Dark Days, Bright Nights

          “Dark Days, Bright Nights: From Black Power to Barrack Obama”, by Peniel E. Joseph, is a boot that explores the black power movement of the 1960’s and 1970’s, its’ impact of the Civil Rights movement, and how, Joseph argues, it paved the way for the first African-American became president.  Joseph includes profiles of Malcolm X and Stokely Carmichael.

Joseph shows in his book that, while the civil rights movements of the 1950’s and 1960’s were soon overshadowed bey angry confrontational black power activists, this all was provided as a stepping stone that eventually culminated in the inauguration of Barrack Obama. He continues to argue that the Voting Rights Act of 1965 opened a proverbial dam that was holding back “radical Democratic impulses”. The initial “impulse” to form as the black power movement, at first was considered to be a failure, actually helped pave the way for a new wave of black leadership. Joseph then retells this movement through the lives of various movement leaders like Malcolm X, Stokely Carmichael and even Obama himself, in order to shine a light on the achievements that were gained by the black power movements that seemed to be unfairly forgotten about. In doing this, “Dark Days, Bright Nights” helps expose the triumphs as well as its influence on American democracy after being rattled with 50 years with of struggles. In chapter 1, entitled “Reimagining the Black Power movement”, the black power movement helped shape and permanently change “black identity” and paved the political landscape which eventually introduced diversity and multiculturism. It was the rhetoric of those who were considered “radicals”, like Malcolm X and Stokely Carmichael that helped spark the debate over issues such as equal rights and the idea of black identity. They helped raise questions of the legitimacy of certain democratic institutions whose doors were closed to African-Americans. While Malcolm X’s views on social and civic justice seemed to be viewed as “radical” in the Northern states, and Carmichael’s approach to civil rights in the south seemed to be more passive-aggressive, both approaches were mistakenly viewed as a dichotomy, when, in fact, they proverbially walked hand in hand with each other reaching the same end by reaching it through means that the respective leaders felt were appropriate for the region. Joseph explains that, between the black power militants in New York and the Civil Rights activists in the southeast, a new generation of well-known African-American advocates has emerged in recent years. For example, the rap group Public Enemy and their song “Fight the Power”. In chapter 2, entitled “Malcolm X, Harlem and American Democracy”, Joseph writes that Malcolm X was known for his constant struggle for equal rights for all African-Americans and his speeches on how whites generally treated the African-American race. Malcolm has been quoted as saying “whenever a Negro fights for democracy, he is fighting for something he has not got, never had and never will have, from one of his speeches from 1964. He even once told a reporter, Louis Lomax, that they (the African-American community) respect authority, but they are ready to fight, and die, in defense of their lives. In the 10 years he was involved with the Nation of Islam, he openly criticized American democracy due to the fact that it was not able to guarantee black citizenship and was unable to protect the lives of civil rights activists. In fact, in 1955, Malcolm analyzed the word “democracy” and declared it to be “judged it to be the rule of evil that promoted death and misery in the black community”, according to the Philadelphia’s F.B.I.’s informants. As it turns out, Malcolm was quite talented and rather good at organizing community get-togethers and functions. Thanks to Malcolm’s organizational skills, he become the chief strategist, main recruiter and organizational architect for “The Nation”. In chapter 3, entitled “Stokely Carmichael and America in the 1950’s”, Joseph states that while Malcolm was doing his part in Harlem, and other parts of the United States, Carmichael was doing what he could in the south. And like Malcolm, Carmichael was one of the more important political figures in the civil rights movements yet has been overshadowed by other leaders. He has been described as a “civil rights militant turned black power revolutionary”. Through his experiences as a civil rights organizer, he identified himself with poor black, and their political struggles, in the rural area of the south. As one who traveled around to help share croppers register to vote, he unwittingly became an icon of the national stage. Yet, while he helped coin the slogan “Black Power”, and was such a public political leader, bot a lot of the res of his life was really known. With his political views, hi felt that pat-Africanism was the zenith of unity of Africans everywhere. In fact, he eventually moved to Guinea and lived there until his death from prostate cancer in 1998. In chapter 4, entitled “A Place Where All Things are Possible Barrack Obama and Dreams of Democracy”, Joseph mentions that Obama was born in 1961, which was the same year that Freedom Riders faced jail time for helping desegregate interstate travel across the country. Obama once said, in a 2007 speech, that “the narrative of black politics is still shaped by the ‘60’s and black power”, and that the country is caught in some form of time warp. Joseph also writes that Obama shares a common public misconception with many others about the very nature of the black power movement and the very nature of its aims and all of its achievements. Joseph continues that black power activists fought for “bread and butter” issues that made an impact on the everyday lives of all Americans, like having good public schools, having decent housing, health care and employment. Obama, however, did acknowledge how the politics display a crucial role in d helping shape contemporary politics, even though he never really did embrace the legacy of the 1960’s. These chapters, while they make no promises of a happy ending, “they probe the transformations in post-war America since the Civil Rights era through key historical figures who found common ground trying to reimagine American Democracy.” (Joseph, p. 10)