Eldridge Cleaver

Eldridge Cleaver in 1968

Leroy Eldridge Cleaver (August 31, 1935 – May 1, 1998) was a prominent leader and early member of the militant Black Panther Party. After a long, tumultuous journey, involving several years as a fugitive on the run as well as some time in prison he was transformed from an angry, young black man, bent on avenging himself against American racism, to a born-again Christian author, and American civil rights activist.

Early Life

Born in Wabbaseka, Arkansas, Cleaver's family moved to Phoenix and then to Los Angeles. As a teenager he became involved with local gangs and petty crime. In 1957 at the age of 22, Cleaver was convicted of assault with the intent to murder.

Prison

While in prison, he wrote several essays, later to be published as the book, Soul on Ice (1968), which became very influential within the burgeoning black power movement. In the book, Cleaver acknowledged raping several white women, which he defended as "an insurrectionary act." He also admitted that he began his career as a rapist by "practicing on black girls in the ghetto." He maintains that his criminal actions have nothing to do with the views expressed in the book.

Black Panthers

Soon after Cleaver was released from prison in 1966, he joined with Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale (October 1966), who had just founded the Black Panther Party. In 1968, serving as its Minister of Information and shortly after the publication of his book, Cleaver became a candidate for President on the ticket of the Peace and Freedom Party. That same year, he was injured and arrested in a conflict between the Panthers and the Oakland police department.

Exile

Charged with attempted murder for the skirmish with police in Oakland, Cleaver jumped bail and fled to Algeria – where he was joined by Timothy Leary. Cleaver placed Leary under "revolutionary arrest" as a counter-revolutionary, although Leary was later released. In his later (1978) book Soul on Fire, Cleaver would reveal that he was supported by regular stipends from the Republic of North Vietnam, with which the USA was then at war. It was also revealed that in his trek into exile, he had been followed by other former-criminals-turned-revolutionaries, many of whom hijacked planes to get to Algeria. The Algerians expected Cleaver to keep his proteges in line, which he described as becoming increasingly difficult, as their increasing number stretched his North Vietnamese allowance to the breaking point. Cleaver organized a stolen car ring to employ his revolutionary proteges. They would steal cars in Europe, and sell them in Africa. Eventually, Cleaver would flee Algeria out of fear for his life, spending time in both Cuba and France. Not only was Algerian police cracking down and tracking him and his gang of proteges, but there had been gun battles. Finally, Cleaver abandoned his proteges and former dreams living underground in France for several years. It was there, during his years of isolation in France that Eldridge Cleaver experienced a Christian rebirth.

Return to America

Cleaver returned to the United States in 1975, and subsequently renounced the Black Panthers. After facing the legal process regarding his past crimes, he was sentenced to probation for assault.

In the early 1980s, Cleaver became interested in religion. After several public appearances with evangelicals, including Pat Robertson and Robert Schuller, he became disillusioned with the commercial nature of evangelical Christianity. After a brief brush with Sun Myung Moon's campus ministry organization CARP, Cleaver made his choice and was baptized into The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints remaining a member until his death.

Politically, Cleaver became a conservative Republican, endorsing Ronald Reagan for President in 1980. In 1986 he embarked on a GOP campaign to win one of California's seats in the United States Senate. (He failed to win his party's nomination.)

Later in the 1980s, Cleaver became addicted to crack cocaine. In 1992 he was convicted of cocaine possession and burglary. In 1994, after nearly dying in a cocaine-related assault, Eldridge Cleaver reportedly overcame his addiction and became involved in fighting addictions with healthy nutrition.

Death

Cleaver died of prostate cancer in Pomona, California in 1998 at the age of 62. He is interred at the Mountain View Cemetery, Altadena, California and is survived by his daughter, Joju Younghi Cleaver, and son Macio Cleaver.

Quotes

• "All the gods are dead except the god of war."

• "History could pass for a scarlet text, its jot and title graven red in human blood."

• "I feel that I am a citizen of the American dream and that the revolutionary struggle of which I am a part is a struggle against the American nightmare."

• "I have taken an oath in my heart to oppose communism until the day I die."

• "If a man like Malcolm X could change and repudiate racism, if I myself and other former Muslims can change, if young whites can change, then there is hope for America."

• "In prison, those things withheld from and denied to the prisoner become precisely what he wants most of all."

• "Respect commands itself and can neither be given nor withheld when it is due."

• "The price of hating other human beings is loving oneself less."

• "There is no calamity which a great nation can invite which equals that which follows a supine submission to wrong and injustice and the consequent loss of national self-respect and honor, beneath which are shielded and defended a people's safety and greatness."

• "You don't have to teach people how to be human. You have to teach them how to stop being inhuman."

References

ISBN links support NWE through referral fees

• Cleaver, Eldridge. Soul on Ice. Delta (January 12, 1999). ISBN 978-0385333795

• ______________. "Soul on Fire." Hodder & Stoughton General Division (March 1, 1979). ISBN 978-0340228647

• ______________. Target Zero: A Life in Writing. Palgrave Macmillan (January 9, 2007). ISBN 978-1403976574

• Oliver, John A. Eldridge Cleaver Reborn. Logos International (1977). ISBN 978-0882702339

External links

• CNN Obituary
• PBS Frontline Interview with Eldridge Cleaver
• Reason Magazine Interview with Eldridge Cleaver

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