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• 1 2019-03-12T23:56:45+00:00 February - Archived Posts 11 plain published 2019-08-26T19:12:02+00:00
  Click on date to view post:
  February 1, 1980: Atlanta Daily World on Carter G. Woodson and articles from 1926-27 on first “Negro History Week.”

  February 2, 1936: Atlanta Daily World and black press editorial cartoons on Ethiopian anti-colonial battle against Italy.

  February 3, 1948: Atlanta Daily World on efforts to block black voting rights on anniversary of passage of 15th Amendment.

  February 4, 1956: Pittsburgh Courier on Montgomery Bus Boycott, in honor of Rosa Parks’ birthday.

  February 5, 1977: New York Amsterdam News, “Roots Captivates Millions of T-Viewers.”

  February 6, 1982: Cleveland Call & Post advertisement for Wilber Black, the (Jheri) “Kurl King” and Black’s Pride Hair Care Center.

  February 7, 1944: Los Angeles Tribune ad for “Sweet ’n’ Hot” revue featuring Dorothy Dandridge.

  February 7, 1948: Cleveland Call and Post editorial cartoon on segregation of University of Oklahoma Law School and Ada Lois Sipuel Fisher.

  February 8, 1964: New York Amsterdam News covers NYC school boycott, the largest civil rights protest in U.S. history.

  February 9, 1935: Selection of articles from Norfolk Journal and Guide on anti-lynching work, Negro History Week, Imitation of Life, and Paul Laurence Dunbar.

  February 10, 1959: Philadelphia Tribune reports on voter registration efforts in the city.

  February 11, 1928: Valentine’s Day wishes from the Chicago Defender Junior.

  February 12, 1949: “Grow Old With Me” short story in Baltimore Afro-American.

  February 13, 1960: Greensboro sit-in protests in Norfolk Journal and Guide and Cleveland Call and Post.

  February 14, 1946: Los Angeles Sentinel on fire in Fontana that killed O’Day, Helen, Barry, and Carol Ann Short.

  February 15, 1975: Pittsburgh Courier editor-in-chief Hazel Garland on professional opportunities for retired black athletes and lack of black television news anchors.

  February 16, 1965: Chicago Defender on the death of Nat King Cole.

  February 17, 1979: Ad for The Warriors in New York Amsterdam News, and article by Amsterdam News intern Nelson George.

  February 18, 1944: Atlanta Daily World on Harry Alpin, the first African-American reporter to cover a White House press conference.

  February 19, 1910: Clubwoman Ida Cummings in the Baltimore Afro-American.

  February 20, 1969: “Bowling Around L.A” by Los Angeles Sentinel columnist Juanita Blocker.

  February 21, 1970: Black journalists’ statement of support for the New York Times’ Earl Caldwell and his right to protect confidential sources in the Black Panther Party.

  February 22, 1965: The black press on the murder of Malcolm X.

  February 23, 1957: Philadelphia Tribune on Thomas Edison (formerly Northeast) High School and how board moved school to create segregated facility.

  February 24, 1934: Carter G. Woodson in Pittsburgh Courier on “Forgotten Negroes.”

  February 25, 1939: Blanche Thompson, Irvin C. Miller, and “Brown Skin Models” revue in Norfolk Journal and Guide.

  February 26, 1949: Baltimore Afro-American on Satchel Paige and other black major league baseball players heading to spring training.

  February 27, 1937: New York Amsterdam News on Dr. Anna Cooper Johnson’s new dental office in Harlem.

  February 28, 1978: Philadelphia Tribune on MOVE conflict with Philadelphia authorities eight years before bombing.

  February 29, 1956: Chicago Defender on Leap Year tradition of single women courting bachelors.
• 1 2019-03-12T23:56:48+00:00 February 21, 1970 8 plain published 2019-11-04T23:26:31+00:00 On February 21, 1970, the New York Amsterdam News published a full-page statement from black journalists in support of New York Times reporter Earl Caldwell. The statement outlined the case: “On Feb. 2, Earl Caldwell, a black reporter for the New York Times, was subpoenaed and ordered to bring his notes and tape recordings accumulated over a 13-month period and appear before a Federal Grand Jury in California—The jury is investigating the Black Panther Party.” Over sixty black journalists signed the statement, which presented their views in no uncertain terms: “We will not be used as spies, informants or undercover agents by anybody. We will protect our confidential sources, using every means at our disposal. We strongly object to attempts by law enforcement agencies to exploit our blackness” (click to view PDF).  
  
  Caldwell started covering the Black Panther Party in the Bay Area in the fall of 1968. “The very first story that I wrote about the Black Panthers was about guns,” Caldwell recalled in a 2006 interview with Frontline. “I thought it was my great reporting. Later I realized they wanted me to see the guns, because they knew if I saw this that I would print it in my story and it would be published in the New York Times, and then everybody in the country would know that they were prepared, on some level, to back up what they were talking about.” Click here to view Caldwell's “Black Panthers: Young Revolutionaries with Guns,” September 6, 1968.
   
  Caldwell was visited by the FBI shortly after this story was published: “When I wrote the first story, I came back to New York, and now I believe somebody in the newspaper called the FBI and told them that I had come back, because I was at my desk five minutes, and the receptionist called and said, ‘There’s two gentlemen out here to see you.’ I go out; it’s two agents from the FBI. They want to know more about these guns that I wrote about. They want to know more information. I told them, ‘Everything I have is in the newspaper.’ They said, ‘That’s not good enough,’ and they challenged me.”
  
  Throughout 1969, Caldwell published several more pieces on the Black Panthers in the New York Times, including stories on the Panthers free breakfast program (“Black Panthers Serving Youngsters a Diet of Food and Politics,” June 15, 1969) and changes in the group’s style, tone, and language (“Panthers: They Are Not the Same Organization,” July 27, 1969).
  
  In the 2006 Frontline interview, Caldwell recalled that the FBI demands became more incessant during these months:

  Question: How did it get to the point where the FBI came to you and said, “We want [your tapes and notes]”?
   
  There came a period, after I was covering the Panthers maybe about 12, 14, 16 months—I’m not sure—where the FBI called me and asked if I would have regular meetings informally with agents. They said: “We know that you’re over there all the time and you’re seeing what’s happening, and you’re all around with them. We’d like you just to tell us what’s going on, be our eyes and ears on the inside.”
   
  I told them of course I couldn’t do that; “I can’t even have this conversation with you.” But they persisted in it. They would call The New York Times bureau almost every day in San Francisco. ... Then one day they told this woman ... who was answering the phone: “Tell Earl Caldwell we’re not playing with him. He doesn’t want to tell it to us, he doesn’t want to talk to us, he can tell it in court.” This was like on a Friday. On a Monday, they ... came back with a subpoena for me to appear before a federal grand jury, and they wanted all of my notebooks and tape recordings and anything else I had accumulated over that period, about 16 months of reporting on the Black Panthers.
   
  Q: And you said no?
   
  Oh, absolutely. ... I began to create a little file in the back of The New York Times office, a private file, apart from The New York Times file. ... stuff that I considered to be very sensitive, and I don’t want anyone messing with it. ... I had to destroy a lot of this [very sensitive] material before the agent came back, before the marshal came back with the subpoena. ...
   
  Q: Why did you feel like you had to destroy material?
   
  If ... it wound up in the hands of the FBI, people were going to say to me, “That was the intention all along.” There was a virtual war going on by this time, escalating between the Black Panthers and the authorities. ...
   
  Q: Did [you] even consider the idea of turning over your material?
   
  No, I never would have done that. It wasn’t even possible to think about doing that. ... There was no way that we as a generation of black journalists—we were not going to do that. 

  Caldwell’s case became an important test of a journalist’s right to protect confidential sources.  The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit ruled in his favor, but this decision was overturned when the case reached the U.S. Supreme Court (where it was combined with two other cases as Branzburg v. Hayes). Justice Byron White, writing for the 5-4 majority, argued that “compelling” and “paramount” state interests required reporters to disclose confidential information to grand juries and that this did not violate the First Amendment.
  
  See also:

  • New York Times advertisement in New York Amsterdam News highlighting Caldwell and other Times journalists who covered black history and culture.  February 14, 1970.
  • “Black Journalists Back Reporter,” New York Amsterdam News, February 21, 1970
  • “Black Newsmen Vow Resistance,” New York Times, February 14, 1970
  Thank you to Tamara Nopper for sharing this source and suggesting this topic for today’s post.