Stokely Carmichael

Kwame Toure, the flamboyant civil rights leader known to most Americans as Stokely Carmichael, died yesterday in Conakry, Guinea. He was 57 and is best remembered for his use of the phrase "black power," which in 1967 ignited a white backlash and alarmed an older generation of civil rights leaders, including the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.The cause of death was prostate cancer, for which Mr. Toure had been treated at Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center in...

Nonviolence, a potent force in the 1960s fight for civil rights, has become an "embarrassment, an instrument of the weak," lamented Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Taylor Branch. Seated in a wing chair Sunday afternoon in the chancel of First and Franklin Presbyterian Church in Mount Vernon, the author described how the strategy has fallen from favor. The Atlanta-born Branch, the son of a dry cleaner, wrote three books on the life of civil rights leader the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. He was later invited by President Bill Clinton for a series of lengthy interviews at the White House for a work on Clinton's presidency.

Nonviolence, a potent force in the 1960s fight for civil rights, has become an "embarrassment, an instrument of the weak," lamented Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Taylor Branch. Seated in a wing chair Sunday afternoon in the chancel of First and Franklin Presbyterian Church in Mount Vernon, the author described how the strategy has fallen from favor. The Atlanta-born Branch, the son of a dry cleaner, wrote three books on the life of civil rights leader the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. He was later invited by President Bill Clinton for a series of lengthy interviews at the White House for a work on Clinton's presidency.

Mayor Sheila Dixon glided onto the stage of Morgan State University's Murphy Auditorium yesterday in her stunning red dress and waved to the crowd, who gave her a standing ovation. Within an hour, she would take the oath of office as Baltimore's first woman mayor. Three former mayors - Gov. Martin O'Malley, Kurt Schmoke and Thomas D'Alesandro III - were on stage with her. So were Baltimore State's Attorney Patricia Jessamy, Comptroller Joan Pratt and City Council President Stephanie Rawlings-Blake.

WHEN NAACP Executive Director Benjamin F. Chavis Jr. held a "secret" meeting with black radicals two weeks ago, he once again raised questions in the African American community concerning the soundness of his judgment.Mr. Chavis invited 50 black activists, including Angela Davis, Kwame Toure (formerly Stokely Carmichael) and rapper Sister Souljah to a closed-door meeting April 8 aimed at encouraging "access of Pan-Africans, progressives and nationalists into increased levels of membership and active participation within the NAACP at national and local levels."

Washington. -- I can't free my mind of Spike Lee's pitch to the National Association of Black Journalists about his upcoming movie, ''Malcolm X,'' so I might as well deal with it.Let me first dismiss as an outrageous hustle Mr. Lee's admonition to my black colleagues: ''Don't go to work that day (November 20)! Don't let the children go to school! Go to this movie! We have to support this film.''It is obvious to all but idiots that, despite Mr. Lee's desire to recoup the millions of dollars that his studio and his rich black friends have plowed into this movie, he is irresponsible in asking kids to stay out of school and black people to risk precious jobs to go see it.I haven't seen the film, but I pray fervently that it makes the life of Malcolm X a more responsible message than the one Spike Lee offered to black journalists.

Mayor Sheila Dixon glided onto the stage of Morgan State University's Murphy Auditorium yesterday in her stunning red dress and waved to the crowd, who gave her a standing ovation. Within an hour, she would take the oath of office as Baltimore's first woman mayor. Three former mayors - Gov. Martin O'Malley, Kurt Schmoke and Thomas D'Alesandro III - were on stage with her. So were Baltimore State's Attorney Patricia Jessamy, Comptroller Joan Pratt and City Council President Stephanie Rawlings-Blake.

AS I SHOOK hands with the Rev. Fred L. Shuttlesworth, it occurred to me that I had met the gentleman several times before. Not in person, of course. March 8, when Shuttlesworth and I exchanged greetings in the lobby of the University of Maryland University College's conference center, was our first face-to-face meeting. Shuttlesworth didn't know me from a Texas cactus plant. But I had met him several times, in the books about the civil rights era that are part of my home library. There was Shuttlesworth in the late civil rights attorney William Kunstler's autobiography Deep In My Heart; on no fewer than 48 pages of Taylor Branch's Parting The Waters: America In The King Years, 1954-63; being lauded by Stokely Carmichael (Kwame Toure)

THE HISTORIC event occurred on July 8, 2002, in Houston. Mark it on your calendar. It doesn't happen often, and indeed may never happen again. But a black leader in America, the one who heads the country's oldest, most powerful and influential civil rights group, actually used the dreaded "b" word. And he used it immediately after the word "black." Here is the precise quote of NAACP President Kweisi Mfume as revealed in news reports on the organization's annual convention, which concluded last week in Texas' largest city.

THE OTHER DAY I took my car to the shop for an oil change and routine check-up. A 1983 model, the old girl requires the type of regular attention that only a good mechanic can provide. That's not me.I miss not being able to drive to work when I leave her at the shop. It's not that I don't like to ride the bus -- even with the exorbitant MTA fares. I do, occasionally.But alone in my car I can play my Hendrix tape of ''Manic Depression'' as loudly as I want (''I know what I want/But I just don't know/How to go about getting it'')

AS I SHOOK hands with the Rev. Fred L. Shuttlesworth, it occurred to me that I had met the gentleman several times before. Not in person, of course. March 8, when Shuttlesworth and I exchanged greetings in the lobby of the University of Maryland University College's conference center, was our first face-to-face meeting. Shuttlesworth didn't know me from a Texas cactus plant. But I had met him several times, in the books about the civil rights era that are part of my home library. There was Shuttlesworth in the late civil rights attorney William Kunstler's autobiography Deep In My Heart; on no fewer than 48 pages of Taylor Branch's Parting The Waters: America In The King Years, 1954-63; being lauded by Stokely Carmichael (Kwame Toure)

THE HISTORIC event occurred on July 8, 2002, in Houston. Mark it on your calendar. It doesn't happen often, and indeed may never happen again. But a black leader in America, the one who heads the country's oldest, most powerful and influential civil rights group, actually used the dreaded "b" word. And he used it immediately after the word "black." Here is the precise quote of NAACP President Kweisi Mfume as revealed in news reports on the organization's annual convention, which concluded last week in Texas' largest city.

THE FIRST TIME I SAW him was on a television newscast -- or it may have been a documentary -- with the inchoate Afro, the ebony complexion and the large eyes that seemed oh-so-innocent above the mouth that chanted the words, "We want black power!"It was 1966. Stokely Carmichael was then chairman of the radical wing of the the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, a civil rights movement better known as SNCC. Carmichael shouted the words along the road to Greenwood, Miss. SNCC members had picked up the march where James Meredith had left off. In 1962, Meredith was the first black admitted to the University of Mississippi law school.

Kwame Toure, the flamboyant civil rights leader known to most Americans as Stokely Carmichael, died yesterday in Conakry, Guinea. He was 57 and is best remembered for his use of the phrase "black power," which in 1967 ignited a white backlash and alarmed an older generation of civil rights leaders, including the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.The cause of death was prostate cancer, for which Mr. Toure had been treated at Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center in...

Let's not mince words. When I heard that former Black Panther misleader Eldridge Cleaver had died last week, my immediate reaction was, "Damn! Stupid Negro died 30 years too late!"Of course, that's not very nice. When someone dies, you're supposed to say all the smarmy, heartwarming, touchy-feely things that make us all fuzzy inside. Sorry, I can't do it for Cleaver, who'll forever be at the top of my "Least Favorite Panther" List.Cleaver never met a profane word he didn't like. In an age when leftists had an inflated sense of self-importance, Cleaver racked up frequent-flier miles on Ego Trip Airlines.

THE OTHER DAY I took my car to the shop for an oil change and routine check-up. A 1983 model, the old girl requires the type of regular attention that only a good mechanic can provide. That's not me.I miss not being able to drive to work when I leave her at the shop. It's not that I don't like to ride the bus -- even with the exorbitant MTA fares. I do, occasionally.But alone in my car I can play my Hendrix tape of ''Manic Depression'' as loudly as I want (''I know what I want/But I just don't know/How to go about getting it'')

I am as quixotic as the next guy, but I gave up on the dream of a unified black community several years ago. And now, I find life much less stressful.The idea that black Americans could unite behind a common purpose, move in a single direction, and speak with one voice was an alluring one. I have been told, for instance, that the combined income of every black American in the country would rival the wealth of a large and powerful nation. Wouldn't it be nice if we pooled our resources and wielded that wealth like a sword?

THE FIRST TIME I SAW him was on a television newscast -- or it may have been a documentary -- with the inchoate Afro, the ebony complexion and the large eyes that seemed oh-so-innocent above the mouth that chanted the words, "We want black power!"It was 1966. Stokely Carmichael was then chairman of the radical wing of the the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, a civil rights movement better known as SNCC. Carmichael shouted the words along the road to Greenwood, Miss. SNCC members had picked up the march where James Meredith had left off. In 1962, Meredith was the first black admitted to the University of Mississippi law school.

WHEN NAACP Executive Director Benjamin F. Chavis Jr. held a "secret" meeting with black radicals two weeks ago, he once again raised questions in the African American community concerning the soundness of his judgment.Mr. Chavis invited 50 black activists, including Angela Davis, Kwame Toure (formerly Stokely Carmichael) and rapper Sister Souljah to a closed-door meeting April 8 aimed at encouraging "access of Pan-Africans, progressives and nationalists into increased levels of membership and active participation within the NAACP at national and local levels."

I am as quixotic as the next guy, but I gave up on the dream of a unified black community several years ago. And now, I find life much less stressful.The idea that black Americans could unite behind a common purpose, move in a single direction, and speak with one voice was an alluring one. I have been told, for instance, that the combined income of every black American in the country would rival the wealth of a large and powerful nation. Wouldn't it be nice if we pooled our resources and wielded that wealth like a sword?