Free Republic

As protests continue to sweep across the country following the Grand Jury decision in the shooting death of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo., a Los Angeles official is calling for the city to commemorate the Watts Riots of 50 years ago. Councilman Bernard Parks has introduced a resolution asking the city to begin planning to mark “this historic event….considered by many to be a key turning point in the local African-American civil rights movement.”

Could Ferguson happen here? Some would say it already did — nearly five decades ago. Days of sometimes violent demonstrations in Ferguson, Mo., erupted after Michael Brown, an unarmed black teen, was shot dead by a police officer Aug. 9, allegedly in self-defense. At the height of the civil rights movement, the Watts riots were triggered after a young black motorist was pulled over and arrested by a white California Highway Patrolman on Aug. 11, 1965, on suspicion of drunk driving. The struggle to arrest him sparked six days of rioting that claimed the lives of 34 people, injured more...

The woman who intervened when an officer pulled over one of her sons, leading to a racially-charged scuffle that set off the 1965 Watts riot, has died. The Los Angeles Times reports Saturday that Rena Price died of natural causes on June 10. She was 97. …

OAKLAND, Calif. (AP) - Former Black Panthers are hoping the phrase "Burn Baby Burn" will help their nonprofit organization market a new product - hot sauce. The Huey P. Newton Foundation, named for the co-founder of the 1960s militant group, is seeking to trademark the phrase that for many brings to mind the racially charged 1965 Watts Riots in Los Angeles that left more than 30 people dead, at least 1,000 wounded and hundreds of buildings in ashes. The new line of hot sauce, called "Burn Baby Burn: A Taste of the Sixties Revolutionary Hot Sauce," is aimed at "anyone...

The divisions are still there, 40 years later. To many, the events that began in Watts on Aug. 11, 1965, remain a riot, pure and simple — a social breakdown into mob rule and criminality. To others, they were a revolt, a rebellion, an uprising — a violent but justified leap into a future of black self-empowerment. To mark the 40th anniversary of the riots, The Times asked nine people, all of whom witnessed the events firsthand, to recount their memories of six days that changed their lives and the course of the city. They include a rioter, a business...

NOTE The following text is a quote: Mullen: U.S. Military Needs More Diversity By Karen Parrish American Forces Press Service WASHINGTON, Oct. 18, 2010 – The armed services “can’t go fast enough” to increase diversity, Navy Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told a group of senior military leaders here yesterday. Navy Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, addresses the Air Force Diversity Senior Leader Working Group at the Doubletree Hotel in Crystal City, Va. on Oct. 17, 2010. DOD photo by Navy Petty Officer 1st Class Chad J. McNeeley (Click photo...

John McWhorter is right to say that we ought to pause and remember the Watts riots of 40 years ago and ponder their implication for America's present and future ["Burned, Baby, Burned..." FR post here]. I take strong issue, however, with the conclusions he draws from his review of the events in Watts and South Central Los Angeles in 1965. I think the difference between McWhorter and me arises in large measure from our profoundly different perspectives on the event. He writes that he was born two months after the riots occurred and that his conclusions are based on his...

While many people this month are focused on the controversy surrounding the 40th anniversary of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, I have another civil-rights-related 40th anniversary on my mind. On Aug. 11, 1965, the Watts neighborhood of Los Angeles broke out in flames on the nation's television screens. Many cherish the memory as the moment when the militant became mainstream in a "fed-up" black America, replacing the nonviolent, gradualist efforts of old-guard civil rights leaders. The Watts riot indeed shaped modern black American history more decisively than the Voting Rights Act. The question is whether it was in a...