Black Panther Party

The Black Panther Party (originally called the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense) was a revolutionary, Black nationalist organization in the United States that formed in the late 1960s and grew to national prominence before falling apart due to a combination of internal problems and suppression by state actors, especially the Federal Bureau of Investigation (which included assassination, arrests and stirring-up of factional rivalries via infiltration). It is best known for its Free Breakfast for Children program, its use of the term "Pigs" to describe police officers and for once carrying guns on the floor of the California Assembly.

Ten point plan

The party was founded on a ten point program, listed below and available here http://lists.village.virginia.edu/sixties/HTML_docs/Resources/Primary/Manifestos/Panther_platform.html in full with the party's explanatory comments for each of the points. The Ten Point Plan was one of the party's central documents, and distributing it was a major method of propaganda, education and recruitment.

Related Topics:
Document - Propaganda - Education - Recruitment

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The Ten Points:

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• We want freedom. We want power to determine the destiny of our Black Community.
• We want full employment for our people.
• We want an end to the robbery by the white man of our Black Community.
• We want decent housing, fit for shelter of human beings.
• We want education for our people that exposes the true nature of this decadent American society. We want education that teaches us our true history and our role in the present-day society.
• We want all black men to be exempt from military service.
• We want an immediate end to police brutality and murder of black people.
• We want freedom for all black men held in federal, state, county and city prisons and jails.
• We want all black people when brought to trial to be tried in court by a jury of their peer group or people from their black communities, as defined by the Constitution of the United States.
• We want land, bread, housing, education, clothing, justice and peace.