Huey Newton Quotes - Page 3

I had a lot of time and the first year I was in prison, I tried to get the party to stop the shooting, to stop the talk about the gun thing.

When I founded the party in 1966, I had just turned 24.And each year, no, not each year, each day I live I've gained new experiences. Now the criticism is not to say the party did not play a positive part in those times, but, in order to be objective, we did not accomplish the things we set out to accomplish.

Revolutionary suicide does not mean that I and my comrades have a death wish; it means just the opposite.

We were trying to increase the conflict that was already happening... we felt that we would take the conflict to so high a level that some change had to come.

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 wanted to leave high school in 1958 and join the Cuban revolution. So the only reason I did not come to join [Fidel] Castro was because my mother would not let me. I was only 16.

I think the basis - the foundation - has already been laid for a society where people will work together and enjoy the wealth of the whole nation together. I think this will be accomplished because this is the theme of the revolutionary government's program.

The Cuban Revolutionary Government has been generous and very considerate to me and my family. I lived in Santa Clara for a few months because I wanted to work in the countryside and get to know the country better.

I think it's absurd to talk about - one time you were outside the system, now you are in the system - no, we fight, the cause of the fight is because the system is bad that we can't get out of it.

I don't like to just talk of Africa, and south of the Sahara in general. No, I'll talk about the Third World in general. I'll like to say this - we in the United States would never believe that another form of goverment - I don't care even if it's against the racism, etc. - it is hard to get the masses of people to believe or accept that a socialist government will relieve them of most of the problems.

I worked in the mechanical factories repairing cement trucks. The Cuban government wanted me to work in the university as a teacher in literature, but I declined because I wanted a more sense of the countryside.

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.

Just before I left [Cuba], I was about to transfer to the university. I had decided I had had enough experience in work in the manual areas. But then I got word from the United States that I could return...that my party had gathered enough information about the false charges that were against me for me to return to the United States.

There is a very strong socialist movement in Jamaica. I was in Jamaica years ago. All the talk, all day they talk politics. The literacy rate is very low. Everyone is so interested in politics, more than those who can read in the United States.

The rest of the Third World people are seeing, that the country can make a real change. No changing or trading one master for another. The only real change would be to socialize the means of production and this is what's happening in Jamaica.

I don't want people to think he [Eldridge Cleaver] is so important - our party is important because our party works for the people and no individual is important in our party, including myself.

Cuba was neo-colony of the United States and still suffers a blockade. So, therefore, the consumer goods and so forth, we don't have here, especially when you leave the city areas it's a spartan life. But what is impressive about it is what is coming about. It's the future that all these socialists look forward to.

The United States is already antique.

I would like to say that racial attitude and prejudice are probably here...It is very difficult to act this out - discrimination - discrimination is an act. After you have the prejudices, the disciminations come out, if there is an institution for it but the Cubans have attempted to create institutions free of discrimination.

I think it's wrong for North America in particular, the West in general to make a comparison between the economic situation in Cuba and the extraordinarily developed industrial complex of North America.

A rather honored guest of the Cuban government, so I wouldn't experience the problems. I think it would take a black Cuban to really articulate this because I'm being treated in a very generous way.

When I was in the penitentiary after being accused of killing a policeman, I was more in the system in the penitentiary than ever.

We always had a central committee. They were mesmerized by Eldridge Cleaver.

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

I am very happy here [on Cuba], but I feel I have work to do in the United States. It's where I can identify with the total world struggle for socialism. But I think as a North American, as a Black North American, I have certain understandings - certain contributions - to make that are unique to the North Amerian experience.