The FBI and The Civil Rights Movement

## Overview

The FBI's involvement in the Civil Rights Movement was not a good one. Their mission was to sabotage the movement by gathering information, turning members against the organization, raiding, and giving information to other racist groups like the Ku Klux Klan. A program within the organization was established called the Counterintelligence Program, or COINTELPRO for short. Agents of COINTELPRO would find and arrest members of Civil Rights organizations, such as The Black Panthers and the National Council of Negro Women, and agree to drop all charges if they would act as double agents within the groups, reporting on them back to the FBI so that they could more effectively disrupt the movement. The director of the FBI at the time, J. Edgar Hoover, believed that if the FBI did not interfere, The Black Messiah would come to power and galvanize the "militant Black Movement." In 1966, the Freedom of Information Act would be passed and five years later in 1971, COINTELPRO was exposed to the American people.

## COINTELPRO

### The Beginnings of the Counterintelligence Program

In 1956 The Counterintelligence Program (COINTELPRO) was formed by order of FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover, with the stated purpose of "disrupting the activities of the Communist Party of the United States." However, sometime in the 1960's, COINTELPRO expanded to include other such groups, such as the Socialist Workers Party, the Ku Klux Klan, and the Black Panther Party. Many of COINTELPRO's activities were illegal.

### A Racist Program

Though the Counterintelligence Program was supposed to protect the American People by disrupting the activities of dangerous organizations like the Communist Party of America, and the Ku Klux Klan, when it began disrupting organizations like the Black Panther Party, it gave information to white supremacy groups, and many suspect that information was also given to the Ku Klux Klan. The FBI would likely justify their aggression against the Black Panther Party with the Party's use of guns, and other lethal weapons, however, the Black Panther Party strictly only used those weapons in self-defense, they never fired the first shot, or initiated conflict. The FBI often infiltrated Civil Rights organizations or sent spies, and they used the justification, "Your organization is no better than the KKK."

### Harassment of Non-Compliers

Michael D. McCarty was a Black Panther who left the party in 1970, and in December of that same year, the FBI came to him at his place of work. They demanded that he rejoin the party and act as an informant for them. After he refused, the FBI harassed him every single day for more than a year, and in 1972, a year after COINTELPRO was discontinued, McCarty joined the military so that he could escape the continued abuse of the FBI even after it had no reason to continue its behavior. This was not out of the ordinary for the FBI, as they frequently demanded informants to assist in the arrests and murders of party members and leaders.

## The Black Messiah

### Who Was The Black Messiah?

The Black Messiah was not, in fact, a real person, they were an idea shared by many groups including the FBI and some Civil Rights groups. The Black Messiah was supposedly a Black man who would come to power and lead a Black revolution against the American Government. This idea is what initially prompted the FBI to create COINTELPRO. The Black Messiah was thought to be a prominent political leader within the Black Community. This person was suspected to be Martin Luther King Jr., Malcom X, Stokely Carmichael, or Elijah Muhammad.

### What Does the Black Messiah Have to do with the FBI?

The Black Messiah was supposed to galvanize "radical" Black organizations into a strong military threat. Though it was never blatantly stated in any official documents, it is heavily implied that the American Government did not believe that they could win in a war against its Black population. In response to this fear, the FBI began arresting and/or assassinating as many Black activists as possible, and began labeling certain members as fugitives for the sole intent of getting warrants to raid Civil Rights camps that they had no legal reason to raid. This practice would continue until COINTELPRO's discontinuation in 1971.

## The FBI's People of Interest

### What is a Person of Interest (POI)?

A Person of Interest is a term used the United States and Canadian Governments to describe a person or entity who has not been formally convicted of a crime, but who is suspected to be involved in one or more criminal organizations (either working with or against them), and who may sometimes, but not always, be a threat to the government, the status quo, or society as a whole.

### Jane Fonda

Born December 21, 1937, Jane Fonda was (and still is) an American actress, political activist, environmentalist, and former fashion model. Her activism in the Black Panther Party caught the attention of FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover, who began a campaign of defamation and harassment. She formed an organization called FTA, which meant "Free the Army," though it could mean other things depending on the person you're talking to. During a trip to Vietnam in 1972, an unfortunate photo-op presented itself (seen to the right). This tarnished her public reputation, because she was smiling while sitting on a Vietnamese anti-aircraft gun, and gave the FBI a way to harshen its campaign of harassment. This was not the FBI's first attempt to ruin her reputation, however. The FBI had been after her reputation for 12 long years ever since she became "radically liberal" in 1960 and joined the Black Panther Party and had an affair with one of its leaders.

### Jean Seberg

Jean Seberg was an American actresses born on November 13, 1938. She lived half her life in France, and tragically committed suicide on August 30, 1979. Her story with the FBI begins in 1968, when getting off of a plane, she gave a proud salute to a member of the Black Panthers in full view of the press, also catching the attention of FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover. According to The Guardian (a news corporation) she was one of many actresses involved in left-wing civil rights movements such as the Black Panthers. However, due to mental issues, she decided to leave the organization, saying, in her own words, "I’ve analyzed the fact that I’m not equipped to participate absolutely and totally. I had a very, very bad mental breakdown, and now I realize I wouldn’t want a person like me in a group I was a member of, as Groucho Marx would put it." During her time on the FBI's watchlist, she was blacklisted from Hollywood, her phones were tapped, she was followed, and her house broken into, all of which would lead her to her eventual suicide.

### Fred Hampton

Fred Hampton was an American political activist, and member of the Black Panther Party, born on August 30, 1948. During his time as a Black Panther, he became a prominent leader within the group. Fred Hampton is responsible for forming "The Rainbow Coalition." Hampton was a threat to the FBI, not because he was popular outside of the Black Panthers, but because he was too popular *within* the organization, and there may have been some fear that he was, in fact, the Black Messiah that the FBI had been so paranoid about during this time. In 1969, the FBI raided the Black Panthers base of operations in Chicago, and he was shot and killed in front of his 8 month pregnant fiancé.

## The FBI and COINTELPRO Exposed

### The Beginning of the End

In 1952, John Moss was elected to Congress as a Democrat. After obtaining the position of chairman on a congressional subcommittee of government information in 1955, he began a push for transparency and a decrease in government secrecy, and prevent the American government from becoming a dictatorship. More than a decade later, in 1966, the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) was passed into law, requiring organizations in the Executive Branch of the American Government to make most documents public, with only a few exceptions. In 1971, the FBI discontinued COINTELPRO, and in accordance with FOIA, was required to declassify the program, and release it to the public.

### What We Learned From the COINTELPRO Documents

Not only did we learn of the program's existence, but we learned that the FBI attempted to suppress almost every political movement at the time, including, but not limited to, Black Rights movements, Feminist movements, Environmentalist movements, Animal Rights movements, and even Anti-Vietnam War movements. We also learned of the FBI's illegal activities that it continues to use today, such as assassination, psychological warfare, and forged documents.

## A TL;DR Summary

During the Civil Rights Movement, the FBI was (and in many ways still is) an incredibly corrupt organization. They began an illegal program called the Counterintelligence Program (COINTELPRO) intended to disrupt of "dangerous groups" such as the Communist Party of America, and civil rights groups like the Black Panthers Party. They used many illegal tactics to maintain control, such as psychological warfare, assassinations, and unlawful break-ins. In 1972, COINTELPRO was discontinued, and due to laws in place because of the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) the FBI was legally required to release all documents related to COINTELPRO to the public for their consumption.

## Links and Resources

The Counterintelligence Program (COINTELPRO)

J. Edgar Hoover

The Communist Party of America

The Ku Klux Klan (KKK)

Michael D. McCarty

Jane Fonda

Jean Seberg

Fred Hampton

The Rainbow Coalition

The Freedom of Information Act