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The Black Power Movement and the Black Student Union (Bsu)

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THE BLACK POWER MOVEMENT AND THE BLACK STUDENT UNION (BSU) IN WASHINGTON STATE, 1967-1970 BY MARC ARSELL ROBINSON A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY WASHINGTON STATE UNIVERSITY Program of American Studies AUGUST 2012 © Copyright by Marc Arsell Robinson, 2012 All Rights Reserved © Copyright by MARC ARSELL ROBINSON, 2012 All Rights Reserved To the Faculty of Washington State University: The members of the Committee appointed to examine the dissertation of MARC ARSELL ROBINSON find it satisfactory and recommend that it be accepted. _________________________________ David J. Leonard, Ph.D., Chair _________________________________ Lisa Guerrero, Ph.D. _________________________________ Thabiti Lewis, Ph.D. ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENT As I think about this dissertation and all the people who played some part in its creation, it is hard to know who to thank first. Yet, perhaps it would be fitting to begin with my dissertation chair, David J. Leonard, whose outstanding mentorship and support has been instrumental to this project. In addition, I was also honored to have Lisa Guerrero and Thabiti Lewis serve on my committee, therefore their service has also been appreciated. Several other Washington State University faculty and staff have made major contributions to my growth and development in the American Studies Ph.D. program including C. Richard King, chair of the Critical Culture Gender and Race Studies (CCGRS) Department, Rory Ong, director of the American Studies Program, and Rose Smetana, Program Coordinator for CCGRS. Moreover, all the faculty and staff of Comparative Ethnic Studies, Women Studies, and other departments/programs who worked with me deserve special acknowledgement for providing invaluable knowledge and guidance. A special thank you goes to Joy Taylor for serving as a copy editor for a substantial portion of this dissertation. And, to Joy and all my graduate students colleagues in American Studies, the Black Graduate Student Association, and other iii programs/departments at WSU, thank you for adding richness and comraderie to my graduate student experience. With my specific dissertation research, I would like to thank everyone who aided me in conducting this project. Those individuals include everyone who agreed to let me interview them: David Covin, Rutledge M. Dennis, Felicia Gaskins, Larry Gossett, Jeff P. Guillory, S. Rudolph Martin Jr., Emile Pitre, Thomas L. Purce, James F. Short Jr., and Ernest Thomas. I would also like that thank the staff at the Washington State University Library, especially members of the Microfilms, Archives and Special Collections unit for their assistance. Thank you also to staff members at the Daily Evergreen newspaper for giving me access to their archives and WSU‘s Academic Media Service provided technical equipment and friendly advice. At the University of Washington, I need to acknowledge the Seattle Civil Rights and Labor History Project and the University of Washington Libraries for rending noteworthy materials and assistance. Finally, I would like to acknowledge the love, support, and encouragement of my family and friends, starting with my life-partner Sina Sam. She and my son Sovann Robinson have been patient and understanding with me all these years as I embarked on this academic journey. Thank you to my sister Mekka Robinson for her generous emotional and financial support over the years, and for also serving as a copy editor for much of this dissertation. And to my mom, Margaret Robinson, the Sam Family, and the rest of my family and friends, thank you for your unwavering support and faith that I would eventually finish. iv THE BLACK POWER MOVEMENT AND THE BLACK STUDENT UNION (BSU) IN WASHINGTON STATE, 1967-1970 Abstract by Marc Arsell Robinson, Ph.D. Washington State University August 2012 Chair: David J. Leonard This dissertation centers on the Black Student Union (BSU) at the University of Washington and Washington State University, during the late-1960s. It traces how the first BSU organization was formed at San Francisco State University in 1966, and soon spread north to the state of Washington. Following the establishment of the BSU at the University of Washington in the fall of 1967, African American students there led a successful protest campaign to implement racial reforms at their institution. The BSU at the University of Washington also spearheaded organizing and protest campaigns throughout Seattle and the State of Washington, leading to the founding of a BSU at Washington State University. Located in a mostly Caucasian and rural area on the Washington-Idaho border, Washington State University is far removed from Seattle in terms of population and social climate, but there too BSU members led substantial protest efforts in the late-1960s. While giving a detailed narrative of BSU history in the Northwest, this dissertation also argues that the BSU was a constituent part of the Black v Power Movement and therefore challenges conventional narratives of Black Power as entirely violent and destructive. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS Page ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS…………………………………………………………………...iii-iv ABSTRACT……………………………………………………………………………………v-vi CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION……………………………………………………………………….1 The Dominant Narrative of Civil Rights and Black Power………………….4 Defining Black Power………………………………………………………….14 The First Black Student Union………………………………………………..23 Dissertation Significance and Outline ………………………………………35 2. THE BLACK STUDENT UNION AT THE UNIVERSTIY OF WASHINGTON…...41 The Black Freedom Struggle in Seattle during the 1960s………………..42 The Black Student Union Comes North……………………………………..51 BSU Further Radicalized, March through May 1968………………………66 May Sit-in……………………………………………………………………….76 Activity Following the Sit-in…………………………………………………...92 3. EARLY BLACK ORGANIZING AT WASHINGTON STATE UNIVERSITY, SPRING 1968……………………………………………………………………...…106 Socio-Geographic Characteristics of Washington State University…….107 The Afro-American Alliance…………………………………………………110 vii Project 408 Incident……………………………………………………….…118 Summer Recruiting, 1968…………………………………………..………130 4. BSU CAMPAIGN FOR BLACK STUDIES AT WASHINGTON STATE UNIVERSITY, 1968-1969 …………………………………………………………..136 Black Studies…………………………………………………………………136 Protest of the Daily Evergreen……………………………………………...140 Campaign for Black Studies Continues…………………………………....146 Black Studies Challenged…………………………………...………………160 5. THE BSU AND ALPHA GAMMA RHO INCIDENT…………………………….…173 The Conflict Begins…………………………………………………………..173 The Controversy Continues………………………………………………....179 BSU Protest in Colfax, Whitman County Jail……………………………...192 Brief Account of BSU Actions, 1969-1970…………………………………212 6. CONCLUSION………………………………………………………………………..220 Dissertation Synopsis and Concluding Arguments……………………….226 Future Research……………………………………………………………...230 The Black Student Union and Post-Soul………………………………..…231 BIBLIOGRAPHY……………………………………………………………………………...240 viii Dedication This dissertation is dedicated to the four people who have made the biggest impact on my life: my maternal grandmother Doretha Robinson, my mother Margaret Robinson, my sister Mekka Robinson, and my life-partner Sina Sam. ix CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION My earliest recollections of learning about Civil Rights history occurred during elementary school. These encounters almost always happened during January or February when my class had a unit on Martin Luther King Day or Black History Month. During these lessons, my class would typically have some sort of play, reading, or sing- a-long to mark the occasion and I was often given a prominent position in the production. Often being one of the only Black males in my classes, I was commonly selected to star in the play or program. I relished these Civil Rights units, not because of the information they provided, but because they offered me a rare occasion to feel valued and affirmed as an African American male within a school setting. By my teen years, I found the high school equivalent of these Civil Rights units totally alienating. In my mind, I had heard the ―I Have a Dream Speech‖ more than enough times, and I found the Civil Rights Movement to be completely uninteresting. The cumulative effect of the narrative that school provided conditioned me to see the Civil Rights Movement as an endless series of marches and speeches that had no direct connection to me or the world around me. I had no concept of how the Movement might comment on why my ―gifted‖ class was filled with mostly White students, while my school and the surrounding neighborhood was predominately African American. It would not have even occurred to me to connect Civil Rights history to my lived 1 experience in this manner, given how these lessons depicted school segregation as a thing of the past. As an undergraduate and graduate student I began to completely rethink what I thought I knew about Civil Rights, as I learned many details and complications that my K-12 lessons neglected to mention. I learned that the ―I Have a Dream‖ speech also included powerful statements about economic justice and ―the fierce urgency of now.‖1 I learned that Rosa Parks was not a tired old lady, nor was she the first person to refuse to give up her seat. I also learned about the Black Power Movement, and how Civil Rights and Black Power impacted my hometown, Seattle, WA. Through these insights, I found a new and fascinating history that challenges simplistic heroes, narratives, and binaries. Now, as I write a dissertation on Civil Rights and Black
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