New Black Panther Party

New Black Panther Party (NBPP), whose formal name is the New Black Panther Party for Self-Defense, is a U.S.-based black political organization founded in Dallas, Texas in 1989. Despite its name, NBPP is not an official successor to the Black Panther Party. Members of the original Black Panther Party have insisted that the newer party is illegitimate and have strongly objected that there "is no new Black Panther Party. The Anti-Defamation League and the Southern Poverty Law Center classify the New Black Panthers as a hate group.

When former Nation of Islam (NOI) minister Khalid Abdul Muhammad became the national chairman of the NBPP from the late 1990s until his death in 2001, the group attracted many breakaway members of the NOI. The NBPP is currently led by Malik Zulu Shabazz; it upholds Khalid Abdul Muhammad as the de facto father of the movement.

In April 2010, Malik Zulu Shabazz appointed French Black supremacist leader Stellio Capo Chichi as the representative of the movement in France. Capo Chichi has been holding the position of head of the francophone branch of NBPP.

Philosophy, ideology, and criticism

The New Black Panther Party identifies with the original Black Panther Party and claims to uphold its legacy. It also says that many others see the organization similarly. The NBPP is largely seen by both the general public and by prominent members of the original party as illegitimate. Huey Newton Foundation members, containing a significant number of the original party's leaders, once successfully sued the group; their ultimate objective in doing so — to prevent the NBPP from using the Panther name — appears to have been unsuccessful. In response to the suit, Aaron Michaels branded the original Panthers "has-been wannabe Panthers", adding: "Nobody can tell us who we can call ourselves.

Although the NBPP says it sees capitalism as the fundamental problem with the world and "revolution" as the solution, the new party does not draw its influences from Marxism or Maoism as the original party did. Instead, it promotes the Kawaida theory of Maulana Karenga, which includes black unity, collective action, and cooperative economics. The NBPP says it fights the oppression of black and brown people and that its members are on top of current issues facing black communities across the world. Also, it notes that not all its members are NOI, though the group acknowledges universal "spirituality" practices within the organization.

Over time, many groups subscribing to varying degrees of radicalism have called for the "right to self-determination" for black people, particularly US blacks. Critics of the NBPP say that the group's politics represent a dangerous departure from the original intent of black nationalism; specifically, that they are starkly anti-white, and also anti-Semitic. The Southern Poverty Law Center classifies the NBPP as a "black racist" hate group. Even the mildest critics of the organization have said that the NBPP's provocative brand of black supremacy undermines other civil rights efforts.

The Southern Poverty Law Center, a NBPP critic, has noted Muhammad's statement that "there are no good crackers, and if you find one, kill him before he changes.

Background

In 1987 Michael McGee, an alderman in Milwaukee, threatened to disrupt white events throughout the city unless more jobs were created for black people. He held a "state of the inner city" press conference in 1990 at City Hall to announce the creation of the Black Panther Militia. Aaron Michaels, a community activist and radio producer, was inspired to establish the New Black Panther Party.

Michaels rose to widespread attention for the first time when he called on blacks to use shotguns and rifles in Philadelphia to protest against the chairman of a school board who had been taped calling black students "little niggers. In 1998, the attorney Khalid Abdul Muhammad brought the organization into the national spotlight when he led the group to intervene in response to the 1998 murder of James Byrd, Jr. in Jasper, Texas. He also made the NBPP well-known for their vehement school board disruptions and public appearances.

Southern Poverty Law Center

Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) is an American nonprofit civil rights organization. It is internationally known for legal victories against white supremacist groups; legal representation for victims of hate groups; monitoring of hate groups, militias and extremist organizations; and educational programs that promote tolerance. The SPLC classifies as hate groups organizations that denigrate or assault entire groups of people for attributes that are beyond their control.

In 1971, Morris Dees and Joseph J. Levin Jr. founded the SPLC as a civil rights law firm based in Montgomery, Alabama. Civil rights leader Julian Bond soon joined Dees and Levin and served as president of the board between 1971 and 1979.The SPLC's litigating strategy involved filing civil suits for damages on behalf of the victims of hate group harassment, threats, and violence with the goal of financially depleting the responsible groups and individuals. While it originally focused on damages done by the Klan and other white supremacists, throughout the years the SPLC has become involved in other civil rights causes, among them, cases concerned with institutional racial segregation and discrimination, the mistreatment of aliens, and the separation of church and state.

The SPLC does not accept government funds, or charge its clients legal fees, or share in the court-awarded judgments to them. Its programs have been supported by successful fund raising efforts which have also helped it to build substantial monetary reserves. Both its fund raising appeals and its accumulation of reserves have been subject to controversy.

Finances

The SPLC's activities including litigation are supported by fundraising efforts, and it does not accept any fees or share in legal judgments awarded to clients it represents in court. Starting in 1974, the SPLC set aside money for its endowment because it was "convinced that the day (would) come when nonprofit groups (would) no longer be able to rely on support through mail because of posting and printing costs." The SPLC has received criticism for perceived disproportionate endowment reserves and misleading fundraising practices. In 1994 the Montgomery Advertiser ran a series alleging the SPLC was financially mismanaged and employed misleading fundraising practices. In response Joe Levin stated: "The Advertiser's lack of interest in the center's programs and its obsessive interest in the center's financial affairs and Mr. Dees' personal life makes it obvious to me that the Advertiser simply wants to smear the center and Mr. Dees. The series was a finalist for but did not win a 1995 Pulitzer Prize in Explanatory Journalism. In 1996 USA Today called the SPLC "the nation's richest civil rights organization", with $68 million in assets at the time. Commentators Alexander Cockburn writing in The Nation and Ken Silverstein writing in Harper's Magazine have been sharply critical of the SPLC's fundraising appeals and finances.

SPLC stated that during 2008 it spent about 69% of total expenses on program services, and that at the end of 2008 the endowment stood at $156.2 million. The SPLC's fundraising methods are somewhat unconventional and critics accuse it of leveraging fear to solicit donations, and say that top officials in the SPLC are paid very high salaries. According to Charity Navigator, SPLC's 2008 outlays fell into the following categories: program expenses of 68.0%, administrative expenses of 14.3%, and fundraising expenses of 17.6%. In October 2010 the SPLC reported its endowment at $216.2 million.

History

The Southern Poverty Law Center was founded by civil rights lawyers Morris Dees and Joseph J. Levin Jr. in 1971 as a law firm to handle anti-discrimination cases in the United States. SPLC's first president was Julian Bond who served as president until 1979 and remains on its board of directors. In 1979 the Center brought the first of its many cases against various Ku Klux Klan type organizations. In 1981 the Center began its Klanwatch project to monitor the activities of the KKK. That project, now called Hatewatch, has now been expanded to include seven other types of hate organizations.

In July 1983, the center's office was firebombed, destroying the building and records. In February 1985 Klan members and a Klan sympathizer pleaded guilty to federal and state charges related to the fire. At the trial Klansmen Joe M. Garner and Roy T. Downs Jr. along with Charles Bailey pleaded guilty to conspiring to intimidate oppress and threaten members of black organizations represented by SPLC."According to Dees over 30 people have been jailed in connection with plots to kill him or blow up the center.

In 1984 Dees became an assassination target of The Order, a revolutionary white supremacist group, for his work with the SPLC. Another target, radio host Alan Berg, was killed by the group outside his Colorado home.

In 1987, SPLC won a case against the United Klans of America for the lynching of Michael Donald, a black teenager in Mobile, Alabama. The SPLC used an unprecedented legal strategy of holding an organization responsible for the crimes of individual members to help produce a $7 million judgment for the victim's mother. The verdict bankrupted the United Klans of America and resulted in its national headquarters being sold for about $52,000 to help satisfy the judgment. In 1987 five members of a Klan off-shoot, the White Patriot Party, were indicted for stealing military weaponry and plotting to kill Dees.

Hate group listings

Main article: List of organizations designated by the Southern Poverty Law Center as hate groups

The Southern Poverty Law Center is named as a resource on the Federal Bureau of Investigation web page on hate crimes. The SPLC maintains a list of hate groups defined as groups that "...have beliefs or practices that attack or malign an entire class of people, typically for their immutable characteristics." It says that hate group activities may include speeches, marches, rallies, meetings, publishing, leafleting, and criminal acts such as violence. It says not all groups listed by the SPLC engage in criminal activity.

The SPLC reported that 926 hate groups were active in the United States in 2008, up from 888 in 2007. These included:

186 separate Ku Klux Klan (KKK) groups with 52 websites

196 neo-Nazi groups with 89 websites

111 White nationalist groups with 190 websites

98 White power skinhead groups with 25 websites

39 Christian Identity groups with 37 websites

93 neo-Confederate groups with 25 websites

113 black separatist groups with 40 websites

159 Patriot movement groups

90 general hate groups subdivided into anti-gay, anti-immigrant, Holocaust denial, racist music, radical traditionalist Catholic groups, and other groups espousing a variety of hateful doctrines, which maintained another 172 hate websites. Only organizations active in 2008 were counted, excluding those that appear to exist only on the Internet. In addition, SPLC reported there were 159 Patriot movement groups active in the United States in 2008, up from 131 in 2007, with at least one such group in every state. They maintain 141 websites.

Slavery in Canada

Slavery in what now comprises Canada existed into the 1830s, when slavery was officially abolished. Some slaves were of African descent, while others were aboriginal (typically called panis, likely a corruption of Pawnee). Slavery which was practised within Canada's current geography, was practised primarily by Aboriginal groups. While there was never any significant Canadian trade in African slaves, native nations frequently enslaved their rivals and a very modest number (sometimes none in a number of years) were purchased by colonial administrators (rarely by settlers) until 1833, when the slave trade was abolished across the British Empire.

A few dozen African slaves were forcibly brought as chattel by Europeans to New France, Acadie and the later British North America (see Chattel slavery), during the 17th century. But Large-scale plantation slavery of the sort that existed in most European colonies in the Americas, from New York to Brazil, never existed in colonial Canada or Newfoundland because the economies were not based on plantation agriculture. The largest industries were based upon the exploitation of natural resources, such as the fur trade. So, while some Canadian slaves performed agricultural labour, most were domestic house servants.

Because early Canada's role in the trans-Atlantic slave trade was so minor, the history of slavery in Canada is often overshadowed by the more tumultuous slavery practiced elsewhere in the Americas - most famously in the American South, and infamously in the colonial Caribbean. Afua Cooper states that slavery is, "Canada's best kept secret, locked within the National closet.

Under British rule

Black slaves lived in the British regions of Canada in the 17th and 18th centuries — 104 were listed in a 1767 census of Nova Scotia, but their numbers were small until the United Empire Loyalist influx after 1783. As white Loyalists fled the new American Republic, they took with them about 2000 black slaves: 1200 to the Maritimes (Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island), 300 to Lower Canada (Quebec), and 500 to Upper Canada (Ontario). The Imperial Act of 1790 assured prospective immigrants that their slaves would remain their property. As under French rule, Loyalist slaves were held in small numbers and were employed as domestic servants, farm hands, and skilled artisans.

The 1763 Treaty of Paris made no reference to slavery in Canada, nor does the Quebec Act of 1774 or the Treaty of Paris of 1783 -- either to ban it or to permit it.

Canadian First Nations owned or traded in slaves. Shawnee, Potawatomi, and other western tribes imported slaves from Ohio and Kentucky and sold them to Canadian settlers. Thayendenaga (chief Joseph Brant) used blacks he had captured during the American Revolution to build Brant House at Burlington Beach and a second home near Brantford. In all, Brant owned about forty black slaves.

The system of gang labor, and its consequent institutions of control and brutality, did not develop in Canada as it did in the USA. Because they did not appear to pose a threat to their masters, slaves were permitted to learn to read and write, Christian conversion was encouraged, and their marriages were recognized by law.

Under French rule

In 1628 the first recorded slave in Canada was brought by a British Convoy to New France. Olivier le Jeune was the name given to the boy originally from Madagascar. His given name resonates with the Code Noir. Although loosely established, the Code Noir forced baptisms and decreed the conversion of all slaves to Catholicism.

By 1688, New France's population was 11,562 people, made up primarily of fur traders, missionaries, and farmers settled along the St. Lawrence Valley. To help overcome its severe shortage of servants and laborers, King Louis XIV granted New France's petition to import black slaves from West Africa. While slavery was prohibited in France, it was permitted in its colonies as a means of providing the massive labour force needed to clear land, construct buildings and (in the Caribbean colonies) work sugar plantation. New France soon established its own 'Code Noir,' defining the control and management of slaves. The Code in 1685 set the pattern for policing slavery. It required that all slaves be instructed as Catholics and not as Protestants. It concentrated on defining the condition of slavery, and established harsh controls. Slaves had virtually no rights, though the Code did enjoin masters to take care of the sick and old. The blacks were usually called "servants," and the harsh gang system was not used. Death rates among slaves was high.

Research

Historian Marcel Trudel has documented 4,092 recorded slaves throughout Canadian history, of which 2,692 were Aboriginal peoples, owned by the French, and 1,400 blacks owned by the British, together owned by approximately 1,400 masters. Trudel also noted 31 marriages took place between French colonists and Aboriginal slaves.