From its founding in 1966 to contemporary attempts to censure its history and revise its significance, the Black Panther party has aroused fear, hope, pride, vilification, and government-sponsored oppression. The trials of Huey Newton, the Chicago Eight, and the Panther 21 made it enormously difficult for many Americans to distinguish the propaganda from the philosophy; the media's indifference to the Panthers' free breakfast programs, neighborhood clinics, and liberation schools only complicated the problem.

This is the first and only collection of the most vital, representative writings of the party. Here are Huey P. Newton, Bobby Seale, Eldridge Cleaver, David Hilliard, and Fred Hampton; Kathleen Cleaver and other Panther women; the party's court battles and acquittals; its positions on black separatism, the power structure, the police, violence, and education; as well as songs and poems. This book explains exactly what the Black Panthers stood for and what issues they confronted, almost all of which remain unresolved today.