revolutionary action movement (ram) - Michael Schwartz Library

was a short lived group because of ideological splits .
During the winter months of 1965,
RAM leadership developed their
ideological perspective into a political document entitled, "The Struggle
for Black State Power in the U .S ." The document described the difference
between a riot and a revolution and outlined what RAM felt was the future
direction of the black revolution in U .S .
This document was widely circulated
among movement activists . It called for raising the question of
Black Power within the movement .
In Detroit, RAM cadre published a periodical
in the automobile plants titled Black Vanguard . In New York, RAM
began working with a youth gang called the Five Per Centers .
After having
been radicalized
through political education classes, they formed themselves
into the Black Panther Athletic and Social Club .
The radicalizing year for SNCC was 1965 .
The Atlanta project based
in Vine City and led by a collective of Bill Ware, Mike Simmons, Don Stone
and Dwight Williams started a black consciousness movement inside of SNCC .
The Atlanta project wasalso instrumental
in changing SNCC policy in foreign
affairs . It started the first anti-draft demonstrations in the country
which consequently led to SNCC publicly denouncing the war in Vietnam .
At one point there was near gun play between James Foreman and his supporters
and the Atlanta project over the question of black nationalism .
Stokely Carmichael in the meantime, was in Loundes County, Alabama
organizing the Loundes County Freedom Organization, an all
black political
party whose symbol was the black panther . At the annual spring SNCC meet
ing, Foreman backed Stokely Carmichael who became chairman of SNCC in 1966 .
James Meredith began his,
'Memphis to Jackson March' on Sunday,
June 5, 1966 . His march was to dramatize fear among blacks in Mississippi
and encourage them to exercise the right to vote . On Monday,