ALL POWER TO THE PEOPLE: Graphics of the Black Panther Party 1966 - 1974
ALL POWER TO THE PEOPLE: Graphics of the Black Panther Party 1966 - 1974
This exhibition was made possible by grants from Liberty Hill, Resist, the Ruth Mott Fund, and individual donors.
Table of Contents: I. Introduction II. A Call to Arms III. Serving the People: Domestic Programs IV. Intercommunication - Linking with Other Struggles V. War Against the Panthers VI. International Solidarity with the Panthers VII. The Struggle Continues
ALL POWER TO THE PEOPLE: Graphics of the Black Panther Party 1966 - 1974 "The community (was) the museum for our artwork. Some people saw art for the first time when they saw my posters. Some joined the party, some got inspired to make art too." Emory Douglas, Minister of Culture, Black Panther Party The Black Panther Party for Self Defense was founded by Huey Newton and Bobby Seale in Oakland, California in October 1966. From the beginning, they understood the importance and power of art for projecting their political goals and recruiting to their cause. Their name and logo—the Black Panther—came from graphics created by the Lowndes County (Alabama) Freedom Organization, an affiliate of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). As the panther would attack only after being attacked, it visually underscored the Party’s role to defend the black community from police harassment. While many artists contributed to the Black Panther Party, Emory Douglas, Minister of Culture stands out. His task was to visualize the Party’s ideology, and to use art to educate and provoke people to action.
Douglas’ drawings dominated the Panther newspaper and posters - the primary means for disseminating their ideas and images. The posters overwhelm us with images of armed combatants, martyrs of police brutality or political prisoners. From “Free Huey” to “Free Angela,” the posters resonate with rage at the system, and comradeship with each other. But the posters only tell part of the Panther story, ironically, the part that the U.S. government focuses upon - their militancy. The newspaper graphics provide a more complete view. The cover, back page, and occasionally the centerfold functioned as posters, using strong graphics to show the Panthers’ commitment and capacity to organize social programs. The Panthers started many innovative community programs, including free breakfast and
healthcare programs, legal assistance and "liberation schools.”These programs gave a popular legitimacy to the Panthers that was threatening to the Federal government. The government responded by creating its own breakfast, health and legal programs— programs that are currently being cut back or dismantled altogether. Selections from a large set of F.B.I. Counterintelligence Program (COINTELPRO) drawings and internal correspondence are included to show that graphics were also used by the government to create dissent within the Party and conflict between the Panthers and rival groups. This disinformation campaign too often resulted in the deaths of Panther members. “All Power to the People” was the Panthers’ central slogan. They were neither nationalists nor separatists. They consistently expressed solidarity with domestic and international struggles for sovereignty and selfdetermination - from the National Liberation Forces of Viet Nam, to the Mexico City students who were massacred in 1968, to the Native Americans at Wounded Knee. The Panthers worked in coalitions with the white left. They actively supported the United Farm Workers and the Chicano movement. In a published letter which is included in the exhibition,
Huey Newton called for unity with the Women’s Liberation and Gay Liberation Movements. The alliances forged by the Black Panther Party have too soon been forgotten. As the divisions in our own community are too frequently drawn along class, racial, and gender lines, the old “divide and conquer” mentality seems to be again winning the war for our hearts and minds. For all their internal contractions and problems—and they had many, the Black Panther Party challenged institutional racism and inequality. Their ideology was derived from Karl Marx, Malcolm X, Mao Tse-Tung, Ho Chi Minh and Frantz Fanon. Their art is part of a long activist and art historical tradition of protest graphics. The Panther graphics are raw and aggressive. Their damning critique of capitalism and imperialism is as relevant today as it was four decades ago. These graphics provide a critical tool for those who would write a more complete history of this period, its issues and its art. They remind us that our actions can and must make a difference. Carol A. Wells Executive Director
I. Introduction
1. All Power to the People Emory Douglas Offset, 1969 Oakland, California 3142
I. Introduction
All Power to the People was the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense’s motto and slogan. It symbolized their basic belief that every community has the right to determine its own destiny through the control of its institutions, determining its own laws, governing its own land, and creating its own cultural values. As Marxists/Maoists, they wanted an end to imperialism, a fairer distribution of the world’s wealth, and political representation in decision making worldwide. This concept is represented in the Party’s Ten Point Platform and Program [#6].
All Power to the People is an inclusive slogan, in contrast to the demand for Black Power associated with black nationalist groups such as the Nation of Islam and the Los Angeles based US organization. As the Panthers became more focused on socialism without racial exclusivity, they condemned black nationalism as “black racism.”
All Power to the People
2. All Power to the People Anonymous Silkscreen, circa 1969 United States 3188
This highly stylized fist was designed by Northern California graphic artist Frank Cieciorka in 1968. It was appropriated by many groups, including the Black Panthers and the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS). It even appeared in a 2006 poster from Oaxaca, Mexico.
I. Introduction
3. Power to the People Dharulla Committee to Defend the Panther 21 Offset, 1970 New York, New York 3187
New York 21—In April 1969, 21 members of the New York Black Panther Party were arrested on charges of conspiracy and possession of illegal weapons. They were accused of plotting to bomb department stores, botanical gardens, and a police station in New York. Many of the New York 21 were central to the Harlem Breakfast Program. In April, 1970, the offices housing the lawyers for the defense of the New York 21, and the Black Panther Party Defense Committee to Free the New York 21 was almost completely destroyed by fire. Police sabotage was suspected. The New York 21 were eventually found innocent of the charges. All Power to the People
4. Huey Newton in Peacock Chair Black Panther Party for Self Defense Offset, 1967 Oakland, California 3194
I. Introduction
Huey Newton (1942-1989) was born in Louisiana, but raised in Oakland, California. He attended Merritt College in Oakland, where he earned an associate in arts degree and was active in the AfroAmerican Association. With Bobby Seale, whom he met as a college student, he founded the Black Panther Party in Oakland in 1966. They were joined by Eldridge Cleaver the next year. In 1967, Newton was charged with the murder of an Oakland policeman. After a spectacular trial with many thousands of demonstrators, he was convicted of voluntary manslaughter and sentenced from two to fifteen years in prison. His conviction was reversed by the California Court of Appeals in 1970, and this reversal
was affirmed by the state Supreme Court. Newton was subsequently released from prison, and two new trials ended in hung juries. Newton later fled the country but returned voluntarily, surrendering to law enforcement officials in July 1977. Newton became an international symbol of organized resistance at the same time he struggled with legal problems and personal demons. He was also a legal scholar who earned a Ph.D. in social philosophy at the University of California, Santa Cruz in 1980, and authored several books, including To Die for the People (1970) and Revolutionary Suicide (1973). In 1989, Newton was gunned down in Oakland during a drug-related incident. All Power to the People
5. Move on Over or We'll Move on Over You Artist Unknown Offset, 1967 United States 3157
I. Introduction
Origin of the Black Panther Logo— Lowndes County, Alabama was well known during the 1950s and 1960s for its virulent racism and repression of black residents. 12,000 of its 15,000 residents were African American, more than half lived below the poverty line, and at the beginning of 1965, none were registered to vote. That year, the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) began a voter registration campaign to politically empower the black residents. They joined with John Hulett, the first Black resident of Lowndes County to vote, and turned his church-based Lowndes County Christian Movement for Human Rights into the secular Lowndes County
Freedom Organization in January of 1966. The organization urged community members to seize political power by voting, and the symbol on their ballot was the black panther, an indigenous American animal that defends itself when attacked. This image later became the symbol and the name for the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense founded in Oakland in 1966.
All Power to the People
6. 17 October 1966 Black Panther Party Platform and Program Black Panther Newspaper Offset, March 9, 1969 Oakland, California 3195
I. Introduction
7. Move on Over or We'll Move on Over You Artist Unknown Offset, 1967 United States 3157
All Power to the People
II. A Call to Arms
8. We Shall Overcome...We Shall Overthrow... Boris Black Panther Newspaper cartoon Photographic enlargement, 1969 Oakland, California 3147
II. A Call to Arms
9. Warning to America Emory Douglas Black Panther Party - Ministry of Information Offset, 1970 Oakland, California 3193
All Power to the People
10. Pigs Photo: Alan Copeland Offset, no date Berkeley, California 3182
The word “PIGS”, referred to the police specifically, and “people in government service.” This epithet was promoted by the Panthers and in the art of Emory Douglas, and was quickly picked up by the broader anti-war and countercultural movement.
"You don't fight racism with racism, the best way to fight racism is with solidarity." Bobby Seale II. A Call to Arms
Bobby Seale was co-founder and Chairman of the Black Panther Party. Born in Dallas, Texas in 1936, his family later moved to Oakland, California. He met Huey Newton in 1962. In October 1966, they formed the Black Panther Party for Self Defense to create a political base that could challenge the racist and capitalist U.S. system. They believed that if the police had guns, so should the people. In May 1967, Seale led a group of 30 armed Panthers into the California State Assembly protesting proposed gun control legislation. This event exploded the Black Panther Party onto the national and international stage of events. In 1968, Seale was arrested on conspiracy charges, although his participation in the Chicago demonstrations was limited to two uneventful speeches during a stay of only 24 hours.
He was briefly part of the Chicago Eight who were charged with conspiracy, inciting to riot, and other charges related to protests that took place in Chicago, Illinois during the 1968 Democratic National Convention. When Seale was tried separately from the other defendants, they became known as the Chicago Seven. The image of Seale bound and gagged during his trial was broadcast internationally, and graphically illustrated the Panthers’ accusations of racism in the criminal justice system. He was convicted of contempt and sentenced to four years in prison. In prison, he wrote Seize the Time, for which he received the Martin Luther King Memorial Prize in 1971. After leaving the Party, Seale moved to Philadelphia, where he currently teaches black studies at Temple University. All Power to the People
11. All the Weapons We Used Against Each Other... Emory Douglas Black Panther Party - Ministry of Information Offset, 1970 Oakland, California 3192 II. A Call to Arms
12. Revolutionary People's Constitutional Convention Artist unknown Offset, 1970 Oakland, California 3191
13. Fascism The Power of Finance Capital Black Panther Newspaper Offset, June 21, 1969 Oakland, California 3248
14. National Conference for a United Front Against Fascism Photographer unknown Black Panther Party National Headquarters Offset, 1969 Oakland, California 3190 All Power to the People
15. Black Studies Emory Douglas Offset, circa 1969 Oakland, California 24829
II. A Call to Arms
16. An Unarmed People are Slaves Tim Lambert Silkscreen, circa 1969 New York, New York 3184
All Power to the People
17. Revolutionary Woman Emory Douglas Offset, circa 1969 Oakland, California 290
II. A Call to Arms
18. The Ideas Which Can And Will Sustain Our Movement Emory Douglas Offset, 1970 Oakland, California 28440
All Power to the People
III. Serving the People: Domestic Programs
18. To Feed Our Children Black Panther Newspaper Offset, April 27, 1969 Oakland, California 3214
III. Serving the People: Domestic Programs
Free Breakfast For Children Program - The Party began the Free Breakfast for Children Program in November of 1968, partially to counter the violent image that was frequently presented to the public. Panthers asked small businesses, mainly in the black communities, to donate food and money for the program. They also persuaded people in the community to donate their time to work in, and eventually run, the programs. The Program originated in an Oakland church, and by April of 1969, there were Breakfast Programs in at least 10 chapters and branches of the Party, with plans to include the program in every chapter and branch of the Party across the country. Within a couple of years they were feeding a hot meal of eggs, hash browns, bacon and hot chocolate, and sometimes pancakes and French toast, to over 10,000 school children in the morning before they went to school. There was frequently so much food left over that the program directors had to eat it and take it door-to-door to
neighbors. The Breakfast Program, which the Panthers regarded as a survival program, created a very positive image for the Panthers worldwide, as well as bringing in new Party recruits. The impact of this program was so strong that the Federal government set up a comparable breakfast program for public schools across the country. Another program the Panthers initiated was the Liberation schools. These schools were held in the afternoons, along with free lunches, in churches and community centers. They were created to counter the regular school programs, which the Panthers felt taught racism to children. They placed an emphasis on the revolutionary struggle as being a class struggle, rather than a race struggle. They also taught Black American History in terms of class rather than race, and they taught that businessmen and the ruling classes exploit and perpetuate racism. All Power to the People
19. Community Day Care Malik Black Panther Newspaper Offset, March 10, 1973 Oakland, California 27207
III. Serving the People: Domestic Programs
20. Thanks to the People’s Free Store Emory Douglas Offset, 1971 Oakland, California 27140
All Power to the People
21. 10,000 Free Bags of Groceries Emory Douglas Black Panther Newspaper Offset, March 25, 1972 Oakland, California 3197
III. Serving the People: Domestic Programs
22. Fight Sickle Cell Anemia Emory Douglas Offset, early 1970's Oakland, California 3199
Sickle Cell Testing - Sickle-cell anemia, a genetic disorder mainly affecting AfricanAmericans, was widely publicized as an issue in the Black Panther newspaper. They drew nationwide attention to the disorder, which had previously received little concern and almost no money. The Panthers also established nine free testing clinics for sickle cell anemia, with the help of a community doctor. As a result of the publicity surrounding the Panther testing program, Richard Nixon mentioned the disorder in his health message to Congress in 1972. All Power to the People
23. People's Free Health Center Black Panther Newspaper Reproduction of offset, June 13, 1970 Oakland, California 3200
In 1969, Bobby Seale issued a directive to institute free health clinics. The first was opened in August 1969 by the Kansas City, Missouri branch of the Black Panther Party. Free Health Clinics by Party branches in Brooklyn, New York, Boston, Cleveland, Philadelphia, Seattle, Chicago and Rockford, Illinois, soon followed, offering a variety of services which included first aid care, physical examinations, prenatal care, and testing for lead poisoning, high blood pressure, and sickle cell anemia. III. Serving the People: Domestic Programs
24. Sterilization - Another Part of the Plan of Black Genocide Black Panther Newspaper Offset, May 8, 1971 Oakland, California 3256
All Power to the People
IV. Intercommunication: Linking With Other Struggles
25. U.S. Imperialism Emory Douglas Black Panther Newspaper Reproduction of offset, January 3, 1970 Oakland, California 3216
IV. Intercommunication: Linking with Other Struggles
26. To Break the Bonds of Fascism We Must Develop a United Front Black Panther Newspaper Offset, June 7, 1969 Oakland, California 3207
All Power to the People
27. Boycott Lettuce Emory Douglas Black Panther Newspaper Offset, September 23, 1972 Oakland, California 2610
IV. Intercommunication: Linking with Other Struggles
The Black Panther Party was very supportive of César Chávez and the United Farm Workers’ (UFW) movement. The UFW boycott of grapes, lettuce, Gallo wine, Safeway markets, etc. was extensively promoted in the Panther newspaper, and they helped publicize agricultural pesticide dangers for farm workers and consumers. In July 1973, the Panthers launched a major boycott against six Oakland Safeway supermarkets. In addition to publishing many articles on the UFW and the boycott, The Black Panther newspaper frequently carried a UFW fundraising coupon to send support directly to the
UFW. The Party supported the Chicano movement in many ways, such as funding the publication of the Chicano newspaper, Basta Ya!, and defending Chicano political prisoners, including Los Siete (The Latino Seven).
All Power to the People
28. Free the Latino Seven Emory Douglas Black Panther Newspaper Reproduction of offset, January 28, 1969 3224
IV. Intercommunication: Linking with Other Struggles
Los Siete de la Raza was the label given to seven young Latinos who were approached by two plainclothes policemen while moving a stereo or TV into a house in the Mission District of San Francisco, California, on May 1, 1969 at around 10:30 a.m. Most of the seven were community activists. The ensuing altercation resulted in one officer dead from a gunshot wound. After a trial that lasted a year and a half, the seven defendants were acquitted. This mass arrest and trial became a seminal event in the awakening of consciousness for Latinos in the San Francisco area.
The Los Siete Defense Committee raised support for the seven youths and was assisted by the Black Panther Party who helped solicit funds for Los Siete’s legal defense and co-published Basta Ya! (Enough!), the newspaper for Los Siete. The Panther newspaper had a national distribution and contributed postage and printing for Basta Ya! The back cover of The Panther was the upside down front cover of Basta Ya! thus both papers were contained within a single tabloid. Because Los Siete were not nationalists, had no money and were associated with the Panthers, a lot of older Latino organizations wouldn’t support them. All Power to the People
29. Basta Ya! Masthead designed by Yolanda Lopez Black Panther Newspaper Offset, 1969 Oakland, California 2615
IV. Intercommunication: Linking with Other Struggles
30. There Can Never Be Peace... Emory Douglas Black Panther Newspaper Offset, May 25, 1969 Oakland, California 3225
All Power to the People
31. A Letter from Huey to the Revolutionary Brothers and Sisters about the Women's Liberation Movements Black Panther Newspaper Reproduction of offset, August 21, 1970 Oakland, California 3209
IV. Intercommunication: Linking with Other Struggles
32. Cleaver for President D.W. Atkins Peace & Freedom Party Offset, 1968 California 3213
The Peace & Freedom Party was founded in 1968 by dissident liberals and leftists opposed to the Viet Nam war which was started, escalated and endorsed by the Democratic Party under Presidents Kennedy and Johnson, and endorsed by Hubert Humphrey, the 1968 Democratic Party candidate for President.
All Power to the People
Eldridge Cleaver (1935-1998)—Born in Arkansas, Cleaver moved to the Watts area of Los Angeles as a young boy. He was in and out of reform school, eventually ending up in prison, where he earned a high school diploma. During his time at San Quentin and Folsom prisons, he became a Muslim. In 1964, he sided with Malcolm X in the split with Black Muslim founder Elijah Muhammed, and moderated his views on white people. He also wrote Notes on a Native Son which was published in the San Francisco radical magazine, Ramparts. Due to the recognition he received from his writings, he was paroled in 1966. After his release, he worked at Ramparts until 1968. In 1970, he won the Martin Luther King Memorial IV. Intercommunication: Linking with Other Struggles
Prize for the autobiography Soul on Ice which sold 2 million copies. In 1967 Cleaver met Huey Newton and Bobby Seale and was soon named Minister of Information for the Black Panther Party, a position he kept until 1971. In 1967 he also met and married Kathleen Neal (they divorced in 1987). In 1968, during a gun-battle with the police, Cleaver and three other Panthers were wounded, and Panther treasurer Bobby Hutton was killed (see poster #37). Cleaver’s parole was rescinded, and he was charged with assault and attempted murder. Free on bail he ran for president representing the predominantly white Peace and Freedom Party, using his
campaign to call on black and white radicals to work together to end racial and class repression. Having exhausted all appeals on the revocation of his parole and due to be returned to prison, Cleaver fled to Cuba in November 1968. The following year he was in Algeria, where he set up the international section of the Black Panthers, which became independent from Newton’s party after the two disagreed and Newton expelled Cleaver in February 1971. In 1975, having converted to Christianity, Cleaver returned to the United States, where he worked out a plea bargain under which he was sentenced to only twelve hundred hours
of community service. In the 1970s, he started a clothing boutique in Hollywood and an evangelical organization in Nevada. In the 1980s, he became a Mormon and ran for national office as a conservative Republican. In the late 1980s he became addicted to crack cocaine, and in 1992 was convicted of cocaine possession and burglary. In 1994, after nearly dying in a cocainerelated assault, he began recovery from his addiction. Cleaver became involved in using healthy nutrition to counteract drug addictions. He died of prostate cancer in Pomona, California, in 1998, at age 62. All Power to the People
33. Children of Zapata Emory Douglas Black Panther Newspaper Offset, March 9, 1969 Oakland, California 3254
IV. Intercommunication: Linking with Other Struggles
Mexico City 1968 - Sparked by a series of brutal police interventions, the Plaza of the Three Cultures in Mexico City had been the scene of violent clashes between students and police throughout the summer of 1968. Student demands included investigation of government abuses, release of all political prisoners, abolition of the special riot police, an end to the military occupation of all schools, and government compensation for students killed and wounded in conflicts with the police and army. The government was concerned over growing worker and peasant support for the students, and felt pressured to end the protests before the Olympic Games were slated to begin on October 12. On October 2, about 6,000 people
gathered for a demonstration at the Plaza, in an area called Tlatelolco. After listening to a series of speeches for an hour, the plaza was suddenly surrounded by 10,000 soldiers armed with highcaliber weapons and expansion bullets. Before the demonstrators could react, the soldiers fired their rifles and machine guns into the crowd. Machine guns strafed the speakers' platform as students were counseling the crowd to leave quickly and quietly. In addition to the student leaders and a number of journalists, the casualties included disproportionate numbers of children and old people who had been unable to flee the plaza. As many as 2,000 people were killed. All Power to the People
34. In the Spirit of Revolutionary Solidarity Emory Douglas Black Panther Newspaper Offset, January 9, 1971 Oakland, California 27129
On August 29, 1970, Huey Newton, Minister of Defense of the Black Panther Party, offered troops to South Viet Nam to aid in their liberation struggle against the United States. He saw American imperialism as the common enemy of both the Vietnamese people and African Americans, and felt that an alliance between the two groups was necessary and important to the Panthers’ ideal of revolutionary internationalism. IV. Intercommunication: Linking with Other Struggles
35. We Want Full Employment for Our People Emory Douglas Reproduction of offset, October 3, 1970 Oakland, California 3204
All Power to the People
V. War Against the Panthers
36. You Can Kill a Revolutionary But You Can’t Kill a Revolution* Emory Douglas Black Panther Newspaper Offset, January 16, 1971 Oakland, California 27126 V. War Against the Panthers
36. The Invincible Thoughts... Martyrs 1968-69 Emory Douglas Black Panther Newspaper Offset, 1969 Oakland, California 3218 * from a speech by Fred Hampton, see poster #42
At 16, Bobby Hutton, was the first person to be recruited into the Party when it was launched October 15, 1966. He had known Panther leader Bobby Seale, who had been his advisor in an antipoverty program. He was appointed treasurer of the Party. The night of April 6, 1968, Hutton was with a group of Panthers, including Eldridge Cleaver, transporting arms from a Panther’s apartment to another location, when police officers began firing at them. Hutton and Cleaver fled into the basement of a nearby home, and officers began to rain gunfire and tear gas into the place. A fire started, and the two were forced to leave their hideout. Cleaver stripped completely
naked before coming outside with his hands in the air; Hutton was too shy to do the same. While walking toward a police car, Hutton stumbled and was shot five rounds in the back at point blank range, because police claimed he was reaching for a gun. Hutton was unarmed. The murder took place three days after Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated. At age 17, “Little” Bobby Hutton was the first member of the Panthers to be killed.
All Power to the People
COINTELPRO Domestic Counter Intelligence Programs (COINTELPROs) were covert operations designed to infiltrate, destabilize, and destroy organizations that law enforcement and government officials deemed as threats to national security. In the 1940s and 1950s, COINTELPROs were directed almost exclusively at the Socialist Workers Party and the Communist Party, USA. During the late 1960s the vast majority of COINTELPRO operations were directed against black organizations, for the purpose of causing internal dissent and conflicts with other V. War Against the Panthers
black organizations. The special publications COINTELPRO division labeled “Black Propaganda” included fabricated publications designed to give organizations a bad public image, fabricated cartoons and letters to foster tensions between groups, infiltration by informers, false rumors, fabricated evidence, and police assaults. In August 1967, the FBI launched a COINTELPRO operation against the Panthers which contributed to the Panther's siege mentality.
COINTELPROs were responsible for the death of Panther Fred Hampton (poster #42), and they exacerbated the conflict between the Panthers and the black nationalist US organization. US was a Los Angeles-based cultural nationalist organization founded and led by Ron Karenga. The organization had frequent confrontations with the Black Panther Party due to differing ideologies: members of US were cultural nationalists, focusing on racial oppression, while the Panthers described themselves as revolutionary internationalists, focusing on class oppression and struggle. Tensions between the two groups
escalated in late 1968, as they struggled for control of two important positions on the campus of the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). The tension culminated in a shootout on the UCLA campus January 17, 1969, in which US members murdered Panthers John Huggins and Bunchy Carter. Three US members were convicted in 1971 for the killings, however, the actual gunmen still remain at large. Ron Karenga, the US leader, maintained close contact with prominent police figures and politicians, and US was used by the FBI as part of their COINTELPRO operations.
All Power to the People
38. COINTELPRO cartoon, Ron Karenga, "Things to do today" Federal Bureau of Investigation Photocopy, 1969 3242
V. War Against the Panthers
39. COINTELPRO letter 2-27-69 Federal Bureau of Investigation Photocopy, 1969 3244
40. COINTELPRO letter 4-10-69 Federal Bureau of Investigation Photocopy, 1969 3245 All Power to the People
41. COINTELPRO cartoon, Ron Karenga, "Now, Geronimo..." Federal Bureau of Investigation Photocopy, 1969 3243
“Geronimo” refers to Geronimo Pratt, a Los Angeles Panther (see poster #50).
V. War Against the Panthers
In April 1969, hundreds of Panthers were meeting on the second floor of the Panther's Southern California chapter's headquarters at 4115 S. Central Avenue in Los Angeles. Hundreds of Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) officers from the Newton Street Division surrounded the building. The chapter's leader at the time, Geronimo Pratt, had been in Viet Nam and had previously sandbagged the building, armed and organized the Panthers to defend themselves, in preparation for such a raid. Pratt turned off the lights and Panthers Joan Kelley and Elaine Brown contacted the news media, ultimately prompting the LAPD to withdraw. This tactical victory over the LAPD made Pratt a special target to be “neutralized,” and gives insight into this
FBI cartoon intending to foment tensions between Ron Karenga of US and Pratt (see poster #41). Huey Newton, Bobby Seale, and their supporters within the party rejected cultural nationalists such as Ron Karenga’s US organization, as "black racists", and dubbed their brand of cultural nationalism as narrow and bourgeois "pork-chop nationalism". Alluding to the US Organization, Black Panther Fred Hampton said, "Political power does not flow from the sleeve of a dashiki; political power flows from the barrel of a gun." ("Political power flows from the barrel of a gun" is an early quote by Mao Zedong.) All Power to the People
42. Fred Hampton - We, the People Artist Unknown Offset, 1970 United States 3221
V. War Against the Panthers
Fred Hampton (1948 -1969)—Born in Illinois, Hampton was a student leader in high school and an activist with the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). In 1968, he joined the Chicago chapter of the Black Panther Party, and quickly became the Illinois State Chair of the organization. Hampton organized weekly rallies, taught political education classes, attended the Breakfast for Children program daily, and helped establish the Free People’s Clinic on Chicago’s West Side.
A powerful and eloquent speaker, he was set to be appointed the Party’s Central Committee as Chief of Staff in November 1970. Fearing Hampton’s ability to spread the Panther’s message, the FBI, through an informant, obtained a floorplan of his apartment. The same informant gave Hampton a drugged hot chocolate before he went to bed on December 3 to ensure he wouldn’t wake up. At 4:30 a.m. on December 3, 1969, the FBI raided the apartment, killing Hampton and Panther Mark Clark, and wounding several others. This poster merges the assassination of Fred Hampton with images of the My Lai Massacre. On March 16th, 1968, U.S. troops arrived in the village of My Lai in the northern province of South Viet Nam. The soldiers opened fire even though
they had not come under attack. The violence quickly escalated into an orgy of killing. More than 500 villagers were murdered, most of them women, children and the elderly. The massacre was kept secret from the U.S. public for over a year, until investigative journalist Seymour Hersh broke the story about the massacre and its cover-up on November 12th, 1969. When the massacre was uncovered, it proved to be a turning point for American public opinion about the war. Hersh was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for his expose. Forty years later, Hersh is still breaking stories about war. In 2004, he exposed the Abu Ghraib scandal in The New Yorker magazine, also a turning point for U.S. public opinion about the current war. All Power to the People
43. In Memory of Alprentice "Bunchy" Carter Black Panther Party Offset, 1969 Los Angeles, California 3220
V. War Against the Panthers
Alprentice “Bunchy” Carter, a former leader of the powerful Los Angeles street gang The Slausons, was introduced to the Black Panther Party by Eldridge Cleaver, a friend and mentor he met while in prison. On joining the L.A. chapter of the Party, he was assigned Deputy Minister of Defense. A Muslim and a poet, Bunchy was known among the Panthers for a sense of style and individuality. At the time, there were conflicts over the control of prominent positions for African Americans in Los Angeles, among them the leadership of the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) Black Student Union and a job in the University’s Black Studies program. Ron Karenga, head of the US organization,
wanted to become head of the BSU and to appoint one of his affiliates to the Black Studies program, but students opposed his involvement. Bunchy Carter and another Panther, John Huggins, attended meetings at UCLA surrounding the debate. When the leadership of the organization became vacant, the two gained popularity with the students by urging them to choose their own leader, rather than letting the controlling nationalist group, US, do the choosing. The tension between US and the Panthers culminated in Huggins and Carter being murdered at UCLA on January 17, 1969, by members of US. (See poster #38) All Power to the People
POLITICAL PRISONERS
V. War Against the Panthers
43. Political Prisoners of USA Fascism Emory Douglas Black Panther Party Offset, ca 1969 San Francisco, California 3229
All Power to the People
45. Revolutionary Intercommunal Day of Solidarity Emory Douglas Offset, 1971 Oakland, California 4296
Poster combines a Grateful Dead Concert with a political rally and fundraiser for the Panthers.
V. War Against the Panthers
Kathleen Neal Cleaver was born May 13, 1945 in Dallas, Texas. She joined the Student Nonviolent Coordinator Committee (SNCC) in New York in 1966, and moved to the organization's headquarters in Atlanta in January 1967. She became SNCC's campus program secretary. While organizing a Black Students Conference in Nashville in Spring1967, she met Eldridge Cleaver.Kathleen Cleaver was the first woman to be accepted on the Central Committee of the Black Panther Party.She spoke throughout the country on issues concerning the Party, including the "Free Huey” campaign which she helped organize in 1968. Also in 1968, she campaigned, unsuccessfully, for the
state Assembly in the California Bay Area on the Peace and Freedom Party ticket.When Eldridge Cleaver fled the country from a federal warrant for his arrest in 1968, she joined him in exile in Algeria the following year. In Algeria they established the International branch of the Black Panther Party. She gave birth to two children while in exile—one in Algeria, the other in North Korea. When the International branch of the Black Panther Party was expelled from the Party in 1971, the Cleavers formed the Revolutionary People's Committee Network. Kathleen returned from exile in 1975 and divorced Eldridge Cleaver in 1987. She graduated from Yale Law School, and now lives and teaches law in Atlanta, GA. All Power to the People
46. Free the Soledad Brothers Photo: Ruth-Marion Baruch Soledad Brothers Defense Committee Offset, ca 1972 Berkeley, California 3228
The Soledad Brothers were three inmates at San Quentin State Prison charged with the murder of guard John V. Mills in 1970. George Jackson, Fleeta Drumgo and John Clutchette were said to have murdered Mills in retaliation for the killing of three black prisoners by a guard, O.G. Miller, at Soledad prison in California. (See poster #54) Activist and author Angela Davis took up the cause of the Soledad Brothers after reading about the case in February 1970, and became the chair of their defense committee. Davis said: "The situation in Soledad is part of a continuous pattern in the Black community. Three Black men who were unarmed, who were not trying to escape, are killed, and this is called justifiable homicide...One white guard is killed, and this is immediately called murder." V. War Against the Panthers
47. Free Huey Day Black Panther Party Offset, 1969 San Francisco, California 3231
All Power to the People
48. Eldridge Cleaver Welcome Here International Committee for Cleaver's Defense Offset, 1968 Oakland, California 3237
V. War Against the Panthers
49. Kidnapped Bobby Seale Emory Douglas Bobby Seale Defense Fund Offset, 1969 Oakland, California 3238
All Power to the People
50. Free Geronimo Pratt New Afrikan People's Organization Committee to Free Geronimo Pratt/ Fireworks Graphics Reproduction of offset, Offset, 1987 Los Angeles, California 3261
V. War Against the Panthers
GERONIMO JI JAGA — Born 1945 and raised in Louisiana, Geronimo ji Jaga (born Elmer Pratt) was a decorated paratrooper in the Viet Nam War. After hearing about the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr., Pratt became disillusioned about the country he had been fighting for and left the service during his second tour of duty. He soon enrolled at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) where he was recruited into the Black Panthers by Bunchy Carter and became Deputy Minister of Defense. Following the 1969 assassination on the UCLA campus of Carter and John Huggins, Pratt became head of the Los Angeles Black Panther Party chapter. Because his military
background allowed him to provide valuable self-defense training for the Panthers, the FBI program COINTELPRO targeted Pratt for neutralization. In 1970, he became one of many Panthers expelled from the party by Huey Newton, in the Newton-Cleaver split. In December 1970, Pratt was arrested and charged with the 1968 robbery and murder of a Santa Monica woman. Convincing evidence existed that Pratt was attending meetings of the Black Panther Party in Oakland, and was nowhere near the scene of the crime. But Newton-faction Panthers who could have testified that Pratt was in Oakland at the time of the murder never came All Power to the People
forward.The FBI withheld 7,000 pages of documents pertaining to his case, and the key witness placing him at the scene of the crime was a paid FBI informant. Since the trial, a number of witnesses, including former F.B.I agent M. Wesley Swearingen, have stated that Pratt was in Oakland the day of the shooting. In 1981, Amnesty International acknowledged that Geronimo was a victim of official government repression. In 1988, Amnesty International asked the Governor of California, George Deukmejian, to order an inquiry into his case. The Governor declined. Pratt was denied parole for the 13th time in August 1994. In May 1997, Judge Everett W. Dickey of Orange County Superior Court, appointed by V. War Against the Panthers
Ronald Reagan, threw out the conviction on the grounds that the key government witness was a police informant. In 1999, Los Angeles County district attorney's office said they would not seek a retrial. Pratt continues to work on behalf of men and women who are believed to be wrongfully incarcerated. He has participated in rallies in support of Mumia Abu-Jamal, whom he had met when both were active as Black Panthers (see poster #58).
All Power to the People
VI. International Solidarity with the Panthers
Many countries including Cuba, France, Germany, Great Britain, Netherlands, and the Soviet Union, produced posters in solidarity with the Black Panther Party, Angela Davis, and other U.S. political prisoners.
VI. International Solidarity with the Panthers
51. Angela Davis Vrij! Artist Unknown Offset, early 1970s Netherlands 3252
"I am charged with three capital offenses ‑murder, kidnapping and conspiracy. My life is at stake in this case ‑ not simply the life of a lone individual, but a life which has been given over to the struggles of my people, a life which belongs to Black people who are tired of poverty, and racism, of the unjust imprisonment of tens of thousands of our brothers and sisters." - Angela Davis All Power to the People
Born in 1944, Angela Davis was raised in Birmingham, Alabama. She graduated magna cum laude from Brandeis University and pursued graduate studies at the Goethe Institute in Frankfurt and the University of California, San Diego. Davis was a member of the UCLA Philosophy Department 1969/70. The day her appointment began (July 1, 1969) the student newspaper published an article provided by an FBI undercover agent, informing the community that the Philosophy Department had hired a Communist. The Regents of the University of California immediately and illegally attempted to fire her. They were unsuccessful. Her teaching, despite the VI. International Solidarity with the Panthers
pressures on her, was impressive, and the Philosophy Department requested that Davis be reappointed for the 197071 academic year. The issue of a reappointment, however, became moot.In 1970, Davis was charged with planning a prison revolt by three black prisoners and accused of supplying the gun that killed four people on August 7, 1970 at the Marin County Courthouse. In one of the most famous trials in U.S. history, Davis was charged with murder, kidnapping and conspiracy. In 1972, after 16 months in jail, she was tried and acquitted of the charges. Davis is an internationally regarded writer, scholar, lecturer, and fighter for
for human rights. She was a member of the Communist Party, U.S.A. from 1968 to 1990, and ran in 1980 and 1984 as their vice presidential candidate. She is a founder and co‑chair of the National Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression and is a founding member of the Committees of Correspondence. Davis also serves on the national board of directors of the National Political Congress of Black Women and on the board of the National Black Women's Health Project. She lives in California, where she teaches philosophy, aesthetics and women's studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz, San Francisco State University, and the San Francisco Art Institute.
Her books include If They Come in the Morning, 1971; Angela Davis: With My Mind of Freedom, an Autobiography (1974); Women, Race and Class, 1981; Women, Culture and Politics, 1984; Are Prisons Obsolete?, 2003; Arbitrary Justice: The Power of the American Prosecutor, 2007.
All Power to the People
52. Stop Moord op Black Panthers Nederlandse Black Panther Solidariteitscomite Dutch Black Panther Solidarity Committee Offset, early 1970s Netherlands 3257
VI. International Solidarity with the Panthers
April 24 Black Panther Day
Stop Murdering Black Panthers Bobby Seale, chairman of the Black Panther Party risks being sentenced to death. He is in imminent danger of becoming another victim of the systematic campaign of the American capitalist government to exterminate all members of the Black Panther Party who fight for their freedom. This must not happen...
The coming trial against Bobby Seale and other Black Panthers is organized by the American judiciary to sentence him to the electric chair. In a previous trial Bobby Seale was bound and gagged because he spoke up for his own rights. Protest against this fascist ‘justice’.
Bobby Seale must be set free Meeting in the Church Mozes & Aron (Waterloo Square). With films and speakers. April 24 20.00. Demonstration after meeting. The meeting is organized by the Netherlands’ Black Panther Solidarity Committee, Red Youth, Cineclub in Freedom School. Tel 223661 or 02150-14750
All Power to the People
53. Black Power Retaliation to Crime: Revolutionary Organization in Solidarity with the People of Asia, Africa and Latin America (OSPAAAL) Offset, c 1970 Havana, Cuba 179
In the late 1960s, early 1970s, the Havana, Cuba based Organization in Solidarity with the People of Asia, Africa and Latin America (OSPAAAL), produced at least 6 posters in solidarity with African Americans, including Angela Davis, George Jackson (poster #54) and the Black Panther Party. Although this poster uses the image of the black panther, the primary Black Panther slogan was “Power to the People”, rather than “Black Power” which was the slogan of the nationalist separatist groups. VI. International Solidarity with the Panthers
50. Power to the People George [Jackson] Organization in Solidarity with the People of Asia, Africa and Latin America (OSPAAAL) Offset, 2000 reprint of 1971 original Havana, Cuba 3258
All Power to the People
"Through the Black Panther Party and the writings of George Jackson, blacks in prison had come to see themselves not as criminals but as men, men whose potential was to form the backbone of an army to free our people. Black prisoners had begun building prison chapters of the party. They had begun pledging themselves to our struggle. The hero of all of them, the standard-bearer of that prisoner movement, was George Jackson. Breathing political fire into the hearts of thousands of angry black inmates across America, he was the Dragon of Ho Chi Minh. He was the field marshal of an army still in formation.George Jackson was Huey's hero.." - Elaine Brown, Taste Of Power
VI. International Solidarity with the Panthers
George Jackson was born in 1941 in Chicago, Illinois. He entered prison at age 15 to serve a sentence of one year to life for stealing $70 from a gas station. Repeatedly denied parole, Jackson found hope and a certain freedom in his writings. His works include the Prison Letters of George Jackson, Soledad Brother and Blood in My Eye. When Nolen Jackson, George's mentor, was murdered by a prison guard who was later found innocent of the charge, inmates retaliated by beating to death another guard. Known as the Soledad Brothers, Jackson along with two others, John Cluchette and Fleeta Drumgo, were found guilty of the murder (see poster #46).This rebellion started the prison
protests against arbitrary killings and beatings of African American inmates. Jackson was transferred to San Quentin, a maximum security facility. He spent the last eleven years of his life in prison and seven of those years in solitary confinement. He was appointed field marshal for the Black Panther Party and dedicated himself to the political struggle in order to escape the gas chamber. In August 1970, Jackson's younger brother Jonathan orchestrated an armed attack on the Marin County court house in Northern California, with the intent of taking hostages for the exchange of his brother George and the other Soledad Brothers. The authorities learned of the
plan and Jonathan, two prisoners, and the judge were killed in the court house battle. A police infiltrator was later revealed to have inspired the attack. Angela Davis was accused of being one of the key co-conspirators in the kidnapping attempt. In 1971, George Jackson was killed while lying wounded in a prison yard. He was allegedly attempting escape following a violent fight with guards. In 1988, trial testimony disclosed a setup by the police to silence Jackson, a revolutionary author and speaker.
All Power to the People
VII. The Struggle Continues
VI. The Struggle Continues
54. They Bled Your Mama Emory Douglas Black Panther Newspaper Offset, 1971 Oakland, California 28436
All Power to the People
55. Why Must Black People Look at Each Other Through Prison Bars? Emory Douglas Black Panther Newspaper Offset, 1971 Oakland, California 3249
VI. The Struggle Continues
The United States has the largest prison population in the world—over two million inmates. In California alone, 32 prisons house over 180,000 men and women at an annual cost of $6 billion. Since the 1970s, when Emory Douglas created this graphic, the rate of most serious crimes has dropped or remained stagnant, yet prisons have been filled at double capacity. People of color, the poor, the illiterate, the mentally ill, youth, and women are the primary occupants. The Washington, DC based Sentencing Project concluded that one in three black men and one in ten Latino men between the ages of twenty and twenty-nine will spend time in prison or jail. The same study showed that the population of of black women in prison increased seventy-eight percent in five years.
The majority of those entering prison for the first time are convicted on non-violent drug charges. Under the California ThreeStrikes laws, many prisoners are serving life sentences for petty theft convictions. In California, 80% of incoming prisoners are returning on parole violations. Resources necessary to successfully re-enter the community are scarce. This phenomenal growth is due to mandatory drug sentencing laws, conspiracy provisions, a dysfunctional parole system, inadequate legal representation, and huge profits made by the multinational corporations servicing the prisons.
All Power to the People
56. U.S. Government Approved Emory Douglas Black Panther Newspaper Reproduction of offset, September 11, 1971 Oakland, California 3255
This graphic refers to the widely held belief that during the Viet Nam War, the C.I.A. was involved with smuggling drugs from Southeast Asia, and distributing them in low income black communities in the United States in order to make this population less interested or able to become activists and protestors. Almost four decades later, drugs are an escalating problem and the active involvement of the C.I.A. continues to be raised. VI. The Struggle Continues
57. Until the Lions have their Historians Tales of Hunting will Always Glorify the Hunter Graphic: Hosea Nganga Young Oxfam Offset, ca 1989 United Kingdom 3263
All Power to the People
58. Free Mumia Abu-Jamal Fireworks Graphics Offset, 1995 Berkeley, California 10053
VI. The Struggle Continues
Mumia Abu-Jamal joined the Philadelphia Black Panthers in 1968, when he was 14 years old. At the age of 15, the Federal Bureau of Investigation—with the help of the Philadelphia Police Department—placed Mumia under surveillance in the covert Cointelpro program, amassing a file on him over the next decade that would run to 700 pages. Mumia became Minister of Information for the Philadelphia Panthers. Later he became a journalist and radio commentator known for his support of the activist black MOVE community and for his condemnation of the Philadelphia police for their habitual brutality against blacks. He served as president of the
Philadelphia Society of Black Journalists and has aired on National Public Radio and National Black Network. Unable to make a living as a conventional journalist because of his controversial views, Mumia supported himself by driving a taxicab in Philadelphia. One night in 1981, he spotted a police officer beating and arresting his brother and went to find out what was going on.At that point, Mumia’s story diverges from that of the police. The police version is that Mumia shot the police officer twice in the head. Mumia maintains that another person in the crowd that gathered shot the officer. Mumia was All Power to the People
also shot by police and almost died that night. The main civilian witnesses at the the trial were two prostitutes. One changed her description of the assailant several times. The other subsequently stated that she was under pressure by police to testify against Mumia. Witnesses to support Mumia’s version were never called to testify, and many inconsistencies were not examined. The prosecutor won a death sentence. Groups such as Amnesty International, the PEN AmericanCenter, and Human Rights Watch have all questioned the fairness of the trial. During his imprisonment he has published several books and other commentaries, notably VI. The Struggle Continues
Live from Death Row. As of 2008, his legal appeals are still unsettled and he is a prisoner at State Correctional Institution Greene near Waynesburg, Pennsylvania.
60. Community Control of Police Emory Douglas Black Panther Newspaper Reproduction of offset, April 3, 1971 Oakland, California 3206
All Power to the People
59. When I spend More Time Fighting the Rats... Emory Douglas Black Panther Newspaper Reproduction of offset, July 25, 1970 Oakland, California 3202
Ericka Huggins was born and raised in Washington D.C., married John Huggins, a resident of New Haven, Connecticut. They arrived in Los Angeles in 1967, and in December of that year joined the Southern Chapter of the Black Panther Party. Following her husband's murder in January 1969 (see posters #41 and #43), Ericka and her infant daughter Mai VI. The Struggle Continues
moved back to New Haven to live with her in-laws. After requests from the community in New Haven for a Black Panther Party chapter, she was given permission by the central committee. The New Haven chapter became functional in April with the establishment of a free breakfast for school children program. She was the first women to open a Black Panther chapter.She worked with local residents and Yale university students and conducted political education classes for the community. On May 22, 1969, she along with several other men and women in the chapter were arrested and charged with conspiracy to murder Alex Rackley, a former New York chapter member suspected of being a police
informant. Their conspiracy trial ended with the dropping of all charges in May 1971. After being released from prison, she returned to Oakland, where she became director of the Oakland Community School run by the Panthers. She was the first black person to become a member of the Alameda County Board of Education. She remained with the Panther Party until 1980. She is currently working part-time at San Francisco State University in the Women's Studies Department.Huggins is now director of a program with the San Francisco-based Shanti Project, for individuals and families with HIV in underprivileged areas of San Francisco. All Power to the People
61. Free the SF8 Emory Douglas Black Panther Newspaper Offset, 2007 Berkeley, California 28022
VI. The Struggle Continues
San Francisco 8—In January 2007, eight former Black Panthers were arrested for their alleged involvement in the 1971 murder of Sgt. John V. Young, a San Francisco police officer, and other thirty year old crimes. Richard Brown, Richard O'Neal, Ray Boudreaux, and Hank Jones were arrested in California. Francisco Torres was arrested in Queens, New York. Harold Taylor was arrested in Florida. Two of the men charged have been in prison for over 30 years: Herman Bell and Jalil Muntaqim.
for several days employing electric shock, cattle prods, beatings, sensory deprivation, plastic bags and hot, wet blankets for asphyxiation. Confessions derived from torture are neither credible nor legal. In January 2008, charges of conspiracy were dropped against five of the defendants, and Richard O'Neal was removed from the case all together, changing the name of the case to the San Francisco 7.
Similar charges were thrown out more than 30 years ago after it was revealed that New Orleans police tortured them All Power to the People
62. The Hottest Places in Hell... Doug Minkler Silkscreen, 1988 Berkeley, California 11562
VI. The Struggle Continues
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS All Power to the People was a four year project involving the dedication and commitment of many people. The Center for the Study of Political Graphics wishes to express our sincere gratitude to the many individuals who helped make this exhibition possible. We wish to especially thank:
Bony Toruño, Two Brothers Custom Silkscreen for making our banners
Roz Payne for providing the COINTELPRO graphics and correspondence
CAl Appel and Don Kalish for donating all the copies of the Panther newspaper
The Getty Grant Program interns from 1993, 1994 and 1995 who did a lot of the research: Araceli Aguilera, Chris Armstrong, Chevy Pham, Jade Sasser, Jose Gabriel Solano and Lorraine Williams.
Charles and Barbara Brittin, David Kunzle and La Peña Cultural Center for providing most of the posters
The volunteer interns, Karmen Hooper And Leisy Abrego who researched, typed and helped in many ways The volunteers who mounted, sorted, typed and did whatever was needed: Ed and Jean Enriquez, Gary Hinte, Marion Krupin, Liz Fischbach, Marc Monarch, and Debbie Willis
As always, CSPG’s staff worked overtime on researching, writing and mounting. Special thanks to Susan Tschabrun,archivist; Rebecca McGrew, assistant director; and Rhoda Shapiro and Ted Hajjar, members of CSPG’s Board of Directors.
This exhibition was made possible by grants from Liberty Hill, Resist, the Ruth Mott Fund, and individual donors.