And also, bill hampton freds brother and freds sister. And [indiscernible] who was also in the apartment that night in the brook truce berkshires. She is here tonight also. [applause] i want to thank northwestern and bernadine for bringing together such a prestigious and accomplished panel. I feel like now, i can sit down and hear what they have to say. I am and all of the people who are here tonight and their accomplishments. Bernadine fork putting it together and for being one of the inspirations for wired with this book. It was bernadine mentioned that fred hampton spoke at Northwestern University law School Almost exactly 40 years ago to the day. The person who introduced him was a young law student by the name of [indiscernible] who is sitting in the front row. Butrently, i wasnt there he stammered through an introduction of fred. Fred. Red got when fred got up he chided him and said you better get it together. He also knew that he had helped him get out on appeal bond. As you know, he is gotten it together. [applause] [laughter] i dont want to spend [laughter] the rest of the night talking about his accomplishments. If you had told me a few years ago that i would be standing here talking about a book that i have written not to mention a personal narrative i would not have believed you. I was a lawyer, i didnt even love writing. Somebody i saw from years ago in seattle said you dont even like to write. Its true. I must say i let most of the brief writing go to my partners. Stopped doing daytoday work of civil rights law and fight in the government and court i had a little time to reflect. I have a story to tell here. A story that needs to be told. To tell the story of fred hampton because even though it was 35 years later, it was the story and a person who had most affected me in my life. My backave people will only come into a tough situation with think what would soandso do tonight in the situation . One of those persons for me was the head of the homeless coalition. The other person was fred hampton who i knew 35 years ago. I often think and a tough situation what would fred hampton do . I decided this story needs to be told because he affected me so much maybe i can tell it in a way that will affect other people. Peopledvantage over some as one of my writing teachers said you were lucky you had a front row seat on history. I did have a pharmacy on history and the fact that i got to meet fred hampton, the panthers, i lived through the 60s and i was a lawyer for much of the movement. Another friend also said you dont get credit for living it. That means you have to write it in a way that hopefully people like and want to read about it. Again, nevertheless i had such a wonderful story to tell. Actually, two or three stories to tell. The first is the story of fred hampton which many of us know much more about his death of his life. I had the pleasure of being with going down to haynesville and being with franciss father who passed away and getting a feel for the family and the cousins and the people who knew fred early on. I heard stories about when he was tenures old, he organized the neighborhood kids and trust him over for breakfast on saturday morning because he knew some of them were hungry and he cooked the neighborhood kids. He had his own breakfast for Children Program when he was tenured told. When fred was young, he had a big head. People used to call him peanut head. He decided he wasnt going to be called that so he learned to be very good at reppo tape. 14 he wase he was known as the king of the nines. He had a list. Isp and in order to overcome that he practiced oratory and he listened to preachers. He also memorized all of the speeches of dr. King and malcolm x. No accident, he took what could have been a deficit and overcame them and became a powerful speaker. He could speak to welfare mothers and getting kids and law students. When fred got older and was in high school, he was a good football player. He was very likable. He was known for being a very sociable guy. He wasnt content to be popular. When he saw injustice, he had to react to it. One of the first things he did he noticed the black girls werent considered to be homecoming queens. He leads a walkout of the school over that. Ae next year he is leading walkout because there are no black administrators and few black teachers. His work is so compelling the principal calls him and when there are racial strikes because he has so much respect of the black and the white students. Fred goes from there because he is such a good organizer, they recognize him and he becomes the chair of the suburban naacp representing the west suburbs of chicago. He spoke up for workers rights and he spoke up for the rights to have principles. One of the issues he worked for was higher pay for police then eventually for more control and the ability to Discipline Police who abuse people. He was always a community person. One of the things he did early on even though he was not a swimmer, there was no place for black kids in may would to swim. The white kids could go to a nearby suburb. He organized the kids and led a march to the city council. It impressed a number of people including a city councilmember. He also have the opposition of some people. When he led a large crowd there, half of them got in. He argued to the city council, lets go to a different place or let people sat on the floor. The police instead fired tear gas and when the people ran they broke windows and they were angry. A police came and arrested fred even though he was inside the village when all of this happened. He was early on a scapegoat. Head of the from naacp, he marched with dr. King on the west side. He also worked with the black power movement. A verytogether Impressive Library of black history books. Then when the panthers came together in 68, when bobby rush came back from the coast to form a panther chapter, the first person he asked to join was fred hampton. 19 68, fred became the chairman of the illinois chapter of the black and the party which immediately grew under his electric energy. He impressed people so much that they did the work that he said and also the work he did. If you went to the breakfast for Children Program. He fed the kids. He didnt just talk about it. He had the ability to inspire people and i think his rhetoric certainly was very strong. It was panther rhetoric it was revolutionary rhetoric and sometimes it was off the paid rhetoric which meant get police who abuse us out of the community. The police did not see it that way. There was a conflict growing. One month before fred was killed, there were two young black men killed in the Housing Project near him who were organizing to get a street light so the kids could get to the clinic without getting run over as two of them had already been hurt. There was no recourse then and even now against Brutal Police behavior. Those police even though one young man was shot in the back of the head, the police claimed he had pulled a gun on them. The other persons similarly was shot and when the police claimed he had a gun and bystanders said he did not. This was the type of thing that fred hampton was dealing with on december 4. And i sawthe office fred and heard him. He was like telling people, you got a be at the breakfast for Children Program on time. You got a get petitions signed for the Community Control of police you got a come to political education. This man vibrated energy and people around him were driven by his energy. On december 4, 1969, two days later, after i had just and with fred, my partner who you saw in the movie lived up the street knocked on my door and said the chairman is dead. I said what do you mean he said chairman fred was shot this morning at a police rally. I thought this guy who i had just seen two days before so vibrant and alive, somebody who made us believe to do everything is dead i couldnt believe it. I went to the station lockup which is where the survivors were. Debra johnsonht freds fiance had been lying in bed next to him. She was a. 5 months pregnant. 8. 5 months pregnant. The entire police story fell apart fell apart. In fact, what happened was that was one shot fired by clark who was dying with his shot, it went up in the air. He said these are Honorable Police we should be praising them for what they did. It ended his political career. The community didnt by the fact that this young man was killed in his bed at 4 30 in the morning and the police raid. There was evidence he was drugged which is why he never woke up. We expose that, that would be the end of the story. A brutal case of police murder. They went in with their shotguns, a machine gun, a rival rifle and a handgun. The is the beginning of story because as we pursue to this lawsuit, it was flint and me and the whole Peoples Law Office and Jim Montgomery and others and help from the center for constitutional rights, it wasnt just a few of us. We got help from the whole progressive legal community. We pursued it. A few years ago a guy named William Oneil showed up as a witness in a federal case. It turns out he was Fred Hamptons personal bodyguard and he was also head of security at the party. We said we wonder if yes had anything to do with the raid. We began asking questions and taking depositions. The government kicked and screamed and lied and had adjudged that covered up for him and the book goes into the 18 months but it took and in the second month of the trial, 200 volumes of files are produced that had been hidden for the entire pretrial. Among these documents we discovered for that i want to mention. There was an fbi program that targeted the entire left the focused on the black movement and in particular, on the black panthers. One of the objectives was to prevent the rise of the messiah who could electrify the masses. We thought doesnt fred hampton that the description . Wasnt he pulling people together to support the community . We were told a hundred times a court he had nothing to do with it and the judge affirmed but then we get a document that shows that under this program, they sent a letter to the head of the rangers saying im a panther i have been hanging around with fred hampton i just want you to know they have a hit on you. Headwas approved by the Marlon Johnson who then became the head of the Chicago Police force. They send a letter and they specifically say its expected it will get retaliatory action. In fact, maybe he realized the language didnt fit a black brother he wasnt too good on this line. He didnt take retaliatory action and in fact what happened was not getting unable to get the blackstone rangers to do their bidding, the head oneil go in and get a floor plan that showed everything, the entire layout of the apartments including said where fred hampton slept. He marked on the diagram the bed of hampton and clark when they sleep her. When the police come in the apartment in the bedroom is in the back and when we look at the direction of the bullet holes, they converge where fred hampton spent was. It turned out that that floorplan was given to the raiders that night. After that, the fbi said we dont take a position on this. Internally, they get a bonus to William Oneil. Because his information was invaluable. The fbi was taking credit for the raid and one of their agents termed it a success on the witness stand. The first story is fred the second story of the raid and the third story was the f dei involvement. When he was leading marches to the city council before there was a Panther Party, hoover was sending memos to the white house, the cia, the army talking about this young leader leading this demonstration to the city council. This was before there was any revolutionary rhetoric. Before the black Panther Party. This is what hoover had in mind. Any black independent group was a threat to him. Interestingly, one of the advantages and we tried this case there was a mood in the country of exposing the government because of watergate. The Church Committee was doing that. From the Ford Administration who fought hardest against it and had ford veto a bill that would have expanded it to include intelligence work don rumsfeld and his chief aide dick cheney. The battle continues to expose government illegality atrocities. Those people had had their day and they deserve a day in jail as well as their day running the country. [applause] finally, i want to say when i went over to the hamptons apartment years later, i asked them is there anything here fred that was personal to him that might be useful in my book . Bill went down into freds old room and came up with this book. It was a book that fred had called deep in my heart. Fred wanted to be a lawyer. Fred believed in justice. In 1969i dont have time to be a lawyer there is too much else going on. Fred has affected lawyers. He has been the inspiration for our office Peoples Law Office and some of the things we did. What kept me going and it was an irony that we were pursuing who killed fred hampton but it was Fred Hamptons alive who us going and inspired us when we said maybe we should give up we have had enough and we said what would frampton what would fred hampton do and we kept going. If we could pass that on to law students, lawyers and the public, we would have gotten the message of fred hampton across and he is not died in vain. Thank you. [applause] [indiscernible] i am telling you all in advance and warning the panel that i am panel that i am planning to interrupt as distinguished as you are. [laughter] i am going to do a really quick round the table not formal introductions because theres so much to talk about and so much to convey. I will briefly introduce you to professor adam green from the university of chicago. He has written an incredible book called selling the race story of black chicago i dont know the official subtitle, postwar chicago. A fantastic book. [indiscernible] still at the Peoples Law Office still fighting the fight and one of the leaders of uncovering the birch torture cases and fighting for people who have been on death row and unjustly imprisoned. These are totally inadequate introductions but im giving you a heads up. [indiscernible] a professor historian at Northwestern Law School and notof stand and fight a law school. I wish you were at the law school. Evanstonepartment in at American Bar Foundation fellow and has written a wonderful book about york black life postwar called to stand and fight. David stonewall, a professor are you an assistant professor . Are you an associate professor . Yes. [laughter] at the university of illinois chicago in education. He teaches at the Chicago Freedom school and the author of 12 brilliant books and we are very happy you are here. Professor Dorothy Roberts from Northwestern Law School also to distinguished to introduce and the author of two books. [indiscernible] , who many of you know, a journalist and a long and distinguished career, editor back in the day of mohammed. Peaks currently a journalist at the university of chicago. History department. Africanamerican studies. Everything just about everything. Author of a wonderful book called ella baker and the black freedom movement. [indiscernible] longtimein chicago activist around labor rights. Around human rights and civil rights and a longtime representative of the freedom movements of southern africa. Somebody who represented the africa in of south apartheid and remains one of the amazing people. For internationalism. For the relationship between the struggles there. Each of you as you can see is e of eliminating illuminating [laughter] and the life and death of fred hampton and his family. Assuming that our audience is with us for only a short time, im going to try to engage this Brilliant Panel in a conversation. This will require keeping a moving so i apologize for my plan to interrupt all of you. [laughter] at the end of this, a civil rights lawyer who many of you know and i will take questions then we will adjourn for more conversation. Project. Part a memory it is shocking and familiar brutality. And the differing calculations. We are today recovering and exercising the collective powers of memory. Im going to go this way and ask you ease ask you each to tell us where you were 40 years ago on december 4, 1969. [laughter] i know dave is going to have the best answer. Just a moment of what you are doing then, than what you first heard of fred hampton. I didnt know you were going to ask this and im grateful that you did. I know exactly where i was on december 4. I was six years old sitting in the living room with my mother and i saw the television probably the night of december 4 after the killing took place. It stayed with me throughout my life. Those of you who know me well, know that it means a great deal to me to say this. This was the first time that i understood about the existence of racism in the united states. Getting news of the killing of the assassination of the murder of fred hampton. It stayed with me throughout my life. That image of seeing that on the television and trying to cope at that age and in my situation with what i had to catch up with in order to process that. I know exactly where i was that night even though i was very young. I was at home. I got a call from skip andrews. I came here to northwestern. I got one of the other law students that worked at the office out of class at lincoln hall and we headed down to the apartment. For the next 10 or 11 days, we stayed there pretty much around the clock. Taking evidence, standing in freds blood, watching while the panthers brought tours through their every day. Showing the bloody mattress this is where the chairman died. There was one particular quote which i think you put in the book that stuck with me. Beyond just the remarkable being and seeing firsthand and documenting this murder. This older black woman came through, looked at the bullet holes and swiss cheese walls by and she saidun is a nothing but a northern lynching. Eight nothing but a northern lynching. I recall be