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mikee675
mikee675
12.11.2020 • 
History

Results of the Haitian Revolution (adapted from The Human Drama) The United States, Britain, Spain, and France, all large slave-owning nations, were more than a little fearful of an all-black republic that claimed the same values as the leaders of the American and French revolutions. Many Americans, especially President Jefferson, Secretary of State Pinckney, and other southerners, feared that a Black Republic, founded on the very principles embodied in the American Declaration of Independence, would threaten their southern slave-owning society. This contradiction between words and actions revealed one of the fundamental flaws in the application of the Enlightenment principles of liberty, equality, and fraternity; they were really intended for white men only. The United States refused for nearly sixty years even to recognize Haiti. (Abraham Lincoln finally did in 1862.) Along with other great colonial powers, America instead rewarded Haiti’s triumphant slaves with a suffocating trade embargo – and a demand that in exchange for peace, the fledgling country paid enormous reparations for its slaves until 1946.
Haiti became the first independent nation in Latin America, the first post-colonial independent black-led nation in the world, and the ONLY nation that won independence through a successful slave rebellion.

Question: Explain the American and European Enlightenment contradiction as it relates to Haiti.

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