by John C. Watson
Graduate Student: University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
School of Journalism and Mass Communication CB# 3365
Howell Hall, Chapel Hill, N.C. 27599-3365
(919) 967-4142
History Division - AEJMC Annual Convention Chicago, IL. 1997
Extinction of the Panther:
A Study of the Black Panther Newspaper's Reports of FBI Subversion
by John C. Watson
Graduate Student: University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
School of Journalism and Mass Communication CB# 3365
Howell Hall, Chapel Hill, N.C. 27599-3365
(919) 967-4142 E-MAIL
History Division - AEJMC Annual Convention Chicago, IL. 1997
Abstract
This paper is a study of the Black Panther Party's weekly newspaper from 1968
until 1971 to assess how it reported the effects of the FBI's subversive actions
against the party. The study indicates that the newspaper's coverage was greatly
affected by the fact that its primary purpose was to serve as the public face of
the party and advance its goals.
Extinction of the Panther
Price Competition
Extinction of the Panther:
A Study of the Black Panther Newspaper's Reports of FBI Subversion
J. Edgar Hoover, director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, considered
the Black Panther Party "the greatest threat to the internal security of the
country " in 1968.[1] Hoover accordingly made sure that the Panthers were
subjected to the ministrations of an FBI program he formally launched in 1967 to
systematically undermine and destroy organizations involved in the Black
Liberation Movement. The memo that launched the program identified it as:
"Counter Intelligence Program - Black Nationalist - Hate Groups."[2] It shall be
referred to here as Cointelpro.
Cointelpro was designed to "expose, disrupt, misdirect, discredit or otherwise
neutralize the activities of black nationalists, hate-type groupings, their
leadership, spokesmen, membership and supporters."[3] When the memo was
initially circulated, the Black Panther Party was not on the Cointelpro list of
targets which included the Nation of Islam, the Southern Christian Leadership
Conference, the Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee and the Congress of
Racial Equality. But five months before Hoover publicly announced his assessment
of the Black Panther Party as an internal enemy of the United States, it had
apparently become the agency's primary target and the number of FBI field
offices was nearly doubled to handle the threat Hoover believed black
nationalists represented.[4]
This study analyzes the content of the Black Panther newspaper from 1968
through 1971to asses how it reported FBI operations against the party. Panther
Chief of Staff Bobby Hilliard wrote in the Nov. 22, 1969 edition of the
newspaper: "People who read our newspaper can stay tuned to what's happening
with regard to the Black Panther Party." However, this analysis of the
newspaper's content indicates Hilliard's statement was not true with respect to
Cointelpro operations against the party. The newspaper did not report how its
leaders and rank and file members had been duped by the FBI into damaging the
party and its dissident movement. The newspaper's primary function was to
advance the goals of the party and it therefore had to present the Panthers as
strong, resolute and capable of leading a Marxist revolution in the United
States
Everything in the Black Panther newspaper was published under the full control
of the Panther party and therefore presented only those aspects of its
operations that its leaders wanted exposed to a sympathetic or impressionable
public, its far-flung membership and those who were hostile to the party. The
newspaper presented the party and its leaders as often beleaguered, dedicated,
fearless and intelligent. It insisted throughout that any missteps or bad acts
were the fault of select individuals or the sinister interference by government
agents, law enforcement officers, reactionaries or counterrevolutionaries.
Self-criticism was rare and the party itself was never presented in a bad light.
The newspaper never revealed when the party or its favored members have been
duped by Cointelpro schemes or federal agents, nor does it fully disclose what
led party leaders to dramatic changes in attitude toward some of its members and
other organizations. As this paper attempts to show, these abrupt attitude
changes were often prompted by Cointelpro.
There are sporadic informational lapses in the Panther newspaper's presentation
of party history that required this study to rely on books and other periodicals
for factual background necessary for a fuller understanding of some issues dealt
with by the newspaper. Outside sources were necessary to provide the framework
of Cointelpro operations and place them within the context of other covert
domestic operations conducted by American police and intelligence agencies
during the 1960s and 1970s. These sources indicate that the Black Panther Party
was not the sole target of covert disruptive schemes, and that the fact that it
was a black organization was not the operative issue that made it a target.
Researcher James Kirkpatrick Davis has detailed Cointelpro activities against
white organizations such as the Ku Klux Klan, the predominantly white Students
for a Democratic Society and the Jewish Defense League to show that the nature
of the FBI disruption is similar in each instance.[5] Athan Theoharis provides
a historical perspective by tracing domestic intelligence agency activities and
policies from 1936 through the mid 1970s.[6] Much of the documentation of FBI
policies is painstakingly collected in the public documents series published by
the R.R. Bowker Company.[7]
More opinionated presentations of the Panthers-Cointelpro interaction are
provided by authors who either have been Panthers or who have extensively
interviewed ex-Panthers and have concluded that that the episodes have produced
clear heroes and villains. Researchers Ward Churchill and Jim Vander Wall
depicted the Panthers as victims of an illegal and unethical FBI operation to
undermine political activism.[8] Author Hugh Pearson, however, was highly
critical of the Panthers and largely blames their personal foibles for
undermining the party.[9] Panther co-founder Huey P. Newton was largely
self-serving in his account of Cointelpro and the Panthers, but his writings on
the subject provided a valuable insight into the relationships of some party
leaders.[10]
This study begins with a brief history of Cointelpro before moving to an
introductory discussion of the Black Panther Party and a fuller discussion of
the four areas in which the party's newspaper reveals a progression toward the
goals sought by Cointelpro. The first area is the disruption and neutralization
of party members through a campaign of harassment waged by law enforcement
officers. The second discussion focuses on the widening of rifts between the
party, the Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee and Stokely Carmichael.
The third area of discussion is the party's alienation from Ron M. Karenga and
his United Slaves organization. The final discussion focuses on the internal
purges and the split between the party's most prominent leaders, Huey P. Newton
and Eldridge Cleaver.
Cointelpro - the FBI's Counterintelligence Program
Cointelpro was exposed to the American public for the first time shortly after
the Media, Pa., offices of the FBI were broken into on March 8, 1971. More than
a thousand internal documents were stolen by a group of activists who identified
themselves as the Citizens Commission to Investigate the FBI. Three days later,
the commission began mailing selected copies of the documents to the Los Angeles
Times, the Washington Post, the New York Times and prominent individuals. The
mailings included a statement from the commission and an explanation that the
documents had been stolen "so that the nature and extent of FBI surveillance
activities in this country could be studied in depth."[11]
The stolen documents revealed Cointelpro initiatives to conduct surveillance
upon and create disruptions among and within the Communist Party U.S.A., white
hate groups, New Left groups such as Students for a Democratic Society and
others opposed to American involvement in the Vietnam War, and prominent black
nationalist groups such as the Black Panther Party. The dissemination led to
hundreds of reports and commentaries in newspapers and other media that prompted
congressional hearings in Washington to substantiate whether and to what extent
the FBI had engaged in domestic spying, not only to gain evidence for criminal
prosecutions, but to disrupt or destroy dissident domestic political
organizations.
The documents revealed to the public that a variety of dangerous deceits and
personally intrusive tactics were used to undermine those targeted by Cointelpro
irrespective of the racial makeup of the group. Among the tactics used against
the Ku Klux Klan, for example, were the mailing of pink postcards to its members
informing them that despite the legendary secrecy of the Klan, people knew who
they were. Letters were sent to low-ranking Klansmen falsely claiming that
higher ranking Klansmen were embezzling dues money. In Louisiana, the FBI mailed
a letter to a second-tier Klansman thanking him for informing on other Klansmen.
Although the Klansman was not an informant, the FBI knew his superiors would see
the letter before he did, and as expected, the targeted member was removed from
duty and distrust was nurtured in the organization.[12] A detailed letter was
sent to the wife of a major Klan leader in Virginia to convince her that he was
committing adultery while on the road handling Klan business. The agent who
wrote the letter contrived to make the wife believe it was written by the wife
of another Klan member who did not want her own spouse tainted by the immoral
practice which could undermine the otherwise noble work of the Klan.[13]
When Cointelpro was initially exposed, J. Edgar Hoover was the only person who
ever had been director of the FBI and was accordingly blamed for its wrongdoing.
He may not have created it, but at a minimum, in his role as director he
approved it and kept it functioning. Some historians have concluded that
Cointelpro was created in the 1960s, but there is documentation indicating that
Cointelpro-type operations were under way as early as the 1920s when black
activist Marcus Garvey was the target.[14] The bullseye inevitably moved to the
Black Panther Party in the late 1960s because the party was the most flamboyant
and widely perceived as the most dangerous of the domestic movements of that
decade.[15]
The Black Panther Party
The Black Panther Party for Self Defense blazed into the national consciousness
on May 2, 1967 when more than three dozen members, wearing the black leather
jackets and black berets that would become their trademark, walked into a
session of the California Legislature carrying rifles to protest a bill that
would revoke their right to openly carry such weapons. They were arrested, and
pictures and reports of their brazen and defiant act were flashed across the
United States and around the world.
Party members had appeared in public armed in an earlier display as they
directed traffic at an intersection near the Santa Fe Elementary School in North
Oakland, Calif. Press coverage of the event was only local, but city officials
soon installed the traffic signal that area parents had vainly sought for years.
The party was formed in October 1966 by Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale while
they were college students in Oakland. Its primary purpose was to monitor the
Oakland Police Department's treatment of blacks. Panthers would follow police
cars on patrols. The party provided community services such as a children's'
breakfast program and a health care clinic, but the Panthers were more widely
seen as armed angry militants intent on confronting the police.
One year after the party was founded, Newton was involved in a gunfight in
which an Oakland police officer was killed.[16] Newton was arrested and
imprisoned. Panther Minister of Information Eldridge Cleaver was involved in a
police shootout less than a year later in which one Panther party member was
killed.[17] Cleaver was imprisoned and later fled to exile in Cuba and Algiers.
Throughout their absences, the Black Panther newspaper included their writings
and reflected what was happening to the party.
The newspaper was a tabloid published weekly in San Francisco and Oakland,
California and distributed across the United States and internationally. In
1969, it had a circulation of 45,000. Party members were required to sell the
paper for 25 cents per copy as part of their regular duties. It was the public
face of the Black Panther Party and a major source of income. It did not carry
any paid advertisements during the period examined in this study, 1968 through
1971, but accepted a paid ad in mid 1972. It regularly carried display-size ads
touting party principles, rules and regulations as well as pleas for funding to
support its revolutionary struggle. Political cartoons, bold preachy headlines,
long and vehement commentary by party leaders, poetry and letters were the
paper's usual fare. Pigs were the symbolic demons used throughout the paper's
history. Law enforcement officers were always referred to as pigs in text and
they were depicted as pigs in the ubiquitous political cartoons that were a
staple graphic of the newspaper. Any person or institution the Panther party
considered an enemy of its movement was liable to be depicted as a pig.
Neutralization by
Harassment
Between 1969 and 1971 there was rarely an issue of the newspaper published
without several reports of members being detained or arrested on a wide variety
of charges. Often the offense was nothing more serious than failing to have
proper registration for a motor vehicle or failure to carry a valid draft card.
Sometimes the offenses were more serious and can be traced to the fact that many
Panther recruits had histories of criminal activity before joining the party and
did not fully reform. The newspaper also carried frequent appeals for bail money
to free those arrested. FBI documents indicated that the pattern of arrests and
detentions was consistent with a tried and proven Cointelpro strategy.
A directive from the FBI director to the Albany, N.Y., office indicated that
the 23 FBI field offices advised of the Cointelpro against black nationalists
were provided an example of a technique that had been used effectively. The
directive said:
The Revolutionary Action Movement (RAM) ... was active in Philadelphia,
Pa. in the summer of 1967. The Philadelphia office alerted local police; who
then put RAM leaders under close scrutiny. They were arrested on every
possible charge until they could no longer make bail. As a result, Ram
leaders
spent most of the summer in jail and no violence traceable to RAM took
place.[18]
Separation of the Panthers from Stokely Carmichael
A second Cointelpro goal was the disruption of the Black Panther Party's
relationships with other black nationalist groups and leaders. This goal may
have been achieved with the abrupt turnaround in the Panthers' relationship with
Stokely Carmichael, who rose to prominence as a leader of the Student
Non-violent Coordinating Committee and who is credited with popularizing the
term, "Black Power." The Panther leadership displayed respect and affection for
Carmichael in their newspaper during 1966 and 1967. The regard was so great that
Newton drafted Carmichael and made him the first and only prime minister of the
Black Panther Party.[19]
When black columnist Julius Lester attacked Carmichael in print, the Black
Panther published an open letter defending him and praising SNCC. The letter
said in part, "Before the Black Panther Party came along, SNCC and other black
militant organizations were doing valuable work organizing the black
community."[20] The letter went on to praise Stokely for advancing the
movement. "Stokely took the first vital step when he told whites, 'Your job is
to eliminate racism where it exists - in the white community.' "
When a rift developed between Carmichael and the Washington D.C. branch of
SNCC, the Black Panther newspaper vehemently defended him and attacked his
detractor: "A reactionary dog has been turned loose in Washington, D.C. His name
is Lester McKinney, head of D.C.'s SNCC office ... Lester is
counter-revolutionary in that he opposes our beloved Prime Minister, Stokely
Carmichael."[21]
By mid-1969, however, the pages of the Black Panther clearly showed that
Carmichael was no longer beloved. Since being drafted, he had been regularly
listed in the newspaper as prime minister. That listing disappeared in the June
14, 1969 edition. The May 31, 1969 edition included a possible explanation in a
column written by Black Panther Minister of Education Raymond "Masai" Hewitt,
who accused Carmichael of deviating from the party line and revealed that an
investigation of Carmichael was being conducted. Carmichael resigned from the
party and left for Africa.
Despite Carmichael's departure, he continued to be reviled in the pages of the
Black Panther for more than a year. Eldridge Cleaver seemed particularly
incensed with Carmichael and published two major pieces attacking him. The first
ran under the headline: "Open letter to Stokely Carmichael." Cleaver opened by
saying, "Your letter of resignation as Prime Minister of the Black Panther Party
came, I think, about one year too late."[22]
Cleaver ominously implied there was a suspicious similarity between
Carmichael's criticism of the party when he announced his resignation and the
allegations law enforcement officers and informants had been making to the U.S.
Senate's (McClellan Committee) Permanent Subcommittee on Subversive Groups. In
his second major written attack on Carmichael, Cleaver was more direct in his
accusations. He said Carmichael was a longtime friend of George Sams, a former
Panther whom the party newspaper accused of being a government informant and who
testified as a prosecution witness in the murder trial of Black Panther
co-founder Bobby Seale. "It was none other than Stokely Carmichael who sent that
running dog, George Sams, from Detroit to San Francisco in February 1968, and
vouched for him, and personally sponsored him into the Black Panther Party,"
Cleaver wrote.[23]
It may be impossible to pinpoint the exact cause of this abject reversal of
attitude toward Carmichael, but the influence of Cointelpro can not be
discounted. The directives J.Edgar Hoover sent to each FBI field office
specifically instructed agents to: "1. Prevent the coalition of militant black
nationalist groups ... 2. Prevent the rise of a 'messiah' who could unify, and
electrify, the black militant movement ... Carmichael has the necessary charisma
to be a real threat in this way."[24]
More telling is a July 10, 1968, FBI memo that said:
"It is suggested that consideration be given to convey the impression
that CARMICHAEL is a CIA informant.
One method of accomplishing the above would be to have a carbon copy
of informant report reportedly written by CARMICHAEL to the CIA carefully
deposited in the automobile of a close Black Nationalist friend. The report
should be so placed that it will be readily seen.
It is hoped that when the informant report is read it will help
promote distrust between CARMICHAEL and the Black Community. It is suggested
that carbon of report be used to indicate that CARMICHAEL turned original copy
into CIA and kept carbon copy for himself.
It is also suggested that we inform a certain percentage of reliable
criminal and racial informants that 'we heard from reliable sources that
CARMICHAEL is a CIA agent.' It is hoped that these informants would spread the
rumor in various large Negroe (sic) communities across the land.[25]
This practice was frequently cited in FBI memos as a successful tactic and was
called "snitch jacketing," or creating a "bad jacket."
Separation of the Panthers from the Cultural Nationalists
The Black Panther newspaper never demonstrated any overt affection for Ron M.
Karenga or United Slaves, the black cultural nationalist group he led in
Southern California. But the two organizations shared goals such as uplifting
the black community and restraining the police. They even conducted community
patrols together at one point.[26] Although the Marxist-Leninist philosophy of
the Panthers differed from the race-based tenets of US and the Cultural
Nationalist Movement in general, the animosity and outright warfare that
developed between the two was inconsistent with the goals and principles they
held in common.
In the fall of 1968, when relations between the Panthers and US were considered
to be at a low point, the pages of the Black Panther still did not carry any
overtly hostile items about US, Karenga or cultural nationalism. The worst was
an item published in December under the byline of "Boston Fred Nolan" that
criticized cultural nationalism without mentioning Karenga or US. An indicative
excerpt from the piece said, "Lately there has been a landslide of 'Black
Cultural Nationalism,' ... Too much emphasis is being placed on I'm Black and
proud, instead of 'I'm Black Revolutionary, going to set all Black people free.'
"[27]
Agents of the FBI, apparently relying on other sources of information instead
of the sentiments expressed in the newspaper to gauge the relationship between
the Panthers and US, sent a memo from the Los Angeles field office to J. Edgar
Hoover to report that informants had claimed the Panthers had arranged for
someone to murder Karenga.[28] That memo advised: "Los Angeles is presently
analyzing the situation to determine if further disruption can be caused between
these two antagonists." Slightly more than five weeks later, the FBI reported
that its informants had uncovered a US plot to kill Eldridge Cleaver.[29] The
Los Angeles office of the FBI subsequently sent a memo to Washington indicating
that it was preparing a letter to the Panthers that would appear to be written
by a US member who would claim that he is aware of the plot against Karenga and
threatens an ambush of Panther leaders in Los Angeles. The memo says in part:
"It is hoped this counterintelligence measure will result in a 'US' and BPP
(Black Panther Party) vendetta."[30]
The Jan. 25, 1969, front page of the Black Panther newspaper bore the blaring
headline: "Panthers Assassinated by US Organization." Panther Deputy Minister of
Defense Alprentice "Bunchy" Carter and Deputy Minister of Information John
Jerome Huggins had been fatally shot Jan. 17 while attending a meeting at UCLA
which was also attended by members of US. Three US members were charged with the
killings.
A page 2 story beneath the label headline, "Political Assassins," was packaged
with a photograph of Karenga flanked by four members of US.[31] A crudely drawn
arrow points to Karenga's shaved head. The photo caption said: "Ron (Karenga)
Everett and Four Henchmen." The accompanying news story provided a detailed
account of the shooting and identified US members as the culprits and claimed
they are "known to receive protection from the L.A. Pig Department." From this
point, members of US and other cultural nationalist groups were regularly
referred to as "pork chop nationalists" when they are mentioned in the Black
Panther. It is another example of the pig metaphor being used to demonize.
The Panthers' continuing hostility to Karenga was indicated by the next edition
of their newspaper which carried a large cartoon on the front page depicting
Karenga (with shaved head and sunglasses) on his knees and crying while a black
man and woman hold pistols to his head.[32] Above the drawing was the headline:
"Panthers Demand Justice." The entire Feb. 2, 1969 edition of the paper seemed
to be dedicated to attacking and belittling Karenga, US and the Black Cultural
Nationalist Movement.
A half-page article by Linda Harrison was typical. It bore the headline, "On
Cultural Nationalism" and was accompanied by a demonic line drawing of Karenga.
The article was 30 inches of eloquent vitriol.[33] She condensed the cultural
nationalist philosophy into "James Brown's words - I'm Black and I'm Proud." She
criticized those who believe "that there is a dignity inherent in wearing
naturals; that a buba (traditional African apparel) makes a slave a man." She
sharply asserted: "A man who lives under slavery... rarely regains his dignity
by rejecting the clothiers of his enslaver." Her penultimate paragraph asked
rhetorically, how can a cultural nationalist "deny the political realities of
his own life in America by dressing up in a (brightly colored) maternity smock
(a buba)?"
Later in the same edition, the Panther minister of information begins a full
page of criticism with the statement, "We must destroy all cultural nationalism
because it is reactionary and has become a tool of Richard Milhous Nixon." The
type wraps around a cartoonish depiction of Karenga as Humpty Dumpty, an
obvious jab at his rotund physique. In this edition, for the first and only
time, an article from the Wall Street Journal is reprinted. A Black Panther
cartoonist added a drawing of Karenga dressed in African garb accepting a huge
bag of money from a pig dressed in a suit. A dialogue balloon above Karenga's
head had him saying, "Just trying to be Black." The Wall Street Journal reprint
was mildly critical of Karenga but balanced and included the fact that Karenga
had met with California Gov. Ronald Reagan. The Panther headline said, "Wall
Street Journal Exposes Karenga."
Throughout 1969, the Black Panther rarely published without an attack on
Karenga, US or cultural nationalism. A May 12, 1969 story carried the headline
"Karenga - King of the Bloodsuckers," above a rambling history of his political
life. An Aug. 9, 1969 story, "Karenga's Stooges in Court," reported on the start
of the trial of the three US members accused of killing two Panthers at UCLA. It
included the observation, "Ron Karenga has been hiding out. That bald headed,
dope shooting, homosexual's ass belongs to the people!"
As vehement and deadly as this feud with US was, and as divisive as the
conflicts with Carmichael and the cultural nationalists proved to be, the
Panther newspaper reflected a more severe debilitation of the party when
conflicts developed within the party. Ahead were the internal purges and the
crippling division of the party's most visible figures. Cointelpro almost
certainly played a role in both.
Internal Purges
The Black Panther Party was among the most widely publicized radical groups in
the United States during the late 1960s and its membership grew accordingly. At
its peak, it had 2,000 members. The Panthers' notoriety motivated federal law
enforcement agencies to infiltrate the party and the steady influx of recruits
allowed them to do so quite effectively. By 1969 the number of FBI operatives
reporting on the activities of black activists was listed at 4,000 and the
Panthers alone were being monitored by 64 informants.[34] The Black Panther
newspaper frequently reflected the parent organization's fear of infiltration
and the certainty that some party members were federal agents, informers or
misguided people who had joined the organization for reasons other than the
party's avowed goal of furthering a Marxist revolution in the United States. In
an effort to get rid of them, the newspapers first edition of 1969 carried an
editorial announcing the leadership's awareness of the problem and a course of
action:
The Black Panther Party ... comes forth to DENOUNCE those PROVOCATEUR AGENTS,
KOOKS and AVARICIOUS FOOLS who found their way into the membership. These are
not members of the Black Panther party. And the Black Panther Party wholly
denounces their acts... Those who violate these rules ( three rules of
discipline and 18 points of attention) are denounced as
counterrevolutionaries."[35]
The newspaper heavily documented the pervasiveness of the purge as required by
the party's Rule 17 which said: " 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."
Unfortunately for researchers trying to detect a cause-and-effect tie between
Cointelpro operations and the Panther purges, the newspaper did not always
provide specific information about what caused any individual member to be
suspected of behavior that warranted expulsion.
The Jan. 4, 1969 editorial marked the beginning of a protracted period of
internal purging of rank and file members as well as prominent party leaders.
The editorial indicated the purge was designed to cast out those who violated
the rules, principles and revolutionary tactics of the party. This was usually
the explanation given in the paper when Panthers were expelled for specific
improper behavior. Researchers also have suggested that the same explanation was
used when Panthers were expelled when suspected of being informants. It fact,
this was the initial explanation published in the May 31, 1969 edition of the
newspaper to justify the expulsion of Stokely Carmichael. The editorial also
said some members were being expelled for common criminal activity such as using
a Panther newspaper delivery truck to stage an $80,000 holdup. Violations of
party rules, principles and tactics were also cited as causes for expulsion when
factional wars within the party were the more likely causes.
Three weeks after the initial editorial on purging, the effort to clean house
appeared to have intensified as three large items in the Jan.25, 1969 edition of
the paper bore the headlines: "Tightening Up," "Panther Purge" and "Combating
the Enemy Within Our Ranks."[36] The first headline was followed by a Frank
Jones byline and a story reporting that party Chairman Bobby Seale had announced
a "program of internal purging" and that the party was "refusing to accept new
members during the purge and is increasing the intensity of the political
education classes."
Jones' article indicated that the party was becoming more strict and would
discipline malefactors. "The purge is not a weakening process, but a preparatory
one," Jones wrote. "We are preparing much as a boxer who is overweight must do."
The second article included the admonition: "We must not leave any stones
unturned in ferreting the enemy out of our midst, while at the same time we must
not allow the presence of agents to paralyze our progressive activity."[37]
Seale further explained the rationale for the purges in a long interview
published in the Black Panther newspaper two months later as a reprint from the
underground newspaper The Movement..[38] He said the purge was instituted
primarily to stop factional strife within the party. It was during this period,
as this paper will later show, that Cointelpro operatives were taking actions
designed to foster factionalism to divide and neutralize the Panthers.
For nearly three years, the newspaper carried news stories, editorials and
commentaries indicating the purge was still under way. Often, the names,
photographs and last known whereabouts of the expelled Panthers were published
with a listing of their crimes against the party and the revolutionary movement.
Many of those purged earned the punishment for unapproved criminal behavior that
may have been a part of their lives before they became Panthers. Still others,
such as Carmichael, were ousted after suspicions were planted and nurtured by
Cointelpro and acted upon by the Panther leadership.
Through 1971, the Panther newspaper was peppered with reports charting the
progress of the purge. An April 1969 article, for instance, claimed that
informant "Barron Howard had been rapping to the F.B.I. for 15 weeks" about
Panther security and weapons at the Indiana chapter offices.[39] Howard was
questioned and exposed a second informant, according to the article which
concluded with the statement, "The Black Panther Party will not be wiped out by
the Full-Blown Idiots (FBI) of pig Hoover's gestapo. As quickly as they plant
informers, so shall we root them out."[40]
Some of those who were expelled became openly hostile to the Panthers and
testified against the party at Senate hearings convened to determine how
subversive the party was. Among them was Larry Powell who had been expelled
under suspicion of being an FBI informant and robbing a tavern, according to the
July 19, 1969 edition of the Black Panther newspaper which also said he had been
paid to testify before the "Permanent Senate Investigating Sub-Committee." It
appears, however, that Powell had not been placed among the Panthers by the FBI.
But the agency nonetheless sent internal memos among its field offices
indicating that the dissension indicated by the expulsion could be used to their
advantage.[41]
At times the expulsions and exposures became ludicrous as in an item sent from
Algiers by Panther Minister of Information Eldridge Cleaver and published in the
Panther newspaper. It resembled a display ad or wanted poster and announced:
"The below indicated persons have all been expelled from the Black Panther Party
because of activity and consistent behavior that can not be tolerated."[42]
Photographs of the six outcasts accompanied the item. The sixth was identified
as Tanya Kathleen Akili, a girl who appeared to be no more than two years
old.[43]
These purges sometimes may have ousted true informers, but they also created
hostilities and furthered the Cointelpro goal of undermining and splintering the
party. William O'Neal, a high-ranking security officer of the Chicago chapter of
the Black Panther Party was quoted several times in the Panther newspaper as he
explained how he uncovered informant Derek Phemster. O'Neal explained that
Phemster was taken into custody and questioned, but did not confess to being an
informant until "we then went into a more intense stage of questioning. We then
used methods which proved very effective."[44] Under questioning by O'Neal,
Phemster reportedly admitted being an FBI informant. This admission is
particularly curious in light of an article The New York Times published in 1974
in which O'Neal admitted that he was actually the informer.[45]
O'Neal also has been implicated in the police raid that killed Panther
Vice-Chairman Fred Hampton on Dec. 4, 1969 in Chicago.[46] A Cointelpro document
sent from the Chicago office of the FBI to J. Edgar Hoover a week after Hampton
was killed noted that an informant provided essential information for the raid
that could not have been provided by anyone else.[47] The Chicago office
requested a special payment for the informant.
Those identified by the Panthers as informants, rightly or wrongly, sometimes
wound up dead instead of or after being expelled from the party. Panthers were
usually charged in connection with the killings. Most prominent among such cases
was the torture killing of Alex Rackley in New Haven, Connecticut after he was
accused of being an informant. Party Chairman Bobby Seale was charged with
playing a role in the slaying and spent more than two years in prison before the
charges were dismissed. As indicted earlier in this discussion, arranging for
the imprisonment of activists on spurious charges was a frequent Cointelpro
tactic. Researchers Ward Churchill and Jim Vander Wall have claimed that Panther
security officer George Sams identified Rackley as an informant, but they claim
Sams was the informant for the FBI and the police.[48] Huey P. Newton also
expressed suspicions about Sams years later.[49] However, there are no public
FBI documents identifying Sams as an operative and Sams was ultimately convicted
of killing Rackley. This latter development may be evidence that Sams was a
criminal and not an FBI operative, or it may explain why the FBI has not claimed
him as one of its own.
Separating Newton and Cleaver
As 1970 began, the Black Panther newspaper depicted the party as strengthened
and ennobled by its systematic purging, but the organization was arguably
weakened by that process. Three months into the year the FBI initiated a program
to split the party by driving a wedge between its two most influential leaders,
Huey P. Newton and Eldridge Cleaver.[50] This might not have seemed necessary
at the time given that Newton was imprisoned and Cleaver was exiled in Algiers.
But both men regularly had long rambling articles published in the party
newspaper and their photographs were displayed religiously within its pages.
Newton's picture was part of the paper's masthead. Although Chief of Staff David
Hilliard handled the daily operations from party headquarters in Oakland,
Newton and Cleaver were the intellectual and spiritual backbone of the party .
The FBI recognized how vital Newton and Cleaver were to the party and
apparently sought to fell them by magnifying and expanding the atmosphere of
suspicion and distrust that created and maintained the party purges. The massive
distance between Newton and Cleaver seemed to make the task of turning them
against each other easier because they communicated primarily by letters and not
face-to-face. The FBI's mission was also facilitated by Newton's emotional
state, which several researchers have described as unstable during this
period.[51] An indicator of Newton's frame of mind was his apparent insistence
from 1970 onward that the Black Panther newspaper refer to him as supreme
commander or supreme servant of the people in addition to his formal title of
minister of defense.
J. Edgar Hoover knew of Newton's emotional fragility, but as one FBI memorandum
indicated, this was not a reason to ease the pressure on Newton, but to increase
it. The Jan. 28, 1971 memo from Hoover to the FBI field offices in Boston, Los
Angeles, New York and San Francisco said in part, "Newton has recently exhibited
paranoid-like reactions to anyone who questions his orders, policies, actions or
otherwise displeases him." The memo concluded, "Newton may be on the brink of
mental collapse and we must intensify our counterintelligence."
When Newton was released from the Alameda County Jail on Aug. 5, 1970, there
were 10,000 supporters outside to greet him.[52] Among the throng were
emissaries Eldridge Cleaver had sent to gauge his relationship with Newton.[53]
Cleaver apparently had been sent a number of Cointelpro letters that caused him
to distrust Newton. This can be inferred from an FBI memo discussing this phase
of the effort to divide the party leaders. Its relevant portions said: "To
create friction between Black Panther Party (BPP) leader Eldridge Cleaver in
Algiers and BPP Headquarters, a spurious letter concerning an internal dispute
was sent to Cleaver, who accepted it as genuine."[54]
One of the people Cleaver sent to Newton's camp was Connie Matthews, who became
Newton's secretary.[55] The FBI later sent Cleaver a letter designed to appear
as if it had been written by Matthews. It claimed the Panther party in
California was in disarray and suggested: "One of two steps must be taken soon
and both are drastic. We must either get rid of the supreme commander or get rid
of the disloyal members."[56]
Newton apparently saw a copy of the letter purportedly written by Matthews or
otherwise became convinced that she was a threat to him because shortly
afterward Matthews was denounced in the Black Panther newspaper as an enemy of
the people and expelled from the party.[57] The Feb. 13, 1971 denunciation by
the Party's Central Committee claimed Matthews had disappeared with her husband,
suspended Panther Michael Cetewayo Tabor, eight days earlier during a speaking
engagement with Newton at New Haven College in Connecticut. The newspaper said
the disappearance "jeopardized the lives of the Minister of Defense and Supreme
Commander of the Black Panther party, Huey P. Newton and Chief of Staff David
Hilliard."[58]
The perception that Newton and Hilliard had been placed in jeopardy stemmed
from the Panthers' prior experience when other members suspected of disloyalty
disappeared. The article cited one such instance: "Remember the case of George
Sams, his disappearance and the immediate wide-scale raids on Black Panther
Party offices."[59]
Matthews was further excoriated for insensitivity, individualism, alcoholism
and lack of discipline. The article sniped at her for marrying Tabor, a man much
younger than herself, and implied there was something wrong with her because she
is a Jamaican who was raised in Europe. The article claimed she had been sent to
work with Cleaver in Algiers, but that he "found it impossible to deal with her
individualism and lack of discipline" and he transferred her to the Panther's
central headquarters in Oakland where Newton was based.[60] This latter
allegation indicates either that the California Panther faction did not know
Matthews was a Cleaver emissary and not a reject, or that it chose not to reveal
its knowledge in the newspaper. Matthews eventually resurfaced in Algiers with
Cleaver.
A few weeks after Matthews was publicly branded an enemy, the FBI sent a letter
to Cleaver and disguised it as a letter from Elbert Howard, a member of Newton's
Central Committee and editor of the Black Panther newspaper. The letter
criticized Newton for living in a luxury penthouse at party expense since
leaving prison. It claimed Newton lied to Cleaver and that unflattering things
were being said in California about the exiled minister of information. Perhaps
the most damaging part of the letter was the final two sentences which warned:
"You should think a great deal before sending Kathleen. If I could talk to you I
could tell you why I don't think you should."[61]
Those two sentences referred to the scheduled appearance of Kathleen Cleaver,
the wife of Eldridge Cleaver and Panther communications secretary, at a March 5,
1971 rally in California to build support for Chairman Bobby Seale and Ericka
Huggins who were facing trial on homicide charges in Connecticut. By not
explaining why Kathleen Cleaver should not attend the rally, the letter left
Eldridge Cleaver to imagine what risks she might face in the company of Newton,
who was now probably considered untrustworthy. Kathleen Cleaver did not show up.
One day after the rally, the Black Panther newspaper published a supplement to
its regular edition with a banner headline on the cover that said: "Free
Kathleen Cleaver." The gist of the accompanying stories was that Kathleen
Cleaver missed the rally because she was being held prisoner by her husband who
was violating party principles. The main story was written by Elaine Brown,
deputy minister of information.
It included the following allegations: Kathleen once found Eldridge in a hotel
room with another woman and he beat her for disturbing them (the article was
accompanied by a photograph bearing the descriptive caption: "Kathleen Cleaver
with eye blackened by Eldridge Cleaver."); Eldridge insisted that Kathleen's
primary loyalty was to him instead of the party; Eldridge refused to submit for
publication articles written by Kathleen and sometimes lied and told her he had
submitted them, but the Panther newspaper editors refused to print them;
Eldridge sent Kathleen to Korea so he could pursue an illicit affair with an
18-year-old woman in Algiers; Eldridge had killed a man whom Kathleen had come
to love.[62]
Brown's story concluded with a poignant and clever statement about Kathleen:
"We know her to be imprisoned there in Algeria, held against her will. Even
though, if Kathleen is allowed to speak for herself, she will probably support
the ravings of her personal, mad oppressor, we know that to speak otherwise at
this time would be a death warrant for her. So we will understand."[63]
By not blaming Kathleen Cleaver for missing the rally, the newspaper portrayed
the dispute as one between the party and Eldridge Cleaver instead of a dispute
between the California faction and the international faction. That tact also
left the door open for Kathleen Cleaver to defect to California at any time,
even if she initially publicly sided with her husband. it also undermined the
credibility of any statements she might make against the party or in support of
Eldridge Cleaver. There was no way for readers of the Panther newspaper to know
for certain if the allegations were true, but it was generally known within the
party hierarchy that Kathleen Cleaver was sometimes beaten.
To bolster the assertion that Kathleen Cleaver did not voluntarily miss the
rally for Seale and Huggins, the newspaper supplement included a reprint of a
letter purportedly written by Kathleen Cleaver on Oct. 24, 1970 to comfort and
reassure the imprisoned Huggins.[64] "We share the same aspirations and
struggles," the letter said. Beside the text was a photograph of Kathleen
Cleaver with her toddler son Maceo, and inserted within the block of type was a
photograph of Ericka and her baby daughter Mai. The letter text that wrapped
around the picture of baby and mother had Kathleen saying, "I always think of
the pain you feel at being torn asunder from Mai."
Readers may have been left with the impression that Kathleen Cleaver was
committed to the Panthers and Huey Newton because another portion of the letter
said, "The picture of you (Ericka) standing in front of the New Haven courthouse
with clenched fist raised shouting 'Free Huey,' gives me new courage to persist
and perform even more powerfully every time I see it and think of you now. I
love you, Ericka, as all revolutionary sisters and brothers must, and we cannot
allow you to endure this torture much longer."[65]
The same edition of the newspaper carried a full page of rhetorical questions
in uppercase headline-size type that had the apparent goal of labeling Cleaver
as an enemy because of statements he made in other media.
IS ELDRIDGE CLEAVER ATTEMPTING TO DIVIDE THE BLACK PANTHER
PARTY ??? HE DENOUNCES CHIEF OF STAFF DAVID HILLIARD AND
MINISTER OF DEFENSE HUEY P. NEWTON. IS ELDRIDGE CLEAVER ATTEMPTING TO DIVIDE
THE COMMUNITY ??? HE DENOUNCES ANGELA DAVIS. IS ELDRIDGE CLEAVER ATTEMPTING TO
DIVIDE THE SOCIALIST WORLD ??? HE DENOUNCES CUBA."[66]
Ultimately, Newton expelled Cleaver and Cleaver expelled Newton and the various
chapters of the Panther party took sides.[67] The Panther newspaper duly
reported those aligning themselves with Newton while insisting that the party
was not divided.
The San Quentin branch of the party weighed in with a front page declaration
against Cleaver that said in part: "We stand with the Supreme Servant, Minister
Huey P. Newton ... You are an outcast ... Death is the only solution to the
problem you pose ... The grapevine has your name on it, along with the rest of
your clan."[68]
Five other major Panther officials, Emory Douglas, Masai Hewitt, Elbert "Big
Man" Howard, Bob Rush and Doug Miranda unequivocally lined up behind Newton in a
quarter-page homage that said in part: "We stand rock firm behind the Black
panther party, our beloved and courageous Central Committee and our leader,
Minister of Defense and Supreme Servant of the People, Huey P. Newton."[69]
From his jail cell in Connecticut, party Chairman Bobby Seale had the newspaper
publish a long statement that ran beneath the headline, "I am the chairman of
only one party."[70] He said the party had not been split, but that "Eldridge
Cleaver has personally defected his own self from the party."
For several months afterward, the newspaper reported killings of Panthers, but
unlike outside news sources and subsequent histories, the paper did not indicate
the likelihood that the deaths were a result of the the factional war between
"Newtonians" and "Cleaverites." The slayings were generally blamed on pigs, or
the readers were left to draw their own conclusions.
When Newton finally publicly addressed the Cleaver issue in the party
newspaper, his rebuke was atypically mild in comparison to those of other party
leaders and the greater portion of the four-page statement was critical of
Newton himself and the party. He continued to maintain that the party was not
divided and that Cleaver had left the party. He cleverly admitted that the party
had wavered from its devotion to the needs of black people because of Cleaver's
influence, but with his departure, the party would rededicate itself to its
original aim of serving the black masses.
Newton's statement was published in an April supplement to the main newspaper.
The Black Panther's front page teaser for the supplement bore a headline more
appropriate for an academic paper than a revolutionary tabloid: "On the
defection of Eldridge Cleaver from the Black Panther Party and the defection of
the Black Panther Party from the black community."[71]
"We had a contradiction with our former Minister of Information," Newton wrote
gently. He said Cleaver was fixated on the violence associated with the Panthers
and the party allowed itself to place too much emphasis on violence without
first building a strong relationship with the masses who would ultimately have
to bear the brunt of the revolution. The only truly vicious swipe Newton took at
Cleaver was in one paragraph:
Sometimes there are those who express personal problems in political terms,
and if they are eloquent, then these personal problems can sound very
political.
We charge Eldridge Cleaver with this. Much of it is probably beyond his
control,
because it is so personal."[72]
A few weeks before Newton published his take on Cleaver, the FBI had apparently
concluded that the wedge between the Panther's two major leaders was permanently
affixed. This was indicated in a memo that said in part," Since the differences
between Newton and Cleaver now appear to be irreconcilable, no further
counter-intelligence activity in this regard will be undertaken at this
time."[73]
Conclusion
The Black Panther Party newspaper reflected how the FBI's counterintelligence
programs were destroying the party's cohesion and in some cases causing its
members to be killed. It never did so overtly, apparently choosing instead to
conceal its vulnerability to such tactics. At worst, the paper depicted the
party as beleaguered by the FBI and other law enforcement agencies, but the
party was always presented as strong, defiant and dedicated to revolutionary
struggle. It was less of a newspaper, in conventional terms, than the public
face of the party. It showed only what it wanted shown to its members,
sympathizers, the impressionable public and its enemies. In a similar vein, it
did not disclose the self-destructive tendencies and practices of its membership
and leaders. These tendencies and practices alone may have been sufficient
weaken the party, but when subjected to the proddings of the FBI they were
virtually certain to bring the party down.
[1] The New York Times, Sept. 8, 1968.
[2] FBI Memorandum from Director to all field offices, August 25, 1967.
[3] Ibid.
[4] FBI Memorandum from C. Sullivan to G.C. Moore, February 29, 1968, expanding
Cointelpro field offices from 23 to 41.
[5] James Kirkpatrick Davis, Spying on America, The FBI's Domestic
Counterintelligence Program, (New York: Praeger Publishers, 1992).
[6] Athan Theoharis, Spying on Americans, Political Surveillance from Hoover to
the Huston Plan, (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1978).
[7] Tyrus G. Fain, comp., The Intelligence Community, History, Organization,
and Issues, (New York: R.R. Bowker Company. 1977).
[8] Ward Churchill and Jim Vander Wall, The Cointelpro Papers, Documents from
the FBI's Secret Wars Against Dissent in the United States, (Boston: South End
Press, 1990).
[9] Hugh Pearson, The Shadow of the Panther, Huey Newton and the Price of
Black Power in America, (Reading, Mass.: Addison-Wesley Publishing Co., 1994).
[10] Huey P. Newton, "War Against the Panthers: A Study of Repression in
America" (Ph.D. diss., University of California - Santa Cruz, 1980).
[11] Davis, Spying on America, 7.
[12] FBI Memorandum, Headquarters to Field Offices, September 21, 1966.
[13] FBI Memorandum, Richmond Field Office to Headquarters, June 26, 1966.
[14] See generally, Ward Churchill and Jim Vander Wall, The Cointelpro Papers,
Documents from the FBI's Secret Wars Against Dissent in the United States,
(Boston: South End Press, 1990).
[15] Ibid.
[16] Police Officer John F. Fuey was killed in the Oct. 27, 1967 confrontation
and Huey Newton was shot four times.
[17] April 11, 1968.
[18] FBI Airtel to SAC Albany from Director, FBI, March 4, 1968.
[19] See generally, Black Panther, 16 March, 1968.
[20] Black Panther, 4 January,1969, p.3.
[21] Black Panther, 14 September, 1968, p. 10.
[22] Black Panther, 16 August, 1969, p. 5.
[23] Black Panther, 31 May, 1970, p. 20.
[24] FBI Airtel to SAC Albany from Director, FBI, March 4, 1968.
[25] Churchill and Vander Hall, Cointelpro Papers, 128.
[26] See generally, Davis, Spying on America .
[27] The Black Panther, 7 December, 1968, p.15.
[28] FBI Memorandum from SAC Los Angeles to Director, FBI, November 29, 1968.
[29] FBI Memorandum, from George C. Moore to W.C. Sullivan, November, 5, 1968.
[30] FBI Memorandum, from SAC Los Angeles to Director, FBI, November, 29, 1968.
[31] The Black Panther, 25 January, 1969, p.2.
[32] Black Panther, 2 February, 1969, p. 1.
[33] Ibid.
[34] Davis, Spying on America, 102; Hugh Pearson, The Shadow of the Panther,
Huey Newton and the Price of Black Power in America, (Reading, Mass.:
Addison-Wesley Publishing Co., 1994), 181.
[35] Black Panther, 4 January, 1969, p.6.
[36] Black Panther, 25 January, 1969, p. 17.
[37] Ibid.
[38] Black Panther, 3 March, 1969, p.10.
[39] Black Panther, 20 April, 1969, p. 8.
[40] Ibid.
[41] FBI Memorandum, From: San Francisco, To: Director, FBI, April 23, 1969.
[42] Black Panther, 21 March, 1970, p. 18.
[43] The child apparently was the daughter of two adults, James and Gwen Akili,
who were also pictured in the item and expelled.
[44] Black Panther, 17 February, 1969, p. 9.
[45] John Kifner, "Panther Chief of Security was Paid FBI Informer," The New
York Times, 13 February, 1974, p. 18.
[46] Davis, Spying on America, 97-127.
[47] Airtel to Director, FBI From: SAC Chicago, Dec. 11, 1969.
[48] Churchill and Vander Wall, Cointelpro Papers.
[49] Huey P. Newton, "War Against the Panthers: A Study of Repression in
America" (Ph.D. diss., University of California - Santa Cruz, 1980.)
[50] Ward Churchill and Jim Vander Wall, Cointelpro Papers, 148.
[51] Newton himself refers to his emotional problems in his dissertation, "War
Against the Panthers," and Hugh Pearson repeatedly refers to Newton's sometimes
psychotic behavior in his book, The Shadow of the Panther.
[52] Hugh Pearson, Shadow of the Panther, 222.
[53] Ibid, 229.
[54] FBI Memorandum, From: G.C. Moore, To: W.C. Sullivan, May 14, 1970.
[55] Matthews' mission is confirmed by Newton in his dissertation "The War
Against the Panthers," and by Hugh Pearson in his book, The Shadow of the
Panther.
[56] FBI Memorandum , From: San Francisco Field Office to Hqtrs, Jan. 18, 1971.
[57] Black Panther, 13 February, 1971, p. 12.
[58] Ibid.
[59] Ibid.
[60] Ibid, p.13.
[61] FBI Memorandum From: Hqtrs, To: San Francisco Field Office, Feb. 24, 1971.
[62] Black Panther, 6 March, 1971, Supplement B.
[63] Ibid.
[64] Kathleen Cleaver, "Letter From Kathleen Cleaver to Ericka Huggins," Black
Panther, 6 March, 1971, Supplement D.
[65] Ibid.
[66] Black Panther, 6 March, 1971, Supplement D.
[67] See generally, Hugh Pearson, Shadow of the Panther, and Huey P. Newton,
"War Against the Panthers: A Study of Repression in America" (Ph.D. diss.,
University of California - Santa Cruz, 1980.
[68] Black Panther, 20 March, 1971, p. 1.
[69] Ibid, p. 12.
[70] Black Panther, 3 April, 1971, p. 2.
[71] Black Panther, 17 April, 1971, p. 1.
[72] Ibid, Supplement.
[73] FBI Memorandum From: Hqtrs, To: San Francisco, March 25, 1971.
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