Howard Fuller (activist)

In the 1970s, Fuller adopted the name Owusu Sadaukai, organized several national African Liberation Day celebrations, and was one of the foremost advocates of Pan-Africanism in the United States.

Fuller said that it was his unique childhood experience that prompted him to "…see all races as equals, hate income disparity, and choose civil rights activism as the only career for [him]".

[9] It was during his time as a student at Case Western Reserve University that he participated in his first protest – a sit-in in 1964 to oppose the construction of a "…new public school in a predominantly black area of Cleveland on the grounds that it would surely be segregated".

[3] Fuller's "relentless impatience of youth"[15] drove him to move to North Carolina in 1965 and take up a job as the director of community development at Operation Breakthrough (OBT).

George Esser, the then-head of the North Carolina Fund, summed up Fuller's strategy: "Howard soon demonstrated both his charismatic leadership, his appreciation for real community organization; that is, encouraging people to take a hand in their own lives, of neighborhoods to organize and come to the City Council or come to the County Commissioners and demand equal treatment in such mundane things as garbage collection, street lights and street paving and so forth.

"[18] Howard Fuller explained his method of mobilization and significance of his experience at OBT thusly: "It was really in North Carolina that I learned everything that I know today about politics and so forth.

And I learned most of it from the people that I was working with … I started out doing grass roots organizing at the neighborhood level trying to get streets paved, have houses fixed and get rid of rats.

"[19] By "disrupting people's inertia"[20] and getting them involved in activism of any sort in the first place, Howard could then easily hone his small army into a more cerebral movement.

[18] Charles W. McKinney Jr. writes, "Fuller's ability to both identify and cultivate indigenous leaders throughout town served as the primary catalyst for the success of OBT's efforts".

[16] Through his efforts at OBT in organizing protests and rallies at Durham's city hall and universities, Fuller earned a reputation as a black power militant.

[26][3] Controversy engulfed MXLU since before its opening; firstly, the fact that Fuller was an executive in the very organization that gave money to his personal project raised concerns of a conflict of interest and a subsequent misappropriation of funds.

[27] Historian Charles w. McKinney Jr. writes, "with the help of incendiary news coverage in Durham, Howard Fuller became a racial caricature – the regional symbol of an ominous, state-sanctioned black radicalism that ran amok throughout the state".

[16] Many historians believe that Fuller adopted his pan-Africanist and Marxist views during his visit to Africa in which he traveled with black freedom fighters in Mozambique.

Prior to his MXLU days, Fuller had seen the class disparity and the resulting injustices inflicted on the disadvantaged as a function primarily driven by racial discrimination.

[34] With a growing list of enemies and a scandal over the issue of funding for MXLU, North Carolina Republican politicians attempted to seize the opportunity that they had been given in order to reduce Fuller's influence in the working-class black community.

However, Fuller quickly regained public support by "… excoriat[ing] Stith for befriending Abe Greenberg, a Durham landlord who refused to bring rental properties up to code.

[26] As a result, George Stith was discredited, and local GOP leaders had no choice but to recommend FCD, and therefore Howard Fuller, as the recipient of the OEO grant.

[26] MXLU's primary investor after the initial funding from the FCD was the Federation of Pan-African Institutions, "a consortium of nation-building elementary, secondary, and higher educational academies dedicated to black cultural nationalism,"[35] of which it was a member.

MXLU received one round of grants from the Church but was denied the second time due to the ideological "struggle between the alternative revolutionary college and members of the state's upper stratum of blacks".

Fuller's adoption of more radical beliefs cost him dearly and constantly threatened to eliminate the level of influence he had in Durham and the civil rights movement.

Reeling from the loss of MXLU, Fuller fell into a spiral of radicalization, culminating in his association with the Revolutionary Workers League (RWL), a Marxist black power extremist group.

[38] Once in Milwaukee, he initially obtained a job as an insurance salesman, and one year thereafter, he became an associate director of the Equal Opportunity Program at Marquette University.

[18] Once he had disrupted people's inertia and apathy, it was then easy for him to lead them to demanding greater things like equal legal treatment[18] Though troubled and convoluted, the trajectory of Howard Fuller's career mirrors the history of the civil rights movement as a whole.

The same ideological infighting (over a disagreement in methods employed to achieve a common goal) that resulted in the assassination of Malcolm X led to the closing of MXLU.

The same lack of funds that contributed to closing MXLU forced other civil rights leaders to hold dangerously large gatherings in overcapacity churches.