rises in the back of the pavilion. we are here to listen to peniel

joseph. i have the pleasure of interviewing and the 11 on the occasion of the 2010 book dark days, bright nights, from black power to barack obama. it was one of those wonderful, and hurried c-span book conversations. i never met him before and i was so impressed not only by intellect but by his ease, he melody and introspection. i left thinking i am going to read all of that dude's books from now on until the end of time. he is the author of the award winning waiting until the midnight hour, a narrative history of black power in america but the book he has come to discuss today and why i am sure you are all here is "stokely: a life" which was described in the new york times

review as an insightful, highly engaging affluent biography, of stokely carmichael, the man widely seen as heir apparent in the black leadership hierarchy to martin luther king jr. and malcolm x following their assassination. and the reporting committee, stokely started as a believer in nonviolence, led him to concentrate his thinking on the notion of black self-defense. carmichael was a complex figure and that complexity was captured wonderfully in this definitive biography, "stokely: a life". you can never be disappointed with a book when you have chapter titles like the chocolate and fred astaire. peniel joseph 11 is restoring, activist, popular radio

commentator on subjects like race relations and civil rights, politics, democracy, a nice shoe collection. give a warm welcome to peniel joseph. [applause] >> thank you for that warm introduction. i start by thanking the library of congress for this invitation to talk about "stokely: a life". it is an honor and privilege to be here. i spent ten years on the life of stokely carmichael, kwame ture, and a lot of questions i received was why did i spend so much time, why was stokely

carmichael, kwame ture, so interesting to me and why did he deserve a biography, and to answer that and before going into stokely carmichael's wife, the legacy left and what it means to us in 2014 especially in the context of contemporary american race relations the age of obama, the age of ferguson, where we are now. i have to begin with my mother, my mother who is watching this right now, germain joseph is 75 years old, retired, haitian immigrant who came to the united states in the mid 1960s and was my first history teacher, my mother was part of the 1199 union. i was on my first pick of line, she taught me values that were really important to shaping who i am as a man, a person, a human

being and a writer, scholar and thinker. within that context of growing up in jamaica, queens, new york, listening to speeches by malcolm x, martin luther king jr. and haitian history, reading the black activist, reading about all these different people who struggle for social and political justice that i came to find kwame ture stokely carmichael. i was really really impressed by stokely carmichael even as an elementary school age child. i didn't know i was going to be his biographer at the time. when i think about stokely carmichael, the first time i encountered stokely was through the miniseries eyes on the prize.

that miniseries, extraordinary, henry hampton and all these people who created really the definitive documentary about the heroic period of the civil rights movement ended in six parts, we pretend six parts. the and 24-year-old stokely carmichael is in one of those episodes calling for black power and if you are in new york city growing up in the 1980s in the context of everything from spike lee to howard beach to different roiling demonstrations against police brutality that documentary was a signal moment in my own political history, my own intellectual development so i encountered kwame ture stokely carmichael by way of the miniseries eyes on the prize and in subsequent years as i went to college, as i became us thinker,

reader, writer, activist, he always stayed on my mind. the first book i wrote waiting until the midnight hour was a history of the black power movement in america and internationally and it was in the course of doing research on that book that i really came to deeply deeply investigate and research the life of stokely carmichael kwame ture. by way of introduction. "stokely: a life," this is of biography, a political activist who i argue in this book stands out as one of the three political activists in the postwar period who transforms democracy, civil rights, community organizing, citizenship and malcolm x, martin luther king jr. and stokely carmichael kwame ture. he was born june 20191941 in trinidad, comes to the united states two weeks before his

eleventh birthday in 1952, he moved to the mars park section of the bronx, he is -- his family is one of the only black families in that neighborhood. he is a precocious, very intelligent child, always identifying with underdogs, has a wide a ray of friends, interracial friends, accused a charismatic, becomes one of the only black students to kiss in to the bronx high school of science which is one of the best public high schools in new york city and he becomes one of the most popular if not the most popular students at bronx and what is extraordinary that stokely carmichael attends bronx science 1956-1960 and it is during some of the key years of the heroic period of the civil rights movement 1954-1965 and in high school he becomes an organizer. in high school he is going to be

mentored by the key social democratic political activist, openly gay, one of the most brilliant minds of the civil rights movement. pcs westin as a teenager and asks who is that speaking of there? some one replies to him that is byron westin the socialist and stokely says that is who i am going to be when i grow up. when we think about bronx science, very important because at bronx science and during his high school years, stokely carmichael is going to imbibers multiple political and intellectual traditions. some are going to be jewish-american, jewish-american vibrant left, marxist, socialist, radically democratic. some are going to be black and global and pan-african. he has relatives in harlem and he is going and listening to street speakers in harlem. he is listening to pan african

speeches in harlem, finds out about the leader of donna and the leader of guinea, find out about the condo so even in high school stokely is taking different traditions in. when we think about this hero period of the civil rights movement, a really short truncated history lesson, between may 17th, 1954, and august 6th, 1965, we have one of the most extraordinary periods in american history. when we think of that period in american history may 17th, 1954, is the brown supreme court desegregation decision. 1955-56 is the 13 month montgomery bus boycott. on august 28th, 1955, 14-year-old cammed pill's body is found in the tallahassee river, up hill had said by baby

to the wife of a white shopowner and was going to be lynched because of that. his body is going to be put on display on the cover of jet magazine, the african-american working-class magazine of the postwar period and that is going to galvanize a whole generation of civil rights activists including stokely carmichael. 1957 is little rock central high school and that crisis that results in mob violence against young people trying to integrate, february 1st, 1960, is the start of the sit in amusement in north carolina where four black students demand equal service and that will spark hundreds of demonstrations across the united states but importantly it will spark the creation of an easter weekend of 1960, the student nonviolent coordinating committee and we have heroic figures from snake

who are still alive today. joanne mulholland is here, we have judy richardson, congressman john lewis, and stokely carmichael was part of the student nonviolent coordinating committee as well. 1961 are the freedom rides where groups of interracial activists tried to defy racial segregation across interstate travel, very infamously on may 4th, 1961, there is going to be a greyhound bus that is firebombed in anniston, alabama and giving us the most iconic pictures and portraits of the civil rights era but also going to force the hand of the attorney general robert kennedy to send in federal marshals in to the south. 1961 is also the gear of really raging protests all across the

united states in terms of counter demonstrations -- 1962 is the year of james meredith, the first black student to integrate the university of mississippi and there will be three days of rioting that leave one person dead. 1963 is the centennial of the emancipation proclamation and the city of birmingham, alabama is literally and figuratively on fire. martin luther king jr. connected with a local movement led by the reverend fred shuttlesworth to desegregate birmingham, alabama. same as the king is incarcerated in birmingham and he writes on scraps of paper letter from birmingham jail and he really defends the movement against critics who say the movement should move slower.

the movement should wait and freedom and justice and democracy. one of the best lines from birmingham jail is king arguing in the future the young men and women being incarcerated and brutalized and arrested in birmingham are going to be remembered as he rose and he says they're going to be remembered as heroes for bringing the nation back to, quote, those great walls of democracy dug deep by the founding fathers. 1963 is the year of german shepherd fire hoses in birmingham, fire hoses that were powerful enough to take the bark off of trees, john f. kennedy says he is sick from the scenes he has witnessed in birmingham of german shepherds and fire hoses and over 1,000 young children, children as young as 8 years old being incarcerated for trying to desegregate birmingham, alabama. 63 is the year that i called

kennedy's finest moment, june 11th, 1963, where kennedy delivers a forceful and robust and eloquent speech about race relations, american democracy and citizenship in a live nationally televised address where he calls the civil rights problem in the united states a moral problem, as old as scripture and as clear as the constitution. the very next morning after kennedy's beach, medgar evers is assassinated in jackson, mississippi and medgar evers was unheroic field secretary for the naacp in mississippi and certainly his work has been continued by his widow, williamson. 1963 is the year of a march on washington, august 28, 1963, and it is important to remember the first words dr. king speaks at the march on washington, he says now is the time to make real the

promise of democracy. the civil rights movement was always a movement about radical democracy. november 22nd, 1963, is the assassination of john f. kennedy and kennedy's assassination is really going to send shock waves throughout the country but by 1964 it also provides a context for comprehensive civil rights legislation and 64 is the year of not just the passage of the civil rights act but the year of freedom summer and this year is the 50th anniversary of the summer project and freedom summer which is an experiment in interracial democracy in mississippi, something stokely carmichael contributed to and many others did. the freedom summer is most remembered for the murders, the tragic murders of cheney and goodman, three civil rights workers who were killed right outside philadelphia, mississippi, went missing

june 21st, 1964. 1965 is recalled as the year of the voting rights act. in march of 65 in alabama at the edmond had this bridge, non-violent demonstrators were routed by alabama state troopers including future congressman john lewis who was chairman of the student nonviolent coordinating committee. that violence in 1965 inspires lyndon johnson on march 15th, 1965, in a joint address to congress to says that civil rights is a national priority. voting rights a national priority and johnson calls it a turning point in the politics of the dignity of humankind and the destiny of democracy. august 6th, 1965, the voting rights act is passed. five days later, los angeles explodes after an encounter

between police and local people. that is the heroic period of the civil rights movement. i preface my comments on stokely carmichael by giving a short sketch precisely because even before stokely carmichael called for black power in 1966, he is one of the key activists in united states working for civil rights and radical democracy during the second half of the civil rights movement's heroic period. we think about stokely carmichael, before we can talk about the movement for black power we think of him as a community organizer, a community activist who from 1965 to 1966 was arrested 27 times for civil rights organizing. a student right here in washington d.c. at howard university who joined the non-violent action group, a group of some of the most

committed and brilliant young activists of the period who are trying not just to desegregate parts of the south and parts of washington d.c. and places like cambridge, md. they're trying to transform democratic institutions in the united states of america. that is what they're trying to do and what is interesting about stokely carmichael is stokely finds his vocation as an organizer. he finds his vocation as an organizer, visit mississippi for the first time at the age of 19 in 1961 and will be the first time he is also arrested. he is arrested as a freedom writers june 8th, 1961, and he is going to spend not just time in hinds county jail in jackson, mississippi but is going to spend 30 days in parchment penitentiary, parchment farm, the state of mississippi's worst prison farm and it is in parchment and people like john

lewis are there, so many different jim farmers there, so many different activists spending time in jail but what is interesting is carmichael adds experience in jail is going to galvanize his political activism so rather than be discouraged by that time period in jail, he calls up his mother before going to new orleans and they're going to get to mississippi by way of new orleans and tells his mother there is going to the media and journalists calling up and he wants her to tell them no matter what happens she is proud of him, she tells him may charles, i don't want you involved in that civil rights mess. stokely tells her the movement has become his life and he doesn't want her, when you're speaking to your mother you don't want your mom to embarrass you in front of people, saying i don't want to be embarrassed,

whenever the press calls you, the line to tell them is you are proud of me so stokely is in parchment penitentiary and the press does call her up and tells him she is so proud of her son she doesn't know what she is going to do. so she did follow and he did stokely's advice. we think of carmichael as one of that key organizers, he is going to fall in love with the south. that first visit in 1961 to mississippi is going to be just the tip of the iceberg. people like bob moses in mississippi, stokely visits jackson. by 62 he is in greenwood mississippi, 62, 63, 64, by the time of freedom summer, stokely is the second congressional district director heading

activists who are organizing in the mississippi delta. when we think about stokely and the heroic period of the civil rights movement what was he doing? he was an organizer, living and working among poor black people in the mississippi delta and when we think about the black folks in the mississippi delta in the postwar period these are african-americans who oftentimes didn't have birth certificates, would never have certificates of death, many never had left the surrounding confine of the plantations that they were gone and with the student nonviolent coordinating committee was not serving as leaders but provide help for local leadership. fannie lou hamer, we celebrate this past week the 52 anniversary of her speech. ..

>> carmichael is going to be one of the biggest cheerleaders and supports of fanny lieu hammer. he talked about fanny in an interview in 1965 with stud turkal. and he said martin luther king is very important but fanny is more important. and he said what do you mean?

how can she be more important? he said because there are more of her in the united states than dr. king's. his vision of american democracy is found when ms. hamer gets respects, credit and access she deserved. what is is interesting for us is before becoming a black power icon and this image and symbol of political revolution. before he is with castro and others, stokely carmichael is pursuing radical freedom in the deep south. that is what he is doing. and one of the most interesting parts for me was the relationship between dr. king and carmichael. they were friends. they met at 1963 at howard. stokely was his body guard

during freedom fest. they march together during selma and that relationship really comes to the fore once stokely is chairman of the committee in 1966. the march from june 7-june 26 is the march that transforms stokely carmichael's life and the civil riots movement. that is when the student is shot on campus and they march to prove a black man with march through mississippi without here but he is shot and injured and carmichael, dr. king, and the civil rights leaders are coming to his bed side and vow to

continue his march. it is a along that march that stokely carmichael after being arrested for the 27th time in greenwood, mississippi is going to call for black power. right? what did black power mean? well black power according to carmichael meant radical social, cultural, political and ethical ratification. dr. king said don't use there term black power because people are equating that term with violence. carmichael says the decision to release black power was a collective decision and black people need to define political and social funonmes for

themselves. it is minteresting now. we talk about ferguson and the politics and the police brutality. but the black people stokely carmichael was concerned about were the poorest of the poor. it wasn't just students even though he was concerned about students. it wasn't elites. it was the poorest of the poor because they were designed right and citizenship and closed out of democracy. king and carmichael's ship is close between 1966 and king's death april 4th, 1968. in the course of doing research on stokely's life his anti-war activism was fascinating to me.

this person who is one of the people who inspired dr. king to come out against the war at riverside church in new york april 4th, 1967. carmichael gives a powerful speech in 1966 at the university of berkeley and 10,000 people are there. he criticized the war in vietnam and talked to white students about american democracy, racial privilege and what can be done in the context of the civil rights and black power struggle to transform democratic institutions in the united states. i have interviewed people who were there at the speech at berkeley and what they all say is that speech for them was a human rights speech. carmichael's anti-war activism

inspired them to speak out against the car. king and carmichael my april 15th, 1967 are on the same platform at the largest demonstration up until that point in the new york city at the un building. 400,000 people are there. carmichael speaks before king criticizing the war in vietnam and criticizing violences that is happening in the united states and connects the war in vietnam to the civil rights and black power movements domestically. ma dr. king speaks after that and they meet ever the speech is over and stokely teases king and

this gives you a great portrait of their relationship. king ask stokely to go to church to him and he said i am out here doing the work of the people. dr. king says i really want you to come to my church tomorrow because i am giving my full speech against the war in vietnam. and stokely replies he is going to be there and in the front row of the pew and there is great footage of the speech april

30th, 1967 and after he makes the speech and vows to study war no more the person who is leading the standing ovation is stokely carmichael and he has the dark shades on, of course. and he is doing his thing. but it is stokely carmichael. when we think about stokely carmichael and what he represents and why he is so important -- he is not just appear activist for radical democracy. after becoming a black power activist he is a full blown revolutionary being an anti-war activist and critic of the system. he provides a context for the black panther party. 1965-1966 it is carmichael who

goes to lions, county alabama the buckle of the black belt and helping local people and others organize for democracy in this county that is 80% african-american and no black public officials. 50 years later we have similar instances now. but in 1965 trying to organize there was hugely dangerous. they organized a freedom organization whose nickname is the black panther party. and that symbol travels all the way to oakland, california when we think about the black panther party for self-defense. so when we think about stokely carmichael who is going to be named honorary prime minister he

is going to provide a platform for the anti-war movement and the different radical activist are going to be participating in in the late 1960's. stokely's legacy is a transfo transformt transformtive lesacy but many have not heard of him and that is because he leaves the united states. in 1956 he did a five month tour of the world. he is in londoned with people like clr james. he is in cuba with castro. castro says stokely carmichael is under his protectio and if anything happens to stokely

there is going to be trouble. he is in algeria with the revolutionary leaders who offer him head quarters in support something that carmichael will not take them up on but the black panthers will in a couple years, right? he is in ghana where he meets two people that have been extradited there and the leader who told the french who leave guinea and suffered after. he met up with mira, who was a beautiful south african singer, activist and icon who was

introduced in the 1950's and they begin a romance and are married by 1968 and become this global pan-african couple. when we think about the international trip, meeting with them changes and transforms stokely carmichael's life. he comes back as a committed pan africanist tat is convinced the key of the liberation lies in the unification of africa and promises to return to africa. by 1969 he does that and between '69 and 1998 even though returning for political speaking tours of the united states he becomes a committed anti-panafricanist revolutionary

and changes his name and becomes by the 1980s in the contex of the reagan administration the counter revolution that transforms the dreams the radicals carried with them. in that context he believes in the idea of a global political revoluti revolution. one of my parent parts of studying kwame ture is reading about obama's reaction to seeing him at columbia in the early '80s. and young obama in his early 20's talking about kwame ture was talking about pan africanism and critiqued capitalism and he

is speaking words of fire. and obama recounts from dreams from my father he says his eyes blazed as he spoke. the eyes of a mad man or a saint, right? and i am hear to say that kwame ture was neither a madman or a saint. he was a radical political activist who was unapologetic in pursuing cultural and social and economically freedom for blacks. he had flaws and shortcomings and i can spell them out. but what is so important is he provides us with a blue print to understand american race relations in a different and expansive ways from the cast of

ic iconic characters who we usually look at. he provides a context for radical political self determination even when it is unpopular. speaking truth to power even when the standing ovation stop. right? so when you measure what does it mean to work in the mississippi delta with poor black sharecroppers? what does it mean to work in tent cities after sharecroppers have been kicked out of where they live because they want to organize for the right to vote? what does it mean when you are writing about small deed democracy in 1966 in places like the new republican and the new york review of books but by the time you start saying you are against the war in vietnam people don't want to publish you and hear your opinion? kwame ture was a political

revolutionary even after that age ended in the united states. so his life is crucial in our contempory peter. when we think about where we are in 2015 on the 50th anniversary of the civil rights act and stokely's activism helped make it happen. sometime we have books frame from a top down experience. certainly it is both. top down and bottom up. the reason the social and political change in the 19606 happened because social movements created such disru disruption in the united states and there had to be legislative and political solutions apply to real world problems.

president kennedy when he speaks on june 11th, 1963 says this much when he says there is a reblution happening right now in the united states and that revolution can be violent or peaceful. right? with we think about stokely the most important aspect of carmichael's activism was the way he helped organize poor black people to try to transform democratic institutions in the united states that didn't want to be transformed. we have this idea that is over today and two everybody loved the fact it was going on. so you start with the beginning, middle and end. it is a fairy tale. rosa parks, martin luther king junior and it ends with obama, right? by the time obama's election

people say that is it. the civil rights movement is over. and people kill tell black people you got obama, what else do you want? as if you cash obama's checks and eat obama's food. i have not gotten my invitation to the whitehouse, you know? when we think about the civil rights movement it was always contested. people had a view of freedom thad that didn't include ella baker who was the lead organize of the student non-violent cordinator and told the students on easter weekend it was more

about a hamburger and the reason she told the students the sit-in was about more than a hamburger is because by april of 1960 new york times and mainstream media were trying to say the movement is about people wanting access to lunch counters. ella baker said this isn't about lunch counters or hamburgers. this is about democracy. james baldwin writes in 1961 that the young people who are organizer and in demonstrations all across the south at lunch counters are doing it to do more than what baldwin calls sip tasteless cups of coffee at sleazy lunch counters across the south. that is james baldwin not we.

what is important when we think about stokely carmichael and the civil rights movement and where we are today in the context of american race relations and civil rights and citizenship is that kwame ture provides an example of a life well-lived. he is not a hedgefund leader. he didn't invent the i-phone. but provided millions of poor black people hope. he did it through organizing for small democracy a political revolution and calling for black power and black self-determination. the whole idea of black is beautiful is impossible without stokely carmichael. the whole ideaf