The Black Panther Party

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The Black Panther Party was founded on October, 15, 1966 by Bobby Seale and Huey Newton in Oakland, California. This organization was a black revolutionary socialist party that was created to primarily protect African American neighborhoods from violent police brutality. In 1967, the party released and circulated its first newspaper, The Black Panther. Within the same year the organization also protested a ban on weapons in Sacramento on the California State Capitol. After becoming an icon of the 1960's counterculture, the Party was see in numerous cities throughout the nation, with record membership at 10,000 in 1969. Editor of The Black Panther, Eldridge Cleaver and his editorial committee created a document called the Ten-Point Program. This document was comprised of desired wants and needs for the black community, such as; freedom, employment, bread, housing, education, clothing, justice and peace. The Black Panthers expressed their injustices with their saying of, "What we Want, What we Believe". Not only did this document demand specific wants for the panthers, it was also a sign of hope and inspiration for the underprivileged blacks that lived in ghettos across the nation. With a strong passion to turn around the poor black communities, the Panthers installed a variety of community social programs that were made to improve several aspects of the inner city ghettos. Two of their most commonly known programs were its Free Breakfast for children program and its armed citizens patrol that made sure police officers behaved within their limit of power and to protect blacks who became victims of racist police brutality abuse. They also instituted a free medical care program and fought the common problem of young blacks using narco... ... middle of paper ... ... very good example of a primary source, by reading this source we the audience are told exactly what the people on December 29th, 1969 are told which gives us a good inside look into the details of everything that is occurring at the time. I, personally would not use this source normally because I feel it was too short and did not display as much information as a normal primary source would. Although I feel this way, the article still does a great job at getting the information out easily and effectively. The strengths this article presets is its quotes coming from governmental representatives and primary examples of how the police took advantage of their powers and authority towards the Black Panthers. The weaknesses the article presents is its short length and its inability to present primary quotes from the opposing side (members of the Black Panther Party).

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