Huey P. Newton by Jeffries Judson L.;

Author:Jeffries, Judson L.;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: University Press of Mississippi
Published: 2002-02-17T05:00:00+00:00

THE “BAD NIGGER” PERSONIFIED

Huey Newton is the baddest mutherfucker ever to step foot inside of history.

—Eldridge Cleaver

All the “bad niggers” are either dead or in jail.

—Unknown

The origins of the phrase “bad nigger” and the use of the word “bad” by blacks as a term of endearment or admiration can be traced back to slavery. John Little, a fugitive slave who escaped to Canada, once recalled that Southern whites seeing a black man in shackles would often say, “Boy, what have you got that on for? … if you weren’t such a bad nigger you wouldn’t have them on.”1 “Bad niggers” were viewed by white slaveholders and those who supported the institution of slavery as slaves who were dangerous and difficult to control. However, for blacks, the individual in question was one who refused to submit and was willing to fight the system. Hence, other slaves generally admired these individuals. To be perceived as a “bad nigger,” then as well as now, is nothing less than a badge of honor in the black community.2 When one is referring to a “ba-ad” nigger, the more one prolongs the “a,” the greater is the homage. Given the status that “bad niggers” enjoy in the black community, it is not surprising that most “bad niggers” are legends. Stackolee, John Hardy, Harry Duncan, and Devil Winston were just a few of the “bad niggers” to capture the imagination of blacks during the last decade of the nineteenth century. Whenever one seeks to disentangle a legend, one must begin by distinguishing the actual person from the stories woven around the legend. Huey P. Newton was no exception.

Huey P. Newton was his own man; he refused to allow anyone, especially the white Establishment, to determine his place in society. Eldridge Cleaver once said, “Huey P. Newton is the baddest mutherfucker to step foot inside of history.”3 At the time, who could argue with Cleaver? After all, Newton may have been one of few black men ever to kill a white police officer (in self-defense or otherwise) and to live to talk about it without having to spend the bulk of his life behind bars. The police officer as an omnipresent figure is captured by H. C. Brearley. He says that “the policeman represents the supreme test of daring. Here is a white man, armed, the embodiment of authority. Whoever gets the better of him has reached the highest goal of the bad nigger.”4 Perhaps the most famous of all “bad niggers” is Railroad Bill, about whose career dozens of ballads have been composed. Railroad Bill shot a police officer and escaped on a freight train. When a sheriff set out to bring him in, he met the same fate. Eventually Railroad Bill was captured and killed. That Newton allegedly shot and killed a young officer, John Frey, who had developed a reputation as being one of the most brutal and racist of Oakland’s police officers only enhanced Newton’s stature within the black community. Cleaver’s description of Newton resembles the sentiment expressed by Samuel M.

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