H. Rap Brown

Jamil Abdullah al-Amin (born Hubert Gerold Brown; October 4, 1943 – November 23, 2025) was an American activist who served as the fifth chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) in the 1960s. Calling himself H. Rap Brown in that period, he was one of the primary spokesmen for the black power movement.

Brown was perhaps best known for his provocative comments during the ghetto riots in the "long hot summer of 1967," such as, "Violence is as American as cherry pie", and, "If America don't come around, we're gonna burn it down." He was also known for his autobiography, Die Nigger Die!. He briefly served as the Black Panther Party's minister of justice during the six month alliance between SNCC and the Black Panther Party.

After spending over a decade as a Muslim cleric and community organizer in Atlanta, Georgia, he was convicted of murder, serving a life sentence for the shooting of two Fulton County, Georgia, sheriff's deputies in 2000.

Background and activism

Hubert Gerold Brown was born on October 4, 1943, as the youngest of three children. His father was a laborer and his mother was a maid and teacher.

Brown's activism in the civil rights movement included involvement with the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). Brown was introduced into SNCC by his older brother Ed. He first visited Cambridge, Maryland, with Cleveland Sellers in the summer of 1963, during the period of Gloria Richardson's leadership in the local movement. He witnessed the first riot between whites and blacks in the city over civil rights issues, and was impressed by the local civil rights movement's willingness to use armed self-defense against racial attacks.

He later organized for SNCC during the 1964 Mississippi Freedom Summer, while transferring to Howard University for his studies. Representing Howard's SNCC chapter, Brown attended a contentious civil rights meeting at the White House with President Lyndon B. Johnson during the Selma crisis of 1965 as Alabama activists attempted to march for voting rights.

Major federal civil rights legislation was passed in 1964 and 1965, including the Voting Rights Act of 1965, to establish federal oversight and enforcement of rights. In 1966, Brown organized in Greene County, Alabama to achieve black voter registration and implementation of the recently-passed Voting Rights Act.

Elected SNCC chairman in 1967, Brown continued Stokely Carmichael's fiery support for "Black Power" and urban rebellions in the Northern ghettos.

During the summer of 1967, Brown toured the nation, calling for violent resistance to the government, which he called "The Fourth Reich". "Negroes should organize themselves", he told a rally in Washington, D.C., and "carry on guerilla warfare in all the cities". They should "make the Viet Cong look like Sunday school teachers". He declared, "I say to America, Fuck it! Freedom or death!"

Cambridge riot incident

In this period, Cambridge, Maryland, had an active civil rights movement, led by Gloria Richardson. In July 1967 Brown spoke in the city, saying "It's time for Cambridge to explode, baby. Black folks built America, and if America don't come around, we're going to burn America down." Gunfire reportedly broke out later, and both Brown and a police officer were wounded. A fire started that night and by the next day, 17 buildings were destroyed by an expanding fire "in a two-block area of Pine Street, the center of African-American commerce, culture and community." Brown was charged with inciting a riot, due to his speech.

Brown was also charged with carrying a gun across state lines. A secret 1967 FBI memo had called for "neutralizing" Brown. He became a target of the agency's COINTELPRO program, which was intended to disrupt and disqualify civil rights leaders. The federal charges against him were never proven. Brown was defended in the gun violation case by civil rights advocates Murphy Bell of Baton Rouge, well-known radical lawyer William Kunstler, and Howard Moore Jr., general counsel for SNCC. Feminist attorney Flo Kennedy also assisted Brown and led his defense committee, winning support for him from some chapters of the National Organization for Women.

The Cambridge fire was among incidents investigated by the 1967 Kerner Commission. But their investigative documents were not published with their 1968 report. Historian Dr. Peter Levy studied these papers in researching his book Civil War on Race Street: The Civil Rights Movement in Cambridge, Maryland (2003). He argues there was no riot in Cambridge. Brown was documented as completing his speech in Cambridge at 10 pm July 24, then walking a woman home. He was shot by a deputy sheriff allegedly without provocation. Brown was hastily treated for his injuries and secretly taken by supporters out of Cambridge.

Later that night a small fire broke out, but the police chief and fire company did not respond until two later. In discussing his book, Levy has said that the fire's spread and ultimate destructive cost appeared to be due not to a riot, but to the deliberate inaction of the Cambridge police and fire departments, which had hostile relations with the black community. In a later book, Levy notes that Brice Kinnamon, head of the Cambridge police department, said that the city had no racial problems, and that Brown was the "sole" cause of the disorder, and it was "a well-planned Communist attempt to overthrow the government".

While being held for trial, Brown continued his high-profile activism. He accepted a request from the Student Afro-American Society of Columbia University to help represent and co-organize the April 1968 Columbia protests against university expansion into Harlem park land in order to build a gymnasium.