Haiti has always been described as the poorest country in the Americas but during its height as Saint-Domingue it was the richest place in the Americas being the main source of the sugar and coffee that had become indispensable to European life, its wealth was based on human capital. Liberty, equality and fraternity were all terms unfamiliar to the world. In 1789 Haiti was still the dormant colony of St. Domingue while French king, king Louis XVI, was being rioted against by Persian mobs who promoted liberty and equality for all.
The whites were outnumbered significantly by the blacks with more than half of them originating from Africa, they brought with them their own traditions and cultures which they had to soon let go of and learn colonial cultures such as the common language “creole” and the accepted religion, Christianity. “Out of elements of African religions and Christianity they evolved a unique set of beliefs, vodou, which gave them a sense of identity.” (Jeremy Popkin) By 1972 the French law enforcers had regained control of most of the country while trouble began to raise in the colonies.
In 1789 the French assembly released a declaration named “The Declaration Of The Rights Of Men” The declaration affirmed that all men have an equal and unassailable right and that the purpose of government is to preserve those rights. It listed the rights as “liberty, property, security, and resistance to oppression. "It was brought to the knowledge of the National Convention that the white colonists’ deputies had deceived them and on Feb. 4, 1794, the Convention took a influential step. France became the first European country to officially outlaw slavery in all its colonies.
As news of the French revolution travelled to the co...
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... in his leadership the black population offered little support. On May 6th 1802 Toussaint Louverture surrendered. At first he was allowed to retire from the army with full honors but one month later he was called to a meeting with the French commander and arrested on charges of conspiracy. Hoping Napoleon would understand his thinking Toussaint boarded a ship for France. In Toussaint’s absence his followers continued negotiations with the French until news arrived from Guadeloupe that Napoleon had re-instated slavery. Once again the former slaves took to the field against European armies, it was reported that they killed all the French white people. After all their efforts in 1803 the French army was finally driven out and Haiti became the world’s first black republic.
Works Cited
Jeremy Popkin, University of Kentucky. "A Different Route to Emancipation." (2004).
Though many conflicts flared in Martinique and Guadeloupe a few years prior, they were not as well coordinated and massive. Not expecting so many to come and attack at once, the white planters were overwhelmed. A fifty-thousand French force of experienced soldiers arrives on the shores of Saint-Domingue. Not ready to give up their freedom and return to their previous servitude, the Africans of the colony defend themselves.
The Declaration of the Rights of Man was formed and intended in 1789 by the National Assembly of France to be the very backbone for the constitution. This allowed the nation of France to become liberated and achieve a more secure and structured society by changing from that of an absolute monarchy to a more constitutional democracy. France sought to gain equality and freedom for all individuals; after being fed up with the constant corruption for so long. France managed to successfully obtain an equal nation and government, in which power was given to the people and not to some tyrannical or dictatorial figure.
Before the revolution started in Saint Domingue, Saint Domingue was producing 60% of the coffee around the world and produced 40% of the worlds sugar at the same time (Haitian Revolution, www.webster.edu). Comparing all the French colonies, Saint Domingue was the most profitable and the most successful of its possessions. Saint Domingue was the most prosperous and wealthiest island in the Caribbean, but for Plantation Owners. In 1789, mulattoes were about 28,000, followed by white people which where 32,000, and the last group was black slaves, which numbered up to 500,000 (Haitian Revolution, www.webster.edu). The lowest class in saint Domingue was the black slaves, which outnumbered the whites 10 to 1. Saint Domingue had so many slaves that out of the 1 million slaves at this time in the Caribbean, the slave population in saint Domingue mad up half of it. Since this colony was mostly driven by its slave labor, it was one of the richest and the colony that gave more profit of them all in that time. What made this colony one of the richest colonies was their land. Their soil was very fertile and it had and ideal climate, letting it grow a lot of its main productions, like sugar, coffee, cocoa, Indigo, tobacco, cotton and vegetables. When the revolution started to spark in 1789, there we...
The French Revolution was a tumultuous period, with France exhibiting a more fractured social structure than the United States. In response, the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen proposed that “ignorance, neglect, or contempt of the rights of man are the sole cause of public calamities, and of the corruption of governments” (National Assembly). This language indicates that the document, like its counterpart in the United States, sought to state the rights of men explicitly, so no doubt existed as to the nature of these rights. As France was the center of the Enlightenment, so the Enlightenment ideals of individuality and deism are clearly expressed in the language of the document. The National Assembly stated its case “in
The first step in Napoleon’s failed effort was to regain the French colony of Sainte-Domingue, which was being ruled by Toussaint L’Ouveture, a leader of the rebel military. Bonaparte’s motivation to recover the island of Sainte-Domingue stemmed from two key factors. His principal reason for wanting to salvage the island was to restore the sugar industry and slave labor in the region. If Napoleon was successful, with regards to this objective, he could successfully launch the Louisiana Territory as his North American empire. The rebellion at Saint-Domingue is essential to the Louisiana Purchase because each phase of Napoleon’s plan was met with resistance from the natives and the generals. Furthermore, a correlation exists as a result of Bonaparte’s failure to accomplish his goal of restoring Saint-Domingue to its days under French rule where slavery was a cornerstone; the defeat of the French during this revolt was the turning point at which Napoleon realized he needed money more than an empire in America. These objectives can be corroborated with an excerpt from “Louisiana: European Explorations and the Louisiana Purchase: A Special Presentation from the Geography and Map Division of the Library of Congress” which
On January 1, 1804, the country of Haiti formally declared independence from the French colonial powers. This newfound state of freedom was born as a result of the Haitian revolution (1791–1804), a movement that was primarily lead by the former slave and prominent leader, Toussaint L’Overture. Due to the successful nature of this slave revolt, the nation of Haiti became a huge inspiration for surrounding colonies – becoming the second former European colony in the New World that was able to achieve independence. Despite the hard-won efforts of the oppressed, political stability within the country quickly unravelled as the national identity formed during the revolution deteriorated under rising conflict between mulattoes and blacks.
François Dominique Toussaint L'Ouverture was an educated former slave and soldier of the king that would eventually lead the revolution against French rule in Saint-Domingue. The prime objective of Toussaint’s letter to the Directory of France was to end colonial tyranny and declared an end to slavery in Saint-Domingue (Haiti) by utilizing the language of freedom and equality in reminisce of the French revolution. Toussaint fiercely pursued the abolition of slavery, as his letter warned the Directory of France against the reinstatement of slavery. Although Toussaint was captured in 1802 and executed in 1803 by the orders of Napoleon Bonaparte, his movement lived on. The French ultimately failed to recapture the island of Saint-Domingue, declaring the independent state of Haiti in 1804.
Haiti was once an economic power when France held claim to the Eastern Part of Hispaniola, then named St. Domingue. It was a French colony flourishing with coffee and sugar. Eventually the ideals of the French Revolution - Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity - made its way to the colonies resulting in a revolution. Haiti was the first slave-led revolution and declared its independence as a republic on January 1, 1804. After their declaration of independence, things started to make a turn for the worst. In 1934 the U.S. forces occupied Haiti to establish stability. The U.S. appointed heads of state but the real power was present in the U.S. occupiers, whereas the heads of state are just figureheads. Haiti’s economy dwindled further down when France demanded reparations of 150 million francs, which wasn’t paid off until 1947. In 65 years, Haiti had 22 heads of state.” In 1957 Francois Duvalier is elected president. He later “creates a totalitarian dictatorship and in 1964 declares himself president-for-life.” This is where Haiti’s political instability really begins.
Haiti, previously known as Saint-Domingue, was a slave island and one of the wealthiest of France’s colonies. Up until this point in time, slavery was still common and, as mentioned above, continued throughout the world even after such freedom declarations such as, the Declaration of Independence in the newly formed United States, and the Declaration of Rights of Man in the Republic of France. The Haitian Revolution was brought on by the want for liberation of slaves, and was largely inspired by the French Revolution and the Declaration of Rights of Man. “Even though the early leaders of the French Revolution had no intention of exporting the upheaval, it spread to the colonies, especially to Saint-Domingue” (Ott 1973). This revolution proved to be a major event as it was the most successful slave revolution in history. The slavery population in Haiti, vastly outnumbered the white colonists in Haiti, and therefore, when the slave population banded together, led to a full-scaled rebellion. Revolts would continue to occur until finally in 1793, the slaves got their freedom, with slavery officially being abolished in all French territories in 1794. From this point until 1802, small rebellions continued to occur as not much changed in the daily lives of slaves, despite technically having their freedom. After the French Revolution and with Napoleon taking power in 1799; Napoleon reinstated slavery in all French colonies, including Haiti. Napoleon also sent an army to Haiti to enforce these new slavery laws and Haiti returned to a slave economy in 1802 (Doyle 1943). The Haitian Revolutionaries finally get their win after defeating the French soldiers in the Battle of Vertieres in 1803; the final part of the revolution. The revolution officially ended in 1804, with Haiti gaining its independence from France and permanently abolishing slavery
The island of Saint-Domingue was made up of a mixture of people including whites from France, creoles, free people of color, and slaves. Once sugar became a major cash crop on the island, an estimated half-million African slaves were brought in to work the land. These slaves outnumbered their white masters more than ten to one and made up the majority of the island inhabitants. Even so, the island had the most secure slave regime in the Caribbean because of the cooperation between masters and free men of color. Due to the difficult policing jobs given to the freed men with little reward, the communication between them and the white masters broke down. Now that the white slaveholders were on their own, it was only a matter of time before their brutal treatment of slaves would lead to an uprising. Once enslaved Africans received word of the revolution in France they too began demanding freedom. After years of civil unrest and vicious fighting, Haiti declared its freedom from France in January of 1804. What makes the Haitian Revolution more radical than the two before it is the fact that it was led by slaves. Throughout the previous revolutions, the main goal was for white men, essentially, to be free from oppressive government rule. There were few thoughts regarding the rights of slaves, even though they too were men. The fact that this group of people were able to remove the colonial authority and establish their own country during this period of time was particularly radical and unheard
Why are these background informations useful? Because these informations provide us some important basic knowledges of Haiti. As a country mainly composed of ex-slaves, Haiti is mainly composed of people of African origin. However, why is Haiti so poor compared to its other black majority neighbors such as Saint Kitts and Neves and Barbados? Because Haiti did not attain its independence through peaceful means. Haitian revolt against the French, and they indeed won, against Napoleon Bonaparte[2].
In September 1791, France achieved the movement of freeing and outlawing slavery. In turn, Haitian slaves were inspired to do the same by revolting against French plantation owners. This transformative movement of 100,000 slaves was led by Toussaint L’Ouverture; unfortunately, he died before experiencing Haiti’s separation from France in 1804. However, along the way of success of both revolutions, a toll occurred on the numerous lives lost. The Reign of Terror in France was created as a way to protect the republic from its internal enemies, but instead 16,000 people were guillotined. Many documents were shown to be describing the execution of the Reign of Terror to be gruesome and wrongful such that J.G. Milligen stated, “The process of execution was also a sad and heartrending spectacle”, in The Revolutionary Tribunal. Milligen continued to describe the vivid scene of the execution, but this was only one event and many others have died in the fall of the Bastille and the attack on the royal palace. Haiti has also lost many lives as an outcome of the revolutions especially in the slave revolts and battles with French soldiers sent by Napoleon. In addition, the Haitian Revolution leader L’Ouverture died in captivity in France. Both of these revolutions were known to have successfully achieved its goals, but it was chaotic and
On August 26, 1789, the assembly issued the “Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen.” Through judicial matters, this document was written in order to secure due process and to create self-government among the French citizens. This document offered to the world and especially to the French citizens a summary of the morals and values of the Revolution, while in turn justifying the destruction of a government; especially in this case the French government, based upon autocracy of the ruler and advantage. The formation of a new government based upon the indisputable rights of the individuals of France through liberty and political uniformity.
Haiti had over a half million enslaved Africans working on sugar plantations owned by the French. The sugar was hugely profitable, but conditions for enslaved worker were horrendous. Many were cruelly over worked and under fed. Haiti also had a population of both free and enslaved mulattoes. Free mulattoes, however, had few right and were badly treated by the French. In 1791, a slave revolt exploded in northern Haiti. Under the able leadership of Toussaint L'Ouverture, Haitians would fight for freedom and pave the way for throwing off French rule.
The Constitution guaranteed it as a freedom to them, and white slaves were virtually nonexistent. Slavery was so deeply engrained as a “black race” attribute, that it came to be used as a descriptor to further lower the status of African Americans. Free of these racial tensions, whites seemed to enjoy freedom without conflict. However, in reality, not all whites had access to equal freedom. “Freedom” often meant the ability to have equal opportunity, as the purpose of immigration to the colonies was often based on a desire for economic independence. Equal opportunity was not the case in a hierarchical, socioeconomically-divided America. Land ownership or religious affiliation were often required to vote or run for office respectively. In many ways, slaves were actually subject to less forced social structure on large Southern plantations, where they could develop their own private communities. The Gullah language is an example of a creole of English and West African dialects. Religious syncretism often resulted in African-influenced versions of Christianity, far more culturally-mixed than what Puritanical Massachusetts mandated its citizens adhere to. These cultural features served as a “glue” for many African Americans, and reflects the complex facets of the word “freedom” The phrase should therefore be modified to account for the fact that