Fredrika Newton Opens MLK Week with Call for Truth and Justice

Colgate University's 2026 celebration of Martin Luther King Jr. Week, held Jan. 22-31, kicked off with a keynote address by activist Fredrika Newton, head of the Dr. Huey P. Newton Foundation. The opening ceremony, hosted by the ALANA Cultural Center and the Office of the Dean of the College, began with a rendition of "Lift Every Voice and Sing," performed by Joycelyn Brobbey '26. The moment underscored the week's theme, Live the Values and Lift Each Other.

Newton, the widow of Black Panther Party co-founder Huey P. Newton and a former member of the party, framed her remarks through a lifetime shaped by activism. "I like to say that I learned to march before I learned to walk," she joked.

Since her husband's assassination in 1989, Newton has dedicated herself to preserving and sharing what she described as the true history of the Black Panther Party. Most recently, she helped lead the 2024 opening of the Black Panther Party Museum in Oakland, Calif., the city where the party was founded.

Throughout her address, Newton emphasized the importance of telling the accurate story of social justice movements, connecting her own work to the legacy of King. "It is important that we recognize him not as a symbol polished for comfort, but as a man whose life and work challenged this nation to tell the truth about itself," Newton said. "I speak to you as someone who's lived through the consequences of that truth being denied."

Newton went on to challenge long-standing media portrayals of the Black Panthers as violent or militant, arguing that such depictions ignored the organization's extensive community-based work. She pointed to initiatives including founding schools, health clinics, and a free breakfast program that fed more than 20,000 children daily across 30 cities, inspiring the creation of the federal government's own free breakfast program.

"The media loved to depict Panthers as gun-toting, leather-wearing, angry what have yous," Newton said. "They always intentionally missed the opportunity to show the reality of our day-to-day lives. They never showed that same brother who was up at five o'clock in the morning feeding children."

Rectifying these narratives has guided her work for decades. "Correcting that distortion has been my life's work. Not because history needs heroes, but because communities need truth," Newton said.

Newton connected this concern to the way King is remembered today. "Dr. King's legacy has been carefully curated and is selectively remembered," Newton said. "Too often his words are quoted without his demands, his courage without his critique. We must be clear that this distortion did not happen by accident but because movements that expose the roots of injustice threaten the foundations of power."

Her remarks set the tone for an ongoing emphasis on reflection and collective action. This focus will continue throughout the remainder of MLK Week with a series of events including lectures, dialogues, a prayer service, and the fifth annual Social Justice Summit. The summit brings together students, faculty, and staff from the New York Six Liberal Arts Schools for workshops and discussions centered around building more inclusive communities.

"Our intention in organizing MLK Week is not to create a single narrative or a single experience," ALANA Director Esther Rosbrook said. "It is to create a learning ecosystem - one that recognizes justice work as intellectual, relational, spiritual, and deeply human."
That commitment, Rosbrook emphasized, extends beyond the week's programming and into the daily life of the campus community.

"MLK Week is not only about honoring Dr. King's legacy. It is about cultivating a Colgate community that cares for one another, listens deeply, acts with intention, and leads with integrity," Rosbrook said. "If we leave this week more committed to lifting each other, across differences, identities, ideologies, and across roles, then we are doing this work as it was always meant to be done."