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[alexandramassliu]

égalité for all notes

haiti was wealthiest island in the western hemisphere based off of its capital of slavery

liberty, equality, faternity

toussaint recruited 3-4000 people and fought spanish and french army for 12 years. they burned the mechanisms of production and the plantations and homes

massacred the colonizers

1789 haiti 

french revolution is happening. the french saw this as an end of enormous privilege to the wealth. means radical thinkers ideas can be realized. means everyone has rights. rights of man. it was not supposed to work for everyone. 

sugar was too powerful to stop slavery and ayiti was the sugar capital of the world. 

to harvest sugar cane is very arduous and painful. 

the slaves were tortured in cruel ways. 

some black people escaped slavery due to having a white father or buying or finessing out. 

toussaint is one of those people. he grows up on a plantation and he was allowed to read and write as a child. he was very smart and had contacts in the united states and other islands. 

whites hoped for more control but there was a large population for mixed raced people on the island who wanted equality. they were the first to ask for equality. they sent a petition to france to request equality and civil protection

made the white people mad mad and white people started killing. 

the french got back and allowed mixed raced people rights but the white leader of saint domingue said no. funny enough his wife was like no france is trying to stop our « rights » we need be separate from france

boukman a slave and voodoo priest. voodoo is the spirit of ancestors. the voodoo ceremony is the start of the revolution is it when the slaves decided enough is enough. in two weeks it will start. 

august 22 1791 

1000 slaves attacked their owners. 👊🏾

1000 to 20,000 slaves joining in. in three days 184 sugar plantation, and 1000 coffee plantations gone. 

white and mulattoes fled to capital for protection 

toussaint meanwhile had two plantations. and went back to his old plantation and looked to protect his former slave owners 

boukman was murdered and mutilated by white owners in battle. rest in power. 

Toussaint decided to go to the mountain (large risk) and join the slaves and become the black spartacus

the french gov sent 10,000 military reinforcement to have the white p*wer be re-established. 

toussaint wasn’t a violent man. he first wrote a settlement offer in exchange for freedom of the slave leaders and better working conditions for the slaves. OBVIOUSLY REFUSED. 

it was hard for everyone on ayiti to imagine freedom for everyone. 

ANYWAYS in the french revolution they beheaded the king. 

mixed race people and white people are closer than ever and the mixed race people can join in politics. white people were not happy so they asked the british to help put down the revolution. 

in 1794 a delegation from the slaves and free black people in ayiti reached france national assembly

he pledge freedom to slaves fighting. the embassy was like no but the french national assembly endorsed the emancipation of the slaves. they also freed slaves around the entire empire (Guadalupe, martinique) 

millions of black slaves become french citizens..  

jean jacque dessalines was a prominent leader. 

toussaint was now a french citizen and pleased i guess but him and dessalines pushed the spanish army out of the island. 

there was word of what toussaint and dessalines was doing which was beating european armies

they didn’t want the army that ran away from the island to go to another and release information by telling the story of what was going on in haiti and sparking more slave rebellions. 

toussaint is now governor of saint domingue. his rival félicite sontonacs. he was popular with black people and toussaint did not like people threatening his power. he forced him off the island. 

in 1798 napolean bonaparte is in egypt  and goes to paris and took the reigns of power in a coup état and toussaint is watching him. Napoleon wants to restore slavery

toussaint wanted everyone to rebuild the economy meaning going back to the fields. slavery pt2 

newly freed slaves wanted to work for themselves. 

toussaint writes a constitution says that slavery would never exist on the island again and it was the first in history to prohibit discrimination based on skin color.. he also made himself governor for life with the sole authority to pick his successor. dictatorship which remained for two centuries.

thomas jefferson and napoleon are communicating. 

toussaint saw a bigger army of french coming to the island. he fought them for three months but with less support since he basically brought back slavery 

may 6 1802. toussaint surrendered. he was arrested on conspiracy. he was shipped to france. dessalines continued cooperating to french general. 

napoleon reinstated slavery in Guadalupe. ayiti erupted in anger and fear. the slaves took the fields again against the armies. dessalines said kill all the white people.  they burnt land. in 1803 the french. Haiti is the first black republic. 

toussaint died in france in a cell. 

The haitian revolution inspired more slave rebellions. france made haiti pay literally and crippled its economy. and the us did not recognize haiti for sixty years. the government continued to be authoritarian. 

[alexandramassliu]

Antenor Fermin

He was born in Cap-Haitian on October 1850, forty-six years after the Haitian Revolution.

He was very smart and from a young age (17)became an educator and taught: Latin, Greek, and French).

He published De L’egalite des Races Humaines (The Equality of the Human Races)  as a rebuttal to Essai sur L’inegalite des Races Humaines (Essay on the Inequality of the Human Races) by French writer and racist Gobineau

Gobineau was a racist scientist in the 19th century. Give a bit of insight as he most likely believed that White people were in some way and for some reason better than other races and more specifically black people.

UNFORTUNATELY, Gobineau was celebrated and Fermin was hidden and his text had to be recovered. in class professor said that he was known in Haiti because of the original text being in French but until a student in the United States brought his name up to a curious professor who hadn’t heard of him; Fermin’s work was not translated to English.

I wonder if Gobineau ever read Fermin’s piece. 

ANYWAYS, Fermin wrote about how black people are not inferior and he debunks that the reason black people had any intellectual progress and stuff because they needed slavery (ahem Gobineau). Fermin rejected the biological basis of race and says that any racial differences are because of social evolution and living conditions.