How the Black Panther Party Was Organized

Primary Document by John Hulett

The following are excerpts from a speech that John Hulett, chairperson of the Lowndes County Freedom Organization, gave in Los Angeles on May 22, 1966 at a meeting sponsored by a group of anti-Vietnam War committees. You can find this and many other primary documents in Emilye Crosby’s “A Documents Based Lesson on the Voting Rights Act.”

John Hulett walking past people standing in line to vote in Lowndes County, Alabama in 1966. He is holding a balloon that reads, “Vote Nov. 8 Lowndes County Freedom Organization.” © Alabama Department of Archives and History, Jim Peppler Southern Courier Photograph Collection

Some of our own known as the Lowndes County Freedom Organization, whose emblem is the black panther . . . Too long Negroes have been begging, especially in the South, for things they should be working for. So the people in Lowndes County decided to organize themselves — to go out and work for the things we wanted in life — not only for the people in Lowndes County, but for every county in the state of Alabama, in the Southern states, and even in California.

You cannot become free in California while there are slaves in Lowndes County. And no person can be free while other people are still slaves. Nobody.

In Lowndes County, there is a committee in the Democratic Party. This committee not only controls the courthouse, it controls the entire county. When they found out that the Negroes were going to run candidates in the primary of the Democratic Party on May 3, they assembled themselves together and began to talk about what they were going to do.

Knowing this is one of the poorest counties in the nation, what they decided to do was change the registration fees in the county. Two years ago, if a person wanted to run for sheriff, tax collector, or tax assessor, all he had to do was pay $50 and then he qualified to be the candidate. This year, the entrance fee is about $900 . . . So we decided that we wouldn’t get into such a primary because we were tired of being tricked by Southern whites . . .

Through the years, Negroes in the South have been going for the bones while whites have been going for the meat. The Negroes of Lowndes County today are tired of the bones — we are going to have some of the meat too.

At the present time, we have our own candidates which have been nominated by the Lowndes County Freedom Organization. And we fear that this might not be enough to avoid the tricks that are going to be used in Lowndes County against us. . . .

. . . We have seven people who are running for office this year in our county; namely, the coroner, three members of the board of education — and if we win those three, we will control the board of education — tax collector, tax assessor, and the individual who carries a gun at his side — the sheriff.

Let me say this — that a lot of persons tonight asked me, “Do you really think if you win that you will be able to take it all over, and live?” I say to the people here tonight — yes, we’re going to do it. If we have to do like the present sheriff, if we have to deputize every man in Lowndes County 21 and over to protect people, we’re going to do it.

There was something in Alabama a few months ago they called fear. Negroes were afraid to move on their own; they waited until the man, the people whose place they lived on, told them they could get registered. They told many people, “Don’t you move until I tell you to move and when I give an order, don’t you go down and get registered . . .”

Then all the people were being evicted at the same time and even today in Lowndes County, there are at least 75 families that have been evicted . . . There were other people who live on their own places who owe large debts, so they decided to foreclose on these debts to run Negroes off the place. People made threats — but we’re going to stay there; we aren’t going anywhere.

I would like to let the people here tonight know why we chose this black panther as our emblem. Many people have been asking this question for a long time. Our political group is open to whoever wants to come in who would like to work with us. But we aren’t begging anyone to come in. It’s open, you come, at your own free will and accord.

But this black panther is a vicious animal as you know. He never bothers anything, but when you start pushing him, he moves backwards, backwards, and backwards into his corner, and then he comes out to destroy everything that’s before him.

Negroes in Lowndes County have been pushed back through the years.

We have been deprived of our rights to speak, to move, and to do whatever we want to do at all times. And now we are going to start moving. On November 8 of this year, we plan to take over the courthouse in Hayneville. And whatever it takes to do it, we’re going to do it.

We’ve decided to stop begging. We’ve decided to stop asking for integration. Once we control the courthouse, once we control the board of education, we can build our school system where our boys and girls can get an education in Lowndes County. There are 89 prominent families in this county who own 90 percent of the land. These people will be taxed. And we will collect these taxes. And if they don’t pay them, we’ll take their property and sell it to whoever wants to buy it. And we know there will be people who’ll buy land where at the present time they cannot buy it. This is what it’s going to take.

We aren’t asking any longer for protection — we won’t need it — or for anyone to come from the outside to speak for us, because we’re going to speak for ourselves now and from now on. And I think not only in Lowndes County, not only in the state of Alabama, not only in the South, but in the North — I hope they too will start thinking for themselves. And that they will move and join us in this fight for freedom.