French_Revolution_and_the_Emancipation_of_Slaves

The Making of the Modern World The events of the French Revolution and the emancipation of slaves in Saint Domingue cannot be looked at as isolated events in history. As a matter of fact these events need to be studied in conjunction with one another, as the emancipation of slaves was a direct product of the French Revolution and the creation of the Declaration of Rights. It is not to say that the emancipation of slaves wasn’t inevitable, but rather the Declaration acted as a catalyst to promote the equality of all men regardless of race, religion, and social status. Similar to many other historical events, the Declaration promoted a new way of viewing one’s purpose and rights within society. Just as Martin Luther enabled the common man to interpret the bible for himself, the Declaration enabled men of all color and religions to be conscious of their natural and civil rights. It goes without mention that the initial motive for the Declaration was not to encourage religious or slave riots but rather, the Declaration was a vehicle to protect natural and civil rights in a time where the King no longer had the justification of complete authority. There are many theories that suggest that the emancipation of slaves was influenced by the rebellion and the introduction of the ideals set forth in the Declaration. This paper will specifically talk about the validity of the declaration, St. Domingue as an unstable colony, and the lack of the King’s authority that made the emancipation of slaves in St. Domingue an inescapable fate. One of the reasons the Declaration was so successful was because it was uncontested. During the period of the Declaration “not one responsible spokesman [..] attempted to show that there were no natural rights, or even that the specific rights of the Declaration were not valid”. No white man in his right mind dare say that one man is more worthy of rights than another especially being the minority in the colony. Just as the Jews were free before Hitler and the Aboriginal peoples were free before the European settlers, the colored people of St. Domingue were free before the colonists. The installment of the Declaration was not a new concept to natives of St. Domingue, “having once been free, the slaves did not need the backing of the natural rights philosophy to convince them that they should be free again”. For the most part the Declaration was widely accepted among the people of France and the French colonists. The colonists adopted the Declaration, altered it, and used it in ways that would benefit them. After the colonists accepted the declaration it was nearly impossible to stop the notions that came with it. Unsupplied with the mention of race or color, the Declaration clearly states that men are born free and equal in rights, therefore the Declaration reinstalled a notion of freedom that the colonists wouldn’t be able to take away from the slaves. Perhaps the reason the emancipation of slaves in St. Domingue was so successful was because the slaves knew that the Declaration was a document that governed France, and at the end of the day they were a French colony and they deserved to enjoy the same rights. The validity of the Declaration was proved by fact that it was uncontested, the slaves knew this and knew that they were worthy of the same rights. Throughout history, and present in today societies there are examples of groups of people who have conflicting ideas and opinions that eventually lead to the break down of the social order of that society; religion is often the cause of these divisions. The Protestant Reformation is a great example of two religions trying to coexist with each other in the same place, ultimately resulting in war and devastation across Europe. History has taught us that civil unrest and internal conflicts in a country or a colony will lead to change. This theory can also be applied to the success of the Declaration in St. Domingue. The colony of St. Domingue was constructed by combining two vastly different cultural climates, in a sense “both whites and the slaves were […] alien visitors from another society”. Trying to mix the two cultures, under the control of French colonists was like trying to mix oil and water: frustrating and impossible. Natives of St. Domingue were immersed in an African culture bringing aspects of Catholicism and Voodoo to everyday practices, were as French colonists were a product of eighteenth century French ideas. The diversity between these two groups of people only added to the conflicting interests and goals each group of people had. The colonists knew that they needed slaves in order to continue the production within in the colony, and without them the colony may be destroyed; however the slaves knew that regardless of their color they were deserving of the same rights as any other French man. These conflicting ideas disturbed the peace of the colony, thus weakening the power of the colonists, ultimately allowing the slaves to be successful in their emancipation. Prior to the Declaration, St. Domingue was under the control of the French King. The Kings presence and authority was a major agent in restricting the slaves thought of a rebellion. Although the slaves were the majority in the colony and could have easily rebelled against the colonists, there was an instilled fear that the King stood firmly behind the Code Noir. As mentioned above, the colony was at civil unrest because of the internal fighting among the colonists and the slaves. The fact that the King was allowing these conflicts to continue showed that he was no longer interested in the activities of the colony. It cannot be proved that the slaves saw the correlation between the Kings withdrawal and the possibility of their own autonomy, but one can assume that the Kings passiveness sent a positive message to the slaves of St. Domingue. The outbreak of war in the West Province was an official sign that the King had withdrawn his support from the colonist, and now the future of the slaves lay in the hands of the planters. What was once unimaginable became a possibility now that the Kings power had been removed from the colony. Whether the King intentionally withdrew his power knowing that the slaves would rebel and become autonomous, no one knows, however it is known that the Declaration was the acting agent that made this rebellion possible. As Hunt states her in excerpt, no one group can be considered in isolation during the time of the Declaration. The emancipation of slavery in St. Domingue was not an isolated event, and cannot be studied without examining the entire movement of the Declaration. It was inevitable that once the freedom and rights of Protestants were discussed, then the freedom and rights of other groups were going to have to be discussed as well. Hunt calls this the bulldozer effect, in that once the idea of freedom and rights are brought up [even if pertaining only to one group of people], the idea is going to spread to more people than the intended receivers. The Declaration was successful in reinstalling the idea of freedom to the slaves, creating civil unrest within the colony, then causing the King to remove his power in the colony. The combination of these powerful agents made the emancipation of slavery unavoidable and ultimately successful. The most powerful agent of the movement of the Declaration was that the first article “men are born and remain free and equal in rights” had no mention of race, color, or religion. This alone provided the necessary confidence needed for slaves to overcome the subordination that had controlled them for far too long. Bibliography Curtin D. Philip. “The Declaration of the Rights of Man in Saint-Domingue, 1788-1791.” The Hispanic American Historical Review 30 (May 1950): 157-175. Hunt, Lynn. Inventing Human Rights: A History. New York: W.W. Norton and Company, 2007. Assembly, National. The French Revolution and Human Rights: A Brief Documentary History. Translated and edited by Lynn Hunt. New York: University of Pennsylvania, 1996. -------------------------------------------- [ 2 ]. National Assembly, The French Revolution and Human Rights: A Brief Documentary History, trans. and ed. Lynn Hunt (New York: University of Pennsylvania, 1996), 77. [ 3 ]. Philip D. Curtin, “The Declaration of the Rights of Man in Saint-Domingue 1788-1791,” The Hispanic American Historical Review 30 (May 1950): 168. [ 4 ]. Curtin., 172. [ 5 ]. National Assembly, 79. [ 6 ]. Curtin, 173. [ 7 ]. Curtin, 174. [ 8 ]. Lynn Hunt, Inventing Human Rights: A History. (New York: W.W Norton and Company, 2077), 165. [ 9 ]. Curtin, 172: Code Noir was a document that Louis XIV signed to regulate slavery [ 10 ]. Ibid., 174. [ 11 ]. Hunt, 151. [ 12 ]. Ibid., 160. [ 13 ]. National Assembly, 78.