revolutionary action movement (ram) - Michael Schwartz Library

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Brother G ., an ex-Black Panther Party and RAM member, from Oakland,
California, in a taped interview, recalled Bobby Seale (who had been
purged from RAM for drunkenness and irresponsibility) joined Huey P .
Newton in forming the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense in Oakland
California . Bobby and Huey first tried to take over a student group
formed by RAM called the Soul
Students Advisory Council at Merritt College
.
In the midst of the power struggle, it was learned that Bobby and
Huey had taken fifty dollars from the student groups treasury without
authorization . When most of the students did not support them, Bobby and
Huey resigned from the student group .
Major differences and near gun play occurred between the Black
Panther Party of Northern California led by Ken Freeman and the
BPP for Self-Defense led by Huey P . Newton . The ideological
differences stemmed from Huey's open display of guns, brandishing
them into the police's faces and challenging them to shootouts
. The dissension between the Panther parties continued
until May, 1967 . 14
According to Brother D .,
an ex-member of the Black Panther Party of Northern
California, one of the discussions centered on the role of armed
struggle . Bobby Seale's and Huey P . Newton's position was that the armed
vanguard went out and brought down repression on the community .
The BPP
of Northern California did not have the answer to how to
successfully pull
off a revolution but knew from the lessons of Nazi Germany that premature
repression could also crush a people's movement . Bobby Seale saw a revolution
as one gigantic shootout :
A revolution is when the police is on one side of the street
and the revolutionaries line up on the other side of the
street . Whoever pulls their pieces first and gets off the
rounds and survives wins the revolution . 15
14 Early Anthony, Picking Up the Gun . (New York : Dial Press, 1971) .
15Taped Interview with Brother D ., January 18, 1979 .