If we must die—let it not be like
hogs
Hunted and penned in an inglorious spot
While round us bark the mad and hungry
dogs
Making their mock at our accused lot
—Claude McKay (1919)
By the end of the 1830’s, the slavery issue
was becoming ever more prominent in the national political
arena. Proslavery and antislavery forces were constantly
maneuvering for advantage in Congress and elsewhere. New Haven
leaders had adopted a lukewarm attitude toward the injection
of the issue into politics. Sympathetic to the plight of the
Negro, they had condemned the extension of slavery permitted
by the Missouri Compromise of 1820. Yet they had vigorously
opposed the establishment of a Negro college at New Haven in
1831. Some had spoken out against the “fanatical
Abolitionists” in 1833, 1835, and 1836. At a citizen’s
meeting held at the Statehouse on September 9, 1835, Noah
Webster, Davis Daggett, Simeon Baldwin, James Babcock, and
Minott Osborn helped to frame resolutions condemning any
interference by Congress with the treatment of slaves within
any of the states, proposing African colonization for “the
free colored population,” and viewing with alarm the efforts
of the Abolitionists.
A few years later sentiment began to change.
In January 1838, president George Day of Yale University and a
group of New Haven citizens prepared a resolution to Congress
condemning the existence of slavery and slave trading in the
District of Columbia. John Quincy Adams presented this paper
to the House, in his capacity as spokesman for a positive
antislavery stand.
The next few years saw New Haven involved
once again with slavery in the case of the Anistad captives.
This affair began in the spring of 1839 on the west coast of
Africa when a band of natives, acting as agents for Spanish
slave traders, captured a considerable number of their
countrymen and placed them in a barracoon at Dumbomo. Although
the slave trade was prohibited by Spanish and American law the
captives were transported to Cuba by a slaver flying the
Portuguese flag. Since Cuba was Spanish territory, Africans
who landed there in violation of the law were technically
free. Such technicalities did not prevent two Cubans, Don Jose
Ruiz and Don Pedro Montez, from purchasing fifty-two of the
victims as slaves for $450 each. Ruiz and Montez then
proceeded to secure a license to move their property from
Havana to another Cuban port, falsely describing the Africans
as having been imported before 1820, to conform to the laws of
slave trading. A small sixty-ton schooner, the Amistad, was
chartered for the trip.
The Amistad left Havana on June 28, 1839.
Ruiz and Montez were surprised at the submissiveness of the
captives. It was therefore considered unnecessary to chain
them. On the second night, the natives became curious about
the vessel’s destination. The crew began to harrass the
Africans by threatening to eat them. Led by a stalwart,
intelligent African of commanding presence named Cinque, the
slaves revolted, and killed only those of the crew who had
abused and terrorized them. The blacks now tried to return to
Africa by forcing their captors to set the course. They knew
the direction of their home only when the sun was visible, so
the Spaniards tricked them and steered back toward America
during the night and when the weather was cloudy. After a
month of zigzagging, the Amistad reached land—not Africa,
but the northern shore of Long Island near Montauk Point.
Having been found under suspicious circumstances, in the
control of fifty-four Africans, the ship was seized by a
government brig, the Washington, for questioning. It was
discovered that Cinque and the other slaves were in command as
a result of mutiny, and the captain of the Washington,
Lieutenant Gedney, took the Amistad and its crew into custody.
The Amistad was sailed into New London harbor, and a message
was sent to New Haven to inform the United States Marshall,
Norris Wilcox, of the incident.
When Captain Gedney visited the well-built
schooner he was astonished. Some Africans were decked out in
silks and finery, while others, emaciated to mere skeletons,
lay nude upon the decks. Scattered over the deck were raisins,
vermicelli, bread, rice, silk, and cotton goods—and even
naked corpses.
Two days later a court of inquiry was held
on board the Washington. Don Pedro Montez and Don Jose Ruiz
made a complaint against Joseph Cinque, the leader of the
revolt. On the basis of this complaint, an indictment was
entered charging the Africans with murder and piracy. The
judicial investigation had paid heed only to the Spanish
story. What about the Africans? Language was surely a problem,
but would their story be told? The helplessness of the
Africans soon dawned upon thoughtful men. Lewis Tappan, an
Antislavery leader in New York, made the first move. He
organized a committee to raise funds to employ competent
counsel and to provide the Africans with clothing and other
resources. Roger Sherman Baldwin of New Haven was retained as
chief defense counsel.
Baldwin sought the aid of Josiah Willard
Gibbs, a versatile linguist and Professor of Theology and
Sacred Literature at Yale, to find some means of getting the
Africans’ story. Upon obtaining sounds from the Africans,
Gibbs then proceeded to look for someone familiar with their
dialects. He found an eighteen-year-old boy, James Covey, from
Sierra Leone. Baldwin was then able with Covey to elicit the
facts necessary for constructing a defense. On September 17,
the prisoners appeared before the United States Circuit Court
in Hartford. Judge Thompson ruled that no criminal proceeding
could take place since the acts complained of were committed
on the high seas aboard a Spanish vessel; but he refused to
discharge the Africans, on grounds that they were held in the
custody of the United States District Court because of the
various civil charges instituted against them. Thompson
concluded that laws recognized slavery, even though
Connecticut as a state did not.
Since Judge Thompson had decided that the
Africans were not liable to criminal proceedings under
American law, they were granted a greater degree of freedom
than given previously. The defense counsel now included John
Quincy Adams. Although he did not come to New Haven for the
initial trial, Adams contributed his wisdom to the preparation
of the case. Judge Johnson ruled that the free-born Africans
had been kidnapped into slavery in defiance of Spanish law,
and that under that law they were free.
The case did not end there. The Secretary of
State ordered appeals taken, first to the United States
Circuit Court, which upheld-the decision of the district court
in April 1840, and finally to the United States Supreme Court.
At the Supreme Court, Attorney General Gilpin argued that the
Africans had been lawfully held as slaves. Roger Baldwin moved
for dismissal of the appeal. The Supreme Court sustained the
original decision of the District Court. On March 9, 1842, the
captives were at last free. When Cinque received the news on
March 11, he replied, “Me glad—me thank the American
men.”
Does history repeat itself? One hundred
thirty-one years later, New Haveners again seemed to have a
lukewarm attitude toward repression of minorities. During the
terms of Mayor Richard C. Lee, many revitalization programs
began in New Haven, aimed mainly at the black community.
Again, there was a struggle for black freedom because of
racism and the continued difficulty for blacks to break into
highly skilled well-paying jobs.
The Black Panther Party tried to lead that
struggle. An important founder of this party was Huey Percy
Newton. Newton, the youngest of seven children and son of a
Baptist minister, grew up in Oakland, California, with dreams
of becoming a lawyer. While attending law school, Newton met
Bobby Seale and his course as an activist was set. Outraged by
the routine harassment of their neighbors by white policemen,
Newton and Seale formed the Black Panther Party for
Self-Defense in 1966. With registered guns and law books,
Newton and Seale began to roam the Oakland ghetto in a
Volkswagen, informing community residents of their civil
rights.
Huey Newton suggested some of the reasons
for the name “Black Panthers” when he wrote, “The
panther is a very dignified animal. It is not in his nature to
attack anyone. But when he is attacked or backed into a
corner, he turns on his aggressor and destroys him thoroughly,
wholly, absolutely, and completely.” The purpose, methods,
and ideology of the Black Panthers as explained by Newton
include the following:
The Black Panther Party was formed to free
all people from all forms of slavery in order that every man
be his own master. The Panthers felt that the people should
collectively decide exactly what they need and then should
share fully in the wealth they produce.
The Panthers believed that the ultimate form
of capitalism, in which a small group of men had another and
larger group of men enslaved simply for profit, existed in
America. They hoped to transform an oppressive capitalistic
society into a socialistic society in which each man would
participate in the decisions that affect his life, this making
him free. They proposed steps that would lead to the creation
of that socialistic society.
The Black Panther Party believed that in
order for ethnic minorities to be free, administrators would
be needed who were responsive to the needs and desires of the
people. They were particularly interested in oppressed
peoples’ struggle for freedom.
The Panthers’ educational program was
designed to expose the forces that have shaped the past and
present. On the sociological level, the Panthers agreed with
Marx that outside forces control man’s behavioral patterns,
and that he would be oppressed until he could control them and
could act in his own best interest.
Let us now examine the New Haven Black
Panther trials. Ericka Huggins was the leader of the Black
Panther Party in New Haven and Bobby Seale was the national
chairman. In May 1969, George Sams, the Panther field marshall,
was sent to New Haven to investigate whether Alex Rackley, a
fellow Panther, was a police informant. Rackley was subjected
to interrogation and torture by the Panthers, according to
testimony in subsequent trial. He confessed to being a police
informant, and was later found dead. Ironically, Bobby Seale
had come to New Haven for other reasons, not to interrogate
Alex Rackley. George Sams reportedly told Seale that Rackley
was a police informant, although Seale later denied knowledge
of this fact. Meanwhile, James Ahern, then New Haven Chief of
Police, had the Panther headquarters under surveillance.
George Sams ordered that Rackley be killed. Lonnie McLucas
allegedly fired the first shot, and Warren Kimboro fired the
second shot that killed Alex Rackley. George Sams, disguised
as a minister, fled to Canada, where he was later apprehended.
Warren Kimboro and eight other members were arrested and
charged with murder. However, all the Panthers, except Ericka
Huggins and Bobby Seale, were set free. Arnold Markle,
State’s Attorney for the County of New Haven, accused Bobby
Seale of kidnapping, conspiracy to commit kidnapping, murder
in the first degree, and conspiracy to commit murder. Markle
also accused Ericka Huggins of kidnapping, conspiracy to
commit kidnapping, murder in the first degree, conspiracy to
commit murder, and binding with intent to commit crime. Yale
Law School graduate Charles R. Garry was the defense lawyer
for Bobby Seale and Catherine Roraback was the defense lawyer
for Ericka Huggins.
Garry, a Marxist, was unique in his
radicalism and the dialectic tactics he employed to oppose the
judicial system. He had a simple but all-encompassing theory
as to why there should be no prisons as we know them. He felt
that most “crimes” are acts of survival based on a
criminal system of property and class in which prison only
seals the victim’s fate. He also felt that some people were
treated unfairly or even tortured by the moralism of a blind
and archaic legal system. Catherine Roraback, the defense
lawyer for Ericka Huggins, had been known as New Haven’s
community lawyer. She had been known to uphold the tradition
of the law as an instrument for protecting individual rights,
for facilitating social change, and generally for maintaining
the ground rules of an open, democratic society.
The New Haven trial climaxed national
awareness of the Panthers. Rackley’s death had become a
legal, political, and media issue. Although Kimboro and Sams
were suspected of committing the actual crime, the
significance of the case revolves around the efforts to
discredit the prominent leadership of the party, mainly Seale.
The Panther case was not one in which a
slave called out for basic Constitutional protection, as in
the Amistad Affair, but rather one which called attention to
the need for re-examination of the judicial system and its
treatment of blacks—one which called for the rights of
blacks as first-class citizens. Previously, the treatment of
blacks in the judicial system had been one of expediency.
Often, when blacks were brought to trial, there was no
thorough examination of the case. Many times, maximum
sentences were given for minor crimes.
The Panther trials, like the slaves’ case,
drew the support of the Yale University community, including
their leaders of the time. George Day, president of Yale
University at the time of the Amistad Affair, had been
instrumental in preparing a resolution to Congress to condemn
the existence of slavery. One hundred fifty years later,
Kingman Brewster, president of Yale University at the time of
the Black Panther trials, echoed the prevailing sentiment of
doubt that a black revolutionary group could get a fair trial
anywhere in the United States. The defense in both cases were
products of Yale University, Roger Sherman Baldwin and John
Quincy Adams for the Amistad Affair and Charles R. Garry and
Catherine Roraback for the Black Panthers.
The similarities of the two cases converge
at one crucial point—the revolts took place as a result of a
denial to blacks of equal rights and protection under the law.
In the Cinque-Amistad case, the non-existence of those rights
and in the Black Panther case the refusal to recognize
first-class citizenship of blacks created a climate filled
with unrest and the potential for violence.
Both cases had national ramifications for
blacks. The Amistad Affair, which lasted approximately seven
years, planted one of the seeds that led to the Civil War and
ultimately clarified the status of blacks in the United
States. Blacks were admitted to Congress, the judicial system
was reconstructed, and three amendments were put into our
Constitution. The Thirteenth Amendment ended slavery for all
time. The Fourteenth Amendment made Negroes citizens of the
United States and of their own states. Each person was
guaranteed the full protection of the law. The Fifteenth
Amendment told all states that all citizens could vote, even
those who had once been slaves. There were government-funded
schools. There were jobs.
After the Black Panther trials, which lasted
for about two years, the government created affirmative action
programs and other federally-funded programs for the inclusion
of blacks. Positive steps were made towards better schools and
better jobs.
In view of the Amistad and Black Panther
cases, we may safely conclude that social injustice often
breeds revolts. Therefore, we may certainly assume that it is
probable that if some of the social injustices that exist
today are not addressed, there could be another revolt that
could ultimately lead to a full-scale revolution. Can we
afford to let this happen?
**********
This unit on the Amistad Affair of 1839 and
the Black Panther trials of 1970 has been prepared for
middle-school students (grades 5-8) who have shown from
previous experiences that they can read and follow directions.
The reading level range is from grade 3 to 8. The unit could
last from four to eight weeks. A suggested format for division
of this unit follows:
Upon completion of this unit, the student will
be familiar with the Amistad Affair and the Black Panther
trials and the influence these two cases had on legislation
which has modified the judicial system of the United States.
Reading List for Students
It has been my experience from teaching
remedial classes that students become disinterested when given
books to read. Therefore, I recommend mimeographed sheets, as
mentioned before, for this unit.
Sample Lesson Plan
Objective: Student will read the story of
Cinque and the Amistad Affair. (Vocabulary will be presented
before story with expectation that other words will be added
by the student).
Specific Objective: After completion of
story, child will retell most memorable part of the story,
noting the use of at least five (5) facts.
(Teacher will have checklist of facts from
story. Many questions cannot be answered by reading plot
alone).
Bibliography for Teachers
Adams, John Quincy. Amistad (Schooner).
Adams, Russell L. Great Negroes Past
and Present. Chicago: Afro-Am Publishing Co., 1964.
Aptheker, Herbert. American Negro Slave
Revolts.
Atwater, Edward E. History of the City
of New Haven. New York: Munsell and Company, 1887.
Barber, John W. A History of the
Amistad Captives. New Haven: E.L. and J.W. Barber, 1840.
Dahl, Mary B. Free Souls. Boston:
Houghton Mifflin Co., 1969.
Dennis, Ethel R. The Black People of
America. New York: McGraw-Hill Book Company, 1969.
Erickson, Kai T. In Search of Common
Ground—Conversation with Eric H. Erickson and Huey P.
Newton. New York: Laurel Edition, 1973.
Freed, Donald. Agony in New Haven: The
Trial of Bobby Seale, Ericka Huggins and the Black
Panther Party. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1973.
Herman, Barry. A Page from
Connecticut’s Afro-American History” Connecticut
Teacher, 1965.
Owens, William A. Black Mutiny: The
Revolt on the Schooner Amistad. Philadelphia: Pilgrim
Press, 1953.
Schanche, Don A. The Panther Paradox.
New York: Paperback Library, 1971.
Seale, Bobby. Seize The Time. New York:
Vintage Book, 1968.
Warner, Robert Austin. New Haven
Negroes. New York: Arno Press and The New York Times,
1969.
Wesley, Charles H. International
Library of Negro Life and History in Freedom’s
Footsteps (from the African Background to the Civil
War). New York, Washington, London: Publishers Company,
Inc., 1968.
