By C.L.R. James
First published in 1938
Random House – 1963 with an afterword
Vintage - 1989
Reviewed by Steve Halpern
Back in the 1970s, I had the opportunity of listening to C.L.R. James speak at a Militant Labor Forum in Brooklyn, New York. I was in my twenties, and James was in his seventies. When he spoke, James attracted several people from the West Indian community in Brooklyn.
I remember being impressed by C.L.R. James. He wasn’t just a revolutionary, but an intellectual who easily made his ideas clear to anyone who was willing to listen.
Then, in the early 1990s, I read James book The Black Jacobins for the first time. This was a turning point for me. Before reading this book, I had an interest in history, but was just beginning to see how that history is relevant to our lives today. In this book, James explained how an event that transpired about 200 years ago, on a relatively small island in the Caribbean, was profoundly relevant to the world today. After reading that book, I began a lifelong study of some of the watershed moments in the history of the human race.
A few years ago, I learned that C.L.R. James had discussions with Leon Trotsky at a time when Trotsky was living in Mexico. This was about one year after his book The Black Jacobins was published. Trotsky was a central leader of the Russian Revolution who had been deported from that country due to the betrayal of the revolution by Joseph Stalin.
Recently, I viewed the Netflix film series Small Axe, created by Steve McQueen. This series is about the West Indian community living in London. In a few of those episodes, McQueen’s characters recommended that people read C.L.R. James’ book The Back Jacobins. Eventually I decided that it might be a good idea to pick this book up again. I was glad that I did.
The French colony of San Domingo
Today, the island of Hispaniola is split up into two nations. The western section, that is closest to Cuba, is the nation known as Haiti. The primary language there is Creole, a language derived from French. In the east is Santo Domingo where the primary language is Spanish.
Before the Haitian Revolution, Haiti was the French colony of San Domingo. For most of the years of this colony, slavery was the law. While there were about 30,000 whites and 40,000 mulattos, there were about 400,000 slaves in San Domingo.
While today Haiti is one of the poorest nations in the world, in the late 18th century the French colony of San Domingo was a wealth producing center of the world. About 30% of the French economy came from San Domingo.
C.L.R. James gave an unvarnished history of the horrors inflicted on the slaves who produced this enormous wealth. Routine torture and murder were legal in those years. Because of those unimaginably horrendous conditions, the life expectancy of slaves was only a few years. For the slave owners, it was less expensive to import slaves on the notorious slave ships, than to make life even slightly less miserable for the slaves who produced their wealth.
There were good reasons why C.L.R. James gave those vivid descriptions of the horrors of slavery. When we begin to realize the full weight of the unimaginable lives those slaves endured, we can also begin to appreciate the unwavering will of these same slaves to free themselves from that institution for all time.
As long as the institution of slavery existed, there were slave rebellions. One of the most famous was the slave rebellion led by Spartacus against the Roman empire. According to histories I’ve read, about 90,000 slaves joined Spartacus in rebellion.
However, until the Haitian Revolution, none of these rebellions managed to take power and put in place a government of former slaves who would maintain power. The story of the Haitian Revolution explains why this exceptional event happened in the former French colony of San Domingo.
The initial rebellion of slaves on the island succeeded in burning some of the most profitable crops on the plantations. However, most of the slave owners maintained their control. Due to their isolation, the rebelling slaves went to the Spanish half of the island, where they received support. The Spanish gave aid to the former slaves as a way of putting pressure on the French colonial authorities.
The French Revolution and its effect on San Domingo
At this same time, the French Revolution erupted. Initially the French monarchy managed to maintain power. During this time, the principal debate in France viewed the problem of San Domingo as a conflict between the whites and mulattos.
In San Domingo, there were 127 levels of mixed race. If someone had one part to 127 parts of Black to white ancestors, that person was not considered to be white. The white people living on the island had absolute power over the Blacks and mulattos. This meant that murder, rape, and torture against Blacks and mulattos was legal.
However, while many mulattos were slaves, many were also free. Some mulattos received advanced education in France. This reality meant that there were white people who were in debt to mulattos, but those same white people had absolute power over the very people who loaned them money. So, within France many were aware of this discrimination and felt it was wrong. However, in the early stages of the French Revolution slavery remained the law.
In the next stage of the French Revolution the masses of the working class of France became intolerant of the old order and exerted their influence. For many French workers, they felt that the slaves of San Domingo had their same interests and became horrified when they learned of the reality of human bondage. Many French workers at that time refused to drink coffee in protest of the conditions faced by slaves. Under those conditions the new revolutionary government of France united under the slogan liberty, equality, and fraternity. This same government outlawed slavery.
When the rebelling slaves of San Domingo learned that slavery was outlawed, they realized that France was the only nation that took this step. This made the revolutionary army switch sides, and they joined with the new French government to take control of the island and remove the Spanish from power.
Toussaint L’Ouverture was a slave who knew how to read and had a relatively better position on the Bréda plantation where he worked. Because the slave owners on this plantation were more benevolent than most, Toussaint aided those owners. This support allowed them to avoid the rath of those who were in rebellion.
Then, Toussaint joined the slave armies, and because of his medical background, tended to the injured soldiers. Toussaint was different from the other slave leaders. He understood from the beginning that the goal of the revolution needed to be the complete abolition of slavery. He also recruited about 500 former slaves and drilled them to become a competent fighting force.
By the time the French government outlawed slavery, Toussaint became the central leader and organized to end Spanish rule on the eastern section of the island. Then, Toussaint needed to deal with a British invasion.
The British attempted to take advantage of the weakened position of France. As I’ve said, the colony of San Domingo was the most lucrative wealth producing location in the world. The British sent an army to the island with the intention of taking control of this enormous wealth.
At that time, Britain and France had the most powerful armed forces in the world. However, those armies proved to be ineffective in taking San Domingo from the army of former slaves.
Because the French government had changed, the new government supported the slave army in the war against the British invasion. Toussaint, for the most part, got along well with the first governors the French sent to the Island.
During the few years when there was relative peace in San Domingo, Toussaint made a determined and effective effort to end the horror story of slavery and develop the island in a meaningful way.
Toussaint won the support of the former slaves by making it clear that he was one of them. He not only tended to many who were injured, he worked at routine tasks along with everyone else.
For Toussaint, a meaningful development of the island meant allowing the former slave owners to keep their plantations. However, those former slave owners needed to pay a wage to the former slaves and the use of torture was now outlawed. Under those conditions, the former slaves would gradually become literate and a meaningful development would unfold.
One of Toussaint’s top military commanders was his nephew General Moise. Moise came into conflict with Toussaint because he believed the government sided with the landowners over the former slaves in many instances. Moise led a rebellion aimed at advancing the interests of the former slaves. Toussaint defeated that rebellion and ordered the execution of Moise. This was a profound mistake that greatly weakened the revolution.
The changing political climate in France and its consequences
In France the capitalist powers were taking control of the country. Napoleon Bonaparte became their leader and the ruling powers in France began to change their political outlook towards San Domingo. Napoleon bowed to the French maritime interests who gouged out immense fortunes derived from the horrors of slavery. As a result, Napoleon developed a plan to bring slavery back to San Domingo.
His plan was based on the absurd idea that the leaders of the Haitian slaves were stupid. Napoleon thought that he could lure these leaders into supporting him, then the revolution would evaporate, and France would have slavery once again in its colony. Initially Napoleon mobilized 12,000 soldiers to advance this task.
Toussaint felt that the only realistic way for the people of San Domingo to advance was to remain a colony of France. At that time, the nations of Britain, Spain, and the United States continued to engage in the slave trade.
Certainly, during the years of relative peace on this island there were important advances, and the horrors of slavery appeared to be over. Given these facts, Toussaint believed that his government had a mutually beneficial relationship with France.
The British warned Toussaint that a French military expedition was on its way to San Domingo, and that this expedition had hostile intentions. However, because of Toussaint’s refusal to believe this, the French expedition was able to land on the island unmolested. Had Toussaint mobilized to stop this invasion, the French would have never been able to take any strongholds on the island.
The other problem was that the former slaves believed that the French were their friends. So, when the French landed many former slaves supported the invasion. However, as the French made clear what their intentions were, the army of former slaves mobilized to take on the French, who were the most advanced army in the world at that time.
General Rigaud was the central commander of the mulattos on the island. Rigaud made the catastrophic mistake of taking the French side against Toussaint. Rigaud paid for that mistake. After he supported the French invasion of San Domingo, the French had him arrested and deported from the island.
Jean-Jacques Dessalines was the top military commander under Toussaint. Dessalines had a different political perspective than his commander. Dessalines hated the slave owners and argued that the freedom of the former slaves needed to take precedence over San Domingo’s relationship with France. So, early in the revolution, Dessalines advocated for independence.
After the French military force landed on the island, the army of the former slaves was in an extremely disadvantageous position. However, in one of the most courageous moments in human history, the army of former slaves managed to push back the French invasion of the island. After the French invasion had been neutralized, the rainy season started. The mosquitoes then infected most of the French forces and their army became incapacitated.
Because the former slaves were more resistant to the mosquito born diseases, they had an excellent opportunity to mount an offensive to decisively defeat the French. However, because Toussaint felt that San Domingo needed to continue to be a French colony, he called for a truce to discuss a workable peace.
While Toussaint was in the French camp, soldiers arrested him. He was placed on a ship where he was forced to sail to France. Toussaint died in a French prison. After Napoleon had been defeated in the war against Britain, he acknowledged that he should have left Toussaint alone to rule the island. This is a clear example of how racism blinds people to the facts of the world. The Haitian Revolution is a clear example how that blindness can have disastrous consequences.
However, after Toussaint’s arrest, Dessalines took over the army of the former slaves. Now, there was no question that this army would demand nothing less than independence from France. In all, the French would lose about 60,000 soldiers in their defeat in San Domingo.
The British took advantage of this defeat and went to war against France. The small French force that survived the revolution sailed into a British fleet. The British then sent those soldiers to prison for many years. Dessalines told those French soldiers that if they attempted to return to the new nation of Haiti, their ships would be blown out the water.
The Haitian Revolution and its lessons for the world
C.L.R. James argued that in the Russian Revolution, Vladimir Ilyich Lenin didn’t make the same errors as Toussaint L’Ouverture. Lenin had a real advantage of both a formal education, and the political legacy of Karl Marx.
Lenin understood that the only way for the Russian Revolution to succeed would be to establish a government of the workers councils known as Soviets. When 14 nations invaded the Soviet Union after the revolution, Lenin didn’t hesitate to mobilize the masses in an army to defend their government. The examples of the Russian and Haitian Revolutions are clear examples of how the masses of working people have the potential to overcome extreme obstacles in order to defend a government they can claim as their own.
Today Haiti is one of the poorest nations in the world. Toussaint was fully aware of the difficulties an independent Haiti would face in a world where the most powerful nations supported slavery. The United States occupied Haiti for about twenty years in the early 20th century. Then, they installed the horrendous puppet governments of Francois Duvalier and his son.
The French government demanded that Haiti pay for the Haitian Revolution that removed the French colonial government. All these measures weakened any possibility for Haiti to become a viable nation advancing the interests of all the people.
The Russian Revolution was betrayed by a clique organized by Joseph Stalin. As a result, Russian capitalism now flourishes, and Vladimir Putin is attempting to become a power broker in the capitalist world.
However, C.L.R. James identified the Cuban Revolution as following in the West Indian tradition that began with the Haitian Revolution. As a result of the Haitian Revolution, many slave owners left the island and settled in the eastern Oriente Province of Cuba. Oriente is the section of Cuba that has the largest Black population, and was the place where the Cuban Revolution began. The revolutionary Cuban government has been able to survive in spite of an imperialist invasion, threats of atomic warfare, and a sixty-year trade embargo by the United States.
While the Haitian Revolution succeeded in ending French colonialism of the island, C.L.R. James identified the central mistake of Toussaint L’Ouverture in the following quotation:
“His grasp of politics led him to make all preparations, but he could not admit to himself and to his people that it was easier to find decency, gratitude, and humanity in a cage of starving tigers than in the councils of imperialism.”
Today as the capitalist system in the world is beginning to fall apart, the example of the Haitian Revolution, as well as the words of C.L.R. James have never been more relevant.
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