H. Rap Brown did not wait for permission to define himself. Long before federal agents called him a menace and politicians wrote laws in his name, he was a young man from Baton Rouge, La., who believed the country needed an honest confrontation with its own history. Long before he died at 82 on Sunday, Nov. 23, in a federal prison medical facility, he had already become Imam Jamil Abdullah Al-Amin, a name he adopted after turning to Islam inside Attica.
“Violence is necessary. Violence is a part of America’s culture. It is as American as cherry pie,” he said during the height of the Black Power movement.
Brown, who would become one of the most vocal leaders of the movement, grew up fighting his way to and from school. He was sent to a Catholic orphanage for discipline and learned early that resistance required both strength and wit. He earned the nickname “Rap” for his unmatched wordplay on the streets of Baton Rouge. His political direction began with his older brother, Ed Brown, who introduced him to the Nonviolent Action Group at Howard University, where Brown met future movement leaders like Courtland Cox, Muriel Tillinghast and Stokely Carmichael. Carmichael later described him as a serious and strong brother whose calm presence inspired confidence…