An Afro-Indigenous History of the United States

The discourse of Black Power and Red Power existed side by side. The
phrase “Black Power” emerged as a rallying cry in Greenwood, Mississippi,
in June 1966, in a speech by Stokely Carmichael during the March Against
Fear, which was organized after the shooting of James Meredith. 7 While
there were earlier iterations of “Black Power,” Carmichael popularized it. 8
In Black Power: The Politics of Liberation, Carmichael and Charles
Hamilton wrote, “The adoption of the concept of Black Power is one of the
most legitimate and healthy developments in American politics and race
relations in our time. . . . It is a call for black people in this country to unite,
to recognize their heritage, to build a sense of community. It is a call for
black people to begin to define their own goals, to lead their own
organizations and to support those organizations. It is a call to reject the
racist institutions and values of this society.” 9 Though Carmichael would
later think beyond nation-state borders, he did understand that one had to
have a clear sense of self before demanding rights and protections from a
state that was predicated on your exploitation.
Native people also participated in the rhetorical power games, raising a
fist and utilizing the phrase “Red Power.” Though the etymology of the
phrase is not entirely clear, it was most definitely an assertion of Indigenous
sovereignty, a declaration that Native people were there to stress to the
white settlers that they were reclaiming their right to sovereignty—
guaranteed by their treaties. Indigenous intellectuals like Vine Deloria Jr.
agreed.
Deloria Jr., a Standing Rock Sioux intellectual, was long a prominent
voice for Indigenous rights, including in his role as the executive director of
the National Congress of American Indians from 1964 to 1967. In perhaps
his most provocative book, Custer Died for Your Sins: An Indian Manifesto
(1969), Deloria shared his belief that the rhetorical assertion of Black
Power was an important step toward Black nationalism. For him, white
Americans did their best to segregate Black people from entering their
neighborhoods, their schools, and their political system. They wanted Black
labor but not their full participation in society. In contrast, white people
attempted to assimilate Native people in order to take their land. 10 Deloria
beckoned Black people to understand that mainstream society had no desire
to include them. 11 After reading Deloria, I was like damn, was he trying to
do his best Malcolm impersonation? Regardless, Deloria’s assertion
generally remains true. Instead of keeping Black people out, corporations