWER!”

The Black Panthers are formed They form in 1966, in Oakland, California, led by Huey Newton and Bobby Seale. Their platform was to protest police brutality, and work for full employment for African Americans. They preached self-defense, and handed out communist literature. They established daycare centers, free breakfast programs, free medical clinics, and other services to help out black communities. They also had multiple shootouts with the police and were heavily surveillance by the FBI.