Welcome to DU!
The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards.
Join the community:
Create a free account
Support DU (and get rid of ads!):
Become a Star Member
Latest Breaking News
General Discussion
The DU Lounge
All Forums
Issue Forums
Culture Forums
Alliance Forums
Region Forums
Support Forums
Help & Search
A World built on Slavery
http://www.juancole.com/2014/02/world-built-slavery.htmlA World built on Slavery
By Juan Cole | Feb. 24, 2014
(By Greg Grandin)
Many in the United States were outraged by the remarks of conservative evangelical preacher Pat Robertson, who blamed Haitis catastrophic 2010 earthquake on Haitians for selling their souls to Satan. Bodies were still being pulled from the rubble as many as 300,000 died when Robertson went on TV and gave his viewing audience a little history lesson: the Haitians had been under the heel of the French but they got together and swore a pact to the devil. They said, We will serve you if you will get us free from the French. True story. And so, the devil said, OK, its a deal.
A supremely callous example of right-wing idiocy? Absolutely. Yet in his own kooky way, Robertson was also onto something. Haitians did, in fact, swear a pact with the devil for their freedom. Only Beelzebub arrived smelling not of sulfur, but of Parisian cologne.
Haitian slaves began to throw off the heel of the French in 1791, when they rose up and, after bitter years of fighting, eventually declared themselves free. Their French masters, however, refused to accept Haitian independence. The island, after all, had been an extremely profitable sugar producer, and so Paris offered Haiti a choice: compensate slave owners for lost property their slaves (that is, themselves) or face its imperial wrath. The fledgling nation was forced to finance this payout with usurious loans from French banks. As late as 1940, 80% of the government budget was still going to service this debt.
In the on-again, off-again debate that has taken place in the United States over the years about paying reparations for slavery, opponents of the idea insist that there is no precedent for such a proposal. But there is. Its just that what was being paid was reparations-in-reverse, which has a venerable pedigree. After the War of 1812 between Great Britain and the U.S., London reimbursed southern planters more than a million dollars for having encouraging their slaves to run away in wartime. Within the United Kingdom, the British government also paid a small fortune to British slave owners, including the ancestors of Britains current Prime Minister, David Cameron, to compensate for abolition (which Adam Hochschild calculated in his 2005 book Bury the Chains to be an amount equal to roughly 40% of the national budget then, and to about $2.2 billion today).
InfoView thread info, including edit history
TrashPut this thread in your Trash Can (My DU » Trash Can)
BookmarkAdd this thread to your Bookmarks (My DU » Bookmarks)
3 replies, 767 views
ShareGet links to this post and/or share on social media
AlertAlert this post for a rule violation
PowersThere are no powers you can use on this post
EditCannot edit other people's posts
ReplyReply to this post
EditCannot edit other people's posts
Rec (4)
ReplyReply to this post
3 replies
= new reply since forum marked as read
Highlight:
NoneDon't highlight anything
5 newestHighlight 5 most recent replies
A World built on Slavery (Original Post)
unhappycamper
Feb 2014
OP
JustAnotherGen
(31,798 posts)1. I think if more people
Knew that Haiti 'won' their Revolution but still had to pay off their equivalent of G.B. for the honor - they 'get' the poverty and suffering there.
Rec
polly7
(20,582 posts)2. Excellent article. nt.
malthaussen
(17,184 posts)3. Didn't know this part of the story.
Seems to me, somebody owes Haiti a few dollars.
-- Mal