- Narrator: The panther was chosen as their symbol. It is a beautiful black animal which never attacks, but, defends itself ferociously.
- Narrator: They no longer carry arms, even if they speak of them often. Quoting Mao, dreaming of obtaining power through guns, and justice through power.
- Narrator: On this Sunday, in August 1968, their purpose is to have one of their leaders, Huey Newton, released from jail. When they sing, they sing: Free Huey. When they dance, the clinch their fists.
- Narrator: Oakland. Population 400,000. 32% black. In Merritt College, two students, Huey Newton and Bobby Seale. Later they began to organize their brothers against their closest enemy, the police, whom they call the pigs.
- Narrator: In 1966, taking advantage of a law which authorized the carrying of visible arms, patrols of the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense cruised in the ghetto following police cars. As soon as a black is arrested, the check the procedure, making sure the laws observed and that the brother knows his rights. As a result, the police hate them and the black community admires them.
- 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.
- Narrator: The Oakland Police, well known for its brutality, never misses the chance to harass the Black Panthers, to search them, to trap them, to enter their houses without warrants, and even to shot them. As they did Bobby Hutton, 17 years old, who was running without arms, having left a basement where he and Eldridge Cleaver had taken refuge after a gun battle involving 50 policemen shooting 1000 rounds. It was April 6, two days after the assignation of Martin Luther King.
- 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.
- Stokely Carmichael: I think its clear, especially clear, that the United States has declared war on black people. She said that when she took the first black man from Africa. Now, of course, she's never said those words and some people expect her to come out and say, "I declare war on black people." But, now the United States, to this day, has not declared war on Vietnam. But, they're in Vietnam. They have not declared war in North Korea. But, they fought in North Korea. And they did not declare war on the Indians either. They just wiped them out. So, we must define our condition. We are at war.
- Narrator: The use of brother and sister has gone beyond the traditional soul meaning. It now means comrade in the political sense. This is the Black Panther style: black leather, black berets, black sunglasses, return to African dress, to natural hairdo, and promotion of women to the political and military life of the party.
- Stokely Carmichael: He is in jail. He is a prisoner of war. We must get him by any means necessary. If we cannot get him, we must - we *must* - retaliate. Period.
- 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.
- Kathleen Cleaver: Black people, in general, are responsive to what we say - especially young black people. And the white people that invite us, they're curious or they want information in the Peace and Freedom Party and they're usually very grateful because the Black Panther Party has a rational program and a rational explanation for the many confusing things that are happening around this country. Whereas, they might invite some speakers who rant and rave and talk about "Hate White People" "Burn" "Kill" etc. And they can't really understand it - they can't isolate it. The Black Panther Party will give them an ideological perspective and separate the institutions from the citizens. The government from the people. And point out the institutions, in particular, the pigs, the police department, the educational system, the economic system, to be attacked. And do not attack the individuals because of the color of their skin.
- Kathleen Cleaver: This brother here, myself, all of us, where born with our hair like this and we just wear it like this. Because, it's natural. Because, the reason for it, you might say, is like a new awareness among black people that their own natural appearance, physical appearance, is beautiful. It's pleasing to them. The women want to please men and if men accept it as beautiful, then women will do it.
- Kathleen Cleaver: For so many, many years, we were told that only white people were beautiful. Only straight hair, light eyes, light skin, was beautiful. And so, black women would try everything they could to straighten their hair, lighten their skin, to look as much like white women. And the black men would let it be known that thought white women were beautiful. And they'd say they didn't want any ugly black woman with short hair. This whole thing. But, this has changed; because, black people are aware, now, that their own appearance is beautiful. They're proud of it. And white people are aware of it too; because, white people now want a natural wig. They want wigs like this. Dig it. Isn't it beautiful? Alright!
- Eldridge Cleaver: We have the pigs uptight. They don't know where we are. They don't know whether all of us represented here. But, they know that we represent a manifestation of the black community.
- White tourist: There seems to be quite a bit of furor in the colored community about the trial. And they keep demonstrating in front of the courthouse. They want to free Huey - whether he's guilty or not.
- Stokely Carmichael: It is a question of an oppression force moving against a repressed people. Brother Huey P. Newton represents all black people who are taken into those prisons.
- Female Black Panther Demonstrators: Black is beautiful!
- Male Black Panther Demonstrators: Free Huey!
- Female Black Panther Demonstrators: Set our warrior free!
- Male Black Panther Demonstrators: Free Huey!
- Female Black Panther Demonstrators: No more brothers in jail.
- Male Black Panther Demonstrators: Off the pigs!
- Female Black Panther Demonstrators: The pigs are gonna catch hell!
- Male Black Panther Demonstrators: Off the pigs!
- 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.
- [last lines]
- Narrator: The story of the Black Panthers is not over.
- Male Black Panther Demonstrators: Off the pigs!
- Female Black Panther Demonstrators: Revolution has come!
- Male Black Panther Demonstrators: Off the pigs!
- Female Black Panther Demonstrators: Time to pick up the guns!
- Eldridge Cleaver: He must be set free. Don't let the pigs, who invade our community, were out to kill him, because of what he was teaching, because of the political party he has organized.
- Narrator: After nine months of jail, this trial if held at the county courthouse. The Black Panthers keep watch in front of the building, making of this case a test case for their political battle. So while the blacks and some whites scream: Free Huey - without even raising the question of his possible guilt. And the courthouse lawn becomes an open forum where they discuss Chairman Mao and teach the Black Panther program.
- 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.