Black Panthers (1968)

Huey P. Newton: Self

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Quotes 

• Huey P. Newton : My mail and books are constantly held up. My attorneys have put a bunch of pressure on the authorities here to give me a book. I always read the book and I'm out of reading material for months sometimes.

  Interviewer : How about writing? Do you get to do any writing while you're confined?

  Huey P. Newton : Yes, only I have to be careful of what I write because periodically they have a shakedown or they...

  Interviewer : Confiscate them?

  Huey P. Newton : Yeah, right. My books too. The books that come in through the mail, they take them for some reason.

  Interviewer : What are these books?

  Huey P. Newton : Malcolm X Speaks. Quotations of Chairman Mao. A couple of other books.

• Huey P. Newton : I've been in solitary confinement for approximately three months now. When I was outside of solitary confinement, I was still confined to a cell, a 7 x 7. I haven't been outside of the 7 x 7 in nine months, other than to take a shower.

• Huey P. Newton : It's a Marxist-Leninist program and I was greatly influenced by the Cuban Revolution. And the Black Panther Party are practical revolutionaries. We identify with the armed struggles of colonized people around the world.

• Huey P. Newton : The community has been very receptive and responsive to my being in prison. They view me as a political prisoner - which I am. It's helped to mobilize the community. My case is definitely a confrontation between the police department, in particular, between the establishment and the colonized black people, in general.

• Huey P. Newton : The role of the black woman in the Black Panther Party is exactly the same as a man. That we make no distinction, what ever. Women hold ranking positions in the Party. They are all instructed and are military trained. They're expected to perform duties, not on a sex level; but, just as a party member and revolutionary.

• Huey P. Newton : The Black Panther Party has succeeded in lifting the consciousness of the community. I'm very optimistic at this point because I feel that the black community is already received a victory.

• Huey P. Newton : The mind and body theory for years, ever since slavery, that blacks have been considered the body, to do the work, and the white population, the mind or the omnipotent administrator. In this country, the white radicals used to attempt to be the theoreticians for themselves and also for the black radicals. But, now, the white radicals are gaining the body by engaging in activities, certain resistances, demonstrations, and so forth, even confrontations with the arm of the establishment, which is the police force. So, they're gaining the body. The blacks are gaining the mind; because, we no longer will stand for *anyone* to be our theoritician. We will decide our ideology as well as engage the practice. So, there's a unity achieved between the white radicals and the black colony.