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Herbert Aptheker: The Death of a Hero
by Jared Ball
March 26, 2003
The week of March 19, 2003 will be remembered by most as the week
the US stepped up its invasion of Iraq. I, however, will remember
it as the week the great historian Herbert Aptheker died. Many
have written summarizing this man's life and work (Jack Fischer Mercury
News March 19, 2003) (Christopher Lehmann-Haupt The New York Times
March 20, 2003) offering sufficient background of this important scholar
and his work.
But not enough can be written highlighting Aptheker's relationship
to world struggle, particularly that of the African in America, and
it is on this that I would like to comment.
Aptheker, a Brooklyn-born Jewish Marxist, must be recognized as important
a historian to the study of the African diaspora as any. But,
as Arturo Schomburg said, Black history is "the missing pages of world
history" and Aptheker's contributions must be seen in that light as
well. Aptheker, born in 1915 two years prior to the Bolshevik
revolution in Russia, grew up in a world filled with competing
capitalist and Marxist ideologies and in a New York filled with an
increasing global African population looking for its own liberation.
As contemporary and friend John Henrik Clarke would once explain Black
people looking for an ideological base from which to wage their own
struggle for freedom turned first to Marxism. It was the growing
Marxism that offered the first solid and established ideological defense
against a capitalism that in league with its life-long partner white
supremacy continued to place Africans at the bottom of the socioeconomic
ladder. Because of his political affiliation, Aptheker
would also come into contact with many of these Black scholars and
activists looking for a place from which to wage their struggle.
To his credit Aptheker never turned away from the rampant racism that
affects every aspect of life including academic scholarship.
He used the early boyhood influence of a Black woman who worked in
his home to
forever remember the specific and seminal experience of the African
in the Americas. Aptheker became one of the world's leading
authorities on and pioneers in the study of African struggle
not only by way of uncovering hidden history but in placing African
people at the center of the study. He reminded his audiences
that it was Black struggle and insurrection that led the movement
for abolition in the United States, not the other way around.
He noted the tremendous affect on domestic and international policy
these insurrections had on the United States and in the constant forced
recognition of American hypocrisy. His work on African rebellion
remains central to those who have continued the tradition of determined
scholarship meant to liberate Black history and return it to its rightful
place in world history. Aptheker has been both the basis of
and inspiration to generations of Black scholars looking for a history
that is more than simple chronological facts but the beginning of
cultural healing and the restoration of stolen humanity.
Aptheker cherished his personal relationship with the greatest of
scholars W.E.B. DuBois and was even there to drive his mentor to the
airport the day DuBois left this country for good to live out the
rest of his life in Ghana. While working with filmmaker Hail
Gerima on the history of the Maroons, I had the opportunity
to preview an interview Gerima had with Aptheker on this subject.
Even as an old man, long studied and battle tested, Aptheker
was moved to tears when recounting the story of the Maroons and African
struggles against enslavement in the Americas. Aptheker wept
as he retold the story Nat Turner's final night when he spoke his
final words while imprisoned and awaiting execution. Recounting
the last words of Turner's response to a question of regret Aptheker
tearfully uttered Turner's last words, "was Christ not crucified."
Similarly, but on a lighter note, sharing the story of Supreme Court
Justice Thurgood Marshall's senatorial confirmation Aptheker jokingly
shared how he had been made the subject of the hearings. Marshall
was asked if he remembered quoting Aptheker in a statement he made
some years earlier. He responded "yes." He was then asked if
he knew that Aptheker was a Marxist to which Marshall responded "no."
Then, asked if he would have quoted Aptheker knowing of his political
affiliations, Marshall answered, "no."
Herbert Aptheker never forgot or shied away from the ideological warfare
that continues to dominate academic life. He recognized the
centrality of history to political struggle and was a tireless supporter
of the oppressed. Personally he meant the world to me because
as the son of a Jewish mother and Black father and as one who has
studied the interaction of these two groups I have, unfortunately,
been shown more division than unity, contrary to the standard historical
myths. I wrote to him and expressed as much shortly before he
died and his response of support remains on my wall where it will
always stay. Aptheker is as much a reminder as any that all groups
of people are represented by their respective sellouts and cowards
making it more difficult for the rest of us to make the necessary
bonds that would lead to the immediate removal of those very sellouts
and cowards.
He was a hero in every sense of the word and he should not be forgotten.
-Jared Ball, aka The Funkinest Journalist , is a founding member of Organized Community Of United People (COUP) a Washington, DC - based organization for total change ( www.voxunion.com/coup ). He has a masters degree in Africana Studies from the Africana Studies and Research Center at Cornell University and is currently a Ph.D. student in Journalism at the University of Maryland. He is also a host of Chaos Or Community a weekly radio foray into funk, news, history and politics.
"In
the abundance of water, the fool is thirsty!" - Bob Marley
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ORGANIZED C.O.U.P. IS A Washington DC Based Movement for Social Change.