Quotes from Huey Newton

I expected to die. At no time before the trial did I expect to escape with my life. Yet being executed in the gas chamber did not necessarily mean defeat. It could be one more step to bring the community to a higher level of consciousness.

Sometimes if you want to get rid of the gun, you have to pick the gun up.

revolutionary suicide does not mean that i and my comrades have a death wish; it means just the opposite. we have such a strong desire to live with hope and human dignity that existence without them is impossible. when reactionary forces crush us, we must move against these forces, even at the risk of death.

As we all know, sometimes our first instinct is to want to hit a homosexual in the mouth and want a woman to be quiet. We want to hit a homosexual in the mouth because we're afraid we might be homosexual; and we want to hit the woman or shut her up because we're afraid that she might castrate us. The remedy is to gain security in ourselves and therefore have respect and feelings for all oppressed people.

Youths are passed through schools that don't teach. Then forced to search for jobs that don't exist and finally left stranded to stare at the glamorous lives advertised around them.

The policemen or soldiers are only a gun in the establishments hand. They make the racist secure in his racism.

We have two evils to fight, capitalism and racism. We must destroy both racism and capitalism.

Any unarmed people are slaves, or are subject to slavery at any given moment.

Black men and women who refuse to live under oppression are dangerous to white society because they become symbols of hope to their brothers and sisters, inspiring them to follow their example.

There's no reason for the establishment to fear me. But it has every right to fear the people collectively - I am one with the people.

I read Plato's 'Republic.' I read it through about five times until I could actually understand it.

What I'm really trying to say is that I believed an armed insurrection could work. After I was shot and went to prison, that ended that illusion. I had time to think.

I have the people behind me and the people are my strength.

I think what motivates people is not great hate, but great love for other people.

There's no reason for the establishment to fear me. But it has every right to fear the people collectively - I am one with the people.

I have the people behind me and the people are my strength.

Black Power is giving power to people who have not had power to determine their destiny.

We've never advocated violence; violence is inflicted upon us. But we do believe in self-defense for ourselves and for black people.

Black Power is giving power to people who have not had power to determine their destiny.

The neighbors were more than neighbors [on Cuba]. They were like part of the family.

My fear was not of death itself, but a death without meaning. I wanted my death to be something the people could relate to, a basis for further mobilization of the community.