"The party gained international notoriety when Seale and Newton sent armed members to the State Assembly in Sacramento in 1967 to oppose gun restrictions. Several members who walked onto the Senate floor with loaded weapons were arrested for disturbing the peace but not on weapons charges, because they were carrying theirs legally, Seale said.
At its height, about two months after Martin Luther King Jr. was murdered, the Black Panther Party had 5,000 members in 49 chapters and branches across the country, Seale said. The 1968 confrontation that left Hutton dead, along with other shootouts with Oakland police, caused the negative image, members say. The incidents also brought the federal scrutiny that they say ultimately broke up the party. The FBI infiltrated the Panthers and several other activist groups in its infamous counterintelligence program called Cointelpro, begun in 1967.
http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/OAKLAND-Black-Panthers-legacy-at-40-2468421.php#page-2
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