17 Quotes by Junius Williams

Later that year, the Voting Rights Act opened the door for thousands to register for the first time.

Life was not always so peaceful and rewarding at NAPA (the office). Sometime during 1968, I cam back to the office and found the plate glass window shattered. I asked Ab what happened, and he strangely knew nothing.

We learned how to envision a different neighborhood, fought for the resources to make it happen, and in March 1968, through the Medical School Agreements, had been given the green light to proceed. All we had to do was make it happen--and ascend to a new level of power in the community.

Organizing a working majority proved harder than we thought because we couldn't get a quorum. But one day in December, twelve people showed up, eight from our coalition. So we changed the quorum to eight. You gotta do what you gotta do--this was war, one faction against many others who wanted control of the land.

I had never run a campaign, but I was an organizer. My job was to create momentum by mobilizing the constituency we had, which I was positioned to do.

So on June 16, 1970, history was made in Newark. Ken Gibson became the first black mayor of a major Northeastern city.

The youth were to be trained to be the vanguard of the next battlefront, whatever that was. I knew within my heart that the Gibson experiment in city hall would attract enemies, so I intended to teach these young people how to fight on this new battlefield.

By the middle to the end of the 1970s, Black Power as we envisioned was a dream deferred. And I was no longer in a position to awaken the minds of the people about what was happening.