March 6, 1971: 53 years ago, March 5 1971, the Black Panther Party held the Revolutionary [...]

53 years ago, March 5 1971, the Black Panther Party held the Revolutionary Intercommunal Day of Solidarity in Oakland. Officially a fundraiser for four Black political prisoners, the event was an attempt by Huey P. Newton to consolidate support amidst a major split in the party

The split in the BPP between Huey Newton’s Oakland leadership and Eldridge Cleaver’s faction, which enjoyed support in New York and in Cleaver’s Algeria-based “International Section,” had split into the open shortly after Newton was freed from prison in August 1970

Party Communications Secretary Kathleen Cleaver, Eldridge’s wife, was slated to speak at the Intercommunal Day of Solidarity, but was with her husband in Algiers. The party’s newspaper claimed she was being held prisoner by her husband, who was alleged to be violently jealous

The event raised money for the defense of two imprisoned leading Panthers, Bobby Seale and Ericka Huggins, and two political prisoners whose charges stemmed from Jonathan Jackson’s 1970 attack on the Marin County Courthouse, Angela Davis and Ruchell Magee
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It was also a belated birthday party for Huey P. Newton, who gave a long theoretical speech after 15 Panther children bearing red roses sang him a specially-composed birthday song (“From your teachings we have learned/Comrade Huey we’ll take our turn/And we will fight”)

Newton’s Marxist-jargon-heavy speech attempted to delineate his positions from Eldridge Cleaver’s, emphasizing the Oakland leadership’s commitment to community programs rather than immediate armed rebellion, as well as its commitment to combatting “sexual fascism”

The entertainment for the evening included the Grateful Dead and the BPP’s house band The Lumpen. Corresponding events were held in Sweden, Italy, France, Belgium, and Denmark, where some 7000 people marched to the US embassy in Copenhagen to demand freedom for Bobby Seale