The main idea of black power relative to mid-1960s discontent essay Essay should be about 1000 words in length. Explain how the creation of new democratic

The main idea of black power relative to mid-1960s discontent essay Essay should be about 1000 words in length.
Explain how the creation of new democratic institutions appears
in the particular view of human freedom and social justice that
Kwame Ture and Charles Hamilton present in Black Power. VINTAGE EDITION, NOVEMBER 1992
“Afterword, 1992” by Kwame Ture copyright © 1992 by Kwame Ture
“Afterword, 1992” by Charles V. Hamilton copyright © 1992 by Charles
V. Hamilton
Copyright © 1967 by Stokely Carmichael and Charles Hamilton
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in
the United States of America by Vintage Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York,
and distributed in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto. Originally published,
in somewhat different form, by Random House, Inc., in 1967.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Carmichael, Stokely.
Black power : the politics of liberation in America / Stokely
Carmichael & Charles V. Hamilton.
p. cm.
Originally published: New York : Random House, © 1967.
eISBN: 978-0-307-79527-4
1. Black power. 2. Afro-Americans—Politics and government.
I. Hamilton, Charles V. II. Title.
[E185.615.C32 1992]
323.1?196073—dc20 92-60284
The authors wish to thank the following for permission to quote material which appears in this
volume:
The New Republic, for permission to quote from “A Time to be Black,” by Bruce Detweiler, © 1966,
Harrison-Blaine of New Jersey, Inc.; and from “Accommodating Whites: A New Look at
Mississippi,” by Christopher Jencks, © 1966, Harrison-Blaine of New Jersey, Inc.; The Tuskegee
News, for permission to quote from a letter to the editor, January 20, 1966; The National Review, for
permission to quote from “Organized Labor and the Negro Worker,” by Myrna Bain, © 1963; Hill and
Wang, Inc., for permission to quote from From Plantation to Ghetto by August Meier and Elliot
Rudwick, © 1966; The Nation, for permission to quote from “Murder in Tuskegee: Day of Wrath in
the Model Town,” by Arnold Kaufman, © 1966; Saturday Evening Post, for permission to quote from
“A New White Backlash,” © 1966; Professor Kenneth Clark, Ebony magazine, and Harper and Row,
Inc., for permission to quote from “What Motivates American Whites,” from Ebony magazine, ©
1965, Johnson Publishing Co., Inc., and from Dark Ghetto, © 1965, Harper & Row, Inc.; Random
House, Inc., for permission to quote from Crisis in Black and White, by Charles Silberman, © 1964,
Random House, Inc.; Prentice-Hall, Inc., for permission to quote from Racial Crisis in America:
Leadership in Conflict by Lewis Killian and Charles Grigg, © 1964; from The Negro Leadership
Class by Daniel Thompson, © 1963; and from The American Negro Reference Book edited by John
P. Davis, © 1966.
v3.1
This book is dedicated to our mothers, Mrs. Mabel Carmichael (affectionately known as May
Charles) and Mrs. Viola White, and to all the black mothers who have struggled through the
centuries so that this generation could fight for black power
Our thanks to Ivanhoe Donaldson, who made a major contribution in Chapter VII, to SNCC
and to all the people in the struggle with whom we worked, for their help, insights and
strength in the formation and articulation of the ideas presented in this book.
FROM THE AUTHORS, 1992
Our paths have taken different routes in the twenty-five years since the publication of this book in
1967. But our commitment to the political struggle of our people in Africa and around the world has
remained consistent.
Indeed, one of us (Kwame Ture) began organizing the All African Peoples Revolutionary Party in
1967 and became an officially recognized member of its central committee when it was publicly
announced in 1972. Kwame Ture has lived in the Peoples Revolutionary Republic of Guinea since
1968. His ideas and understanding of the fight for Pan Africanism under an all-African Socialist
Government have been sharpened by his work and study with Kwame Nkrumah, co-president of the
Peoples Revolutionary Republic of Guinea, and Guinean President Sekou Toure prior to their deaths.
Charles V. Hamilton, since 1969, has been a professor of political science at Columbia University.
He has written several books on American politics, race, and public policy during this time.
Many readers have asked us over the years how our views have changed, if at all. We certainly
hope so, and the Afterwords should reflect this from our individual perspectives and experiences.
From these accounts, the readers can make their assessments. We attempt to be brutally honest about
our respective positions, self-critical, and always mindful that our analyses and emphases will and
should be subject to evaluation and criticism. We do not reject this scrutiny. We believe that a correct
understanding of the nature of our struggle is essential. And we hope that our individual subsequent
thoughts will aid this process. We both are far more keenly sensitive to the international implications
of our struggle than our initial presentation indicated. We both believe that until Africa is free, no
African anywhere in the world will be free. To us, this is self-evident. It is also self-evident that the
revolutionary struggle for that goal will not be deterred.
Kwame Ture
Charles V. Hamilton
JULY 1992
This book presents a political framework and ideology which represents the last reasonable
opportunity for this society to work out its racial problems short of prolonged destructive
guerrilla warfare. That such violent warfare may be unavoidable is not herein denied. But if
there is the slightest chance to avoid it, the politics of Black Power as described in this book is
seen as the only viable hope.
STOKELY CARMICHAEL,
CHARLES V. HAMILTON
AUGUST 1967
CONTENTS
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Acknowledgements
Epigraph
PREFACE
I WHITE POWER: THE COLONIAL SITUATION
II BLACK POWER: ITS NEED AND SUBSTANCE
III THE MYTHS OF COALITION
IV MISSISSIPPI FREEDOM DEMOCRATS: BANKRUPTCY OF THE ESTABLISHMENT
V BLACK-BELT ELECTION: NEW DAY A’COMING
VI TUSKEGEE, ALABAMA: THE POLITICS OF DEFERENCE
VII DYNAMITE IN THE GHETTO
VIII THE SEARCH FOR NEW FORMS
AFTERWORD: “T. C. B.”
AFTERWORD, 1992 BY KWAME TURE
AFTERWORD, 1992 BY CHARLES V. HAMILTON
BIBLIOGRAPHY
PREFACE
This book is about why, where and in what manner black people in America must get themselves
together. It is about black people taking care of business—the business of and for black people. The
stakes are really very simple: if we fail to do this, we face continued subjection to a white society
that has no intention of giving up willingly or easily its position of priority and authority. If we
succeed, we will exercise control over our lives, politically, economically and psychically. We will
also contribute to the development of a viable larger society; in terms of ultimate social benefit, there
is nothing unilateral about the movement to free black people.
We present no pat formulas in this book for ending racism. We do not offer a blueprint; we cannot
set any timetables for freedom. This is not a handbook for the working organizer; it will not tell him
exactly how to proceed in day-to-day decision-making. If we tried to do any of those things, our book
would be useless and literally dead within a year or two. For the rules are being changed constantly.
Black communities are using different means, including armed rebellion, to achieve their ends. Out of
these various experiments come programs. This is our experience: programs do not come out of the
minds of any one person or two people such as ourselves, but out of day-to-day work, out of
interaction between organizers and the communities in which they work.
Therefore our aim is to offer a framework. We are calling here for broad experimentation in
accordance with the concept of Black Power, and we will suggest certain guidelines, certain specific
examples of such experiments. We start with the assumption that in order to get the right answers, one
must pose the right questions. In order to find effective solutions, one must formulate the problem
correctly. One must start from premises rooted in truth and reality rather than myth.
In addition, we aim to define and encourage a new consciousness among black people which will
make it possible for us to proceed toward those answers and those solutions. This consciousness,
which will be defined more fully in Chapter II, might be called a sense of peoplehood: pride, rather
than shame, in blackness, and an attitude of brotherly, communal responsibility among all black
people for one another.
To ask the right questions, to encourage a new consciousness and to suggest new forms which
express it: these are the basic purposes of our book.
It follows that there are statements in this book which most whites and some black people would
prefer not to hear. The whole question of race is one that America would much rather not face
honestly and squarely. To some, it is embarrassing; to others, it is inconvenient; to still others, it is
confusing. But for black Americans, to know it and tell it like it is and then to act on that knowledge
should be neither embarrassing nor inconvenient nor confusing. Those responses are luxuries for
people with time to spare, who feel no particular sense of urgency about the need to solve certain
serious social problems. Black people in America have no time to play nice, polite parlor games—
especially when the lives of their children are at stake. Some white Americans can afford to speak
softly, tread lightly, employ the soft-sell and put-off (or is it put-down?). They own the society. For
black people to adopt their methods of relieving our oppression is ludicrous. We blacks must
respond in our own way, on our own terms, in a manner which fits our temperaments. The definitions
of ourselves, the roles we pursue, the goals we seek are our responsibility.
It is crystal clear that the society is capable of and willing to reward those individuals who do not
forcefully condemn it—to reward them with prestige, status and material benefits. But these crumbs
of co-optation should be rejected. The over-riding, all-important fact is that as a people, we have
absolutely nothing to lose by refusing to play such games.
Camus and Sartre have asked: Can a man condemn himself? Can whites, particularly liberal
whites, condemn themselves? Can they stop blaming blacks and start blaming their own system? Are
they capable of the shame which might become a revolutionary emotion? We—black people—have
found that they usually cannot condemn themselves; therefore black Americans must do it. (We also
offer, in Chapter III of this book, our ideas of what whites can do who want to be helpful.)
Anything less than clarity, honesty and forcefulness perpetuates the centuries of sliding over,
dressing up, and soothing down the true feelings, hopes and demands of an oppressed black people.
Mild demands and hypocritical smiles mislead white America into thinking that all is fine and
peaceful. They mislead white America into thinking that the path and pace chosen to deal with racial
problems are acceptable to masses of black Americans. It is far better to speak forcefully and
truthfully. Only when one’s true self—white or black—is exposed, can this society proceed to deal
with the problems from a position of clarity and not from one of misunderstanding.
Thus we have no intention of engaging in the rather meaningless language so common to
discussions of race in America: “Granted, things were and are bad, but we are making progress”;
“Granted, your demands are legitimate, but we cannot move hastily. Stable societies are best built
slowly”; “Be careful that you do not anger or alienate your white allies; remember, after all, you are
only ten percent of the population.” We reject this language and these views, whether expressed by
black or white; we leave them to others to mouth, because we do not feel that this rhetoric is either
relevant or useful.
Rather, we would suggest a more meaningful language, that of Frederick Douglass, a black
American who understood the nature of protest in this society:
Those who profess to favor freedom yet deprecate agitation, are men who want crops without
plowing up the ground; they want rain without thunder and lightning. They want the ocean
without the awful roar of its many waters.… Power concedes nothing without demand. It never
did and it never will. Find out just what any people will quietly submit to and you have found
out the exact measure of injustice and wrong which will be imposed upon them, and these will
continue till they are resisted with either words or blow, or with both. The limits of tyrants are
prescribed by the endurance of those whom they oppress.1
Finally, it should be noted that this book does not discuss at length the international situation, the
relationship of our black liberation struggle to the rest of the world. But Black Power means that
black people see themselves as part of a new force, sometimes called the “Third World”; that we see
our struggle as closely related to liberation struggles around the world. We must hook up with these
struggles. We must, for example, ask ourselves: when black people in Africa begin to storm
Johannesburg, what will be the role of this nation—and of black people here? It seems inevitable that
this nation would move to protect its financial interests in South Africa, which means protecting white
rule in South Africa. Black people in this country then have the responsibility to oppose, at least to
neutralize, that effort by white America.
This is but one example of many such situations which have already arisen around the world—with
more to come. There is only one place for black Americans in these struggles, and that is on the side
of the Third World. Frantz Fanon, in The Wretched of the Earth, puts forth clearly the reasons for this
and the relationship of the concept called Black Power to the concept of a new force in the world:
Let us decide not to imitate Europe; let us try to create the whole man, whom Europe has been
incapable of bringing to triumphant birth.
Two centuries ago, a former European colony decided to catch up with Europe. It succeeded
so well that the United States of America became a monster, in which the taints, the sickness and
the inhumanity of Europe have grown to appalling dimensions.…
The Third World today faces Europe like a colossal mass whose aim should be to try to
resolve the problems to which Europe has not been able to find the answers …
It is a question of the Third World starting a new history of Man, a history which will have
regard to the sometimes prodigious theses which Europe has put forward, but which will also
not forget Europe’s crimes, of which the most horrible was committed in the heart of man, and
consisted of the pathological tearing apart of his functions and the crumbling away of his unity.
No, there is no question of a return to nature. It is simply a very concrete question of not
dragging men towards mutilation, of not imposing upon the brain rhythms which very quickly
obliterate it and wreck it. The pretext of catching up must not be used to push man around, to tear
him away from himself or from his privacy, to break and kill him.
No, we do not want to catch up with anyone. What we want to do is go forward all the time,
night and day, in the company of Man, in the company of all men … [pp. 253–55].
1 West India
Emancipation Speech, August, 1857.
CHAPTER I
WHITE POWER: The Colonial Situation
The dark ghettos are social, political, educational and—above all—economic colonies.
Their inhabitants are subject peoples, victims of the greed, cruelty, insensitivity, guilt, and
fear of their masters.
DR. KENNETH B. CLARK,
Dark Ghetto, p. 11.*
In an age of decolonization, it may be fruitful to regard the problem of the American Negro
as a unique case of colonialism, an instance of internal imperialism, an underdeveloped
people in our very midst.
I. F. STONE,
The New York Review of Books
(August 18, 1966), p. 10.
What is racism? The word has represented daily reality to millions of black people for centuries,
yet it is rarely defined—perhaps just because that reality has been such a commonplace. By “racism”
we mean the predication of decisions and policies on considerations of race for the purpose of
subordinating a racial group and maintaining control over that group. That has been the practice of
this country toward the black man; we shall see why and how.
Racism is both overt and covert. It takes two, closely related forms: individual whites acting
against individual blacks, and acts by the total white community against the black community. We call
these individual racism and institutional racism. The first consists of overt acts by individuals, which
cause death, injury or the violent destruction of property. This type can be recorded by television
cameras; it can frequently be observed in the process of commission. The second type is less overt,
far more subtle, less identifiable in terms of specific individuals committing the acts. But it is no less
destructive of human life. The second type originates in the operation of established and respected
forces in the society, and thus receives far less public condemnation than the first type.
When white terrorists bomb a black church and kill five black children, that is an act of individual
racism, widely deplored by most segments of the society. But when in that same city—Birmingham,
Alabama—five hundred black babies die each year because of the lack of proper food, shelter and
medical facilities, and thousands more are destroyed and maimed physically, emotionally and
intellectually because of conditions of poverty and discrimination in the black community, that is a
function of institutional racism. When a black family moves into a home in a white neighborhood and
is stoned, burned or routed out, they are victims of an overt act of individual racism which many
people will condemn—at least in words. But it is institutional racism that keeps black people locked
in dilapidated slum tenements, subject to the daily prey of exploitative slumlords, merchants, loan
sharks and discriminatory real estate agents. The society either pretends it does not know of this latter
situation, or is in fact incapable of doing anything meaningful about it. We shall examine the reasons
for this in a moment.
Institutional racism relies on the active and pervasive operation of anti-black attitudes and
practices. A sense of superior group position prevails: whites are “better” than blacks; therefore
blacks should be subordinated to whites. This is a racist attitude and it permeates the society, on both
the individual and institutional level, covertly and overtly.
“Respectable” individuals can absolve themselves from individual blame: they would never plant
a bomb in a church; they would never stone a black family. But they continue to support political
officials and institutions that would and do perpetuate institutionally racist policies. Thus acts of
overt, individual racism may not typify the society, but institutional racism does—with the support of
covert, individual attitudes of racism. As Charles Silberman wrote, in Crisis in Black and White,
What we are discovering, in short, is that the United States—all of it, North as well as South,
West as well as East—is a racist society in a sense and to a degree that we have refused so far
to admit, much less face.… The tragedy of race relations in the United States is that there is no
American Dilemma. White Americans are not torn and tortured by the conflict between their
devotion to the American creed and their actual behavior. They are upset by the current state of
race relations, to be sure. But what troubles them is not that justice is being denied but that their
peace is being shattered and their business interrupted [pp. 9–10].
To put it another way, there is no “American dilemma” because black people in this country form a
colony, and it is not in the intere…
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