Fred Hampton Essay

One such member was Fred Hampton. Fred Hampton was a young member of the party, but one of the strongest revolutionaries. Hampton was a chairman of the Illinois Black Panther chapter at the age of 20. At 15 he organized NAACP chapters at his high school. Hampton was well known as the charismatic party member. His most influential ideology was education. He believed that radical change was nothing without education because after the revolution occurs, the same type of oppression would just repeat itself. Hampton was widely beloved because he appealed to all groups of oppressed people. He preached the unity of all races against government exploitation, capitalism, and racism. The Black Panther Party was able to form strong relationships with

Unfortunately, this made Hampton a clear threat in the eyes of the government and the FBI. His ability to unify different groups was seen as a major threat to the status quo of racism and classism that the government tries to maintain. Fred Hampton was assassinated by the FBI in his apartment while he was asleep next to his eight-and-a-half-month pregnant partner. Nearly one hundred bullets were fired, with only one bullet coming from the Panthers. The single bullet was the result of a gun accidentally discharging, not from Mark Clark or Fred Hampton trying to shoot back at the FBI. There was even evidence that the police created fake bullet holes with nails to falsify a struggle. All this evidence still did not stop a jury from determining that this raid and murder was justified. Hampton may have been brutally murdered, but his legacy continues. As he said himself, “You can kill a revolutionary, but you can’t kill a revolution.” This rang true for his followers as they continued to spread his message of racial unity against oppressive

It had newspapers circulating, fostered a deep sense of pride and community, and served the people of their communities. Despite their progress, the Party faced extreme difficulties and complications. Two of the most detrimental and destructive forces acting against the Black Panther Party were the U.S. government and the FBI. As previously discussed, Huey Newton had thoroughly studied gun laws in order to be completely well versed on the subjected. He wanted to ensure that the Panthers were operating legally in terms of their open-carry tactics. As a direct opposition to this, Californian Republicans passed anti-gun legislation. The Mulford Act of 1967 was passed, outlawing the public carrying of loaded firearms. The initial bill was met with bipartisan support, as the Panthers were perceived as being a genuine threat to the lives of police officers and white Americans. According to The Revolution Has Come, the Panthers had previously been able to openly carry firearms because of Oakland’s liberal gun laws, but the Mumford Act closed the loopholes allowing for open carrying, thus leading the Panther’s guns into a part of underground