After the violence in Chicago and riots in black neighborhoods, many Americans became extremely radicalized against their government. The peaceful protests and sitins of the early sixties had turned into an all-out war against au thorities. Nowhere was this more obvious than in black ghettos across America where calls for black equality had turned into cries of "Black Power!"

The Black Power movement was led by a group known as the Black Panthers, an organization founded by Bobby Seale and Huey Newton. The Panthers, like the hippies, grew out of the neighborhoods of the San Francisco Bay area. Unlike the hippies, however, the Panthers were raised in the mean streets of East Oakland, where the white police force kept the black neighborhoods under tight militaristic control.

The Panthers expressed their outrage in a stylish paramilitary pose that was quickly imitated by many in...