Unit Essential Question: Is nationalism the most powerful force in shaping the geopolitical world?Aim: How did independence movements in Latin America compare to the French Revolution?

The following is an excerpt from Thomas Jefferson to the Marquis de Lafayette, written June 16, 1792. In the letter, Jefferson refers to the French colony San Domingo (Haiti), made up primarily of slaves of African descent.

Behold you then, my dear friend, at the head of a great army, establishing the liberties of your country against a foreign enemy. may heaven favor your cause, and make you the channel thro’ which it may pour it’s [sic] favors. while you are exterminating the monster aristocracy, & pulling out the teeth & fangs of it’s associate monarchy, a contrary tendency is discovered in some here. a sect has shewn itself among us, who declare they espoused our new constitution, not as a good & sufficient thing itself, but only as a step to an English constitution, the only thing good & sufficient in itself, in their eye. .  .  . what are you doing for your colonies? they will be lost if not more effectually succoured. indeed no future efforts you can make will ever be able to reduce the blacks...we have been less zealous in aiding them, lest your government should feel any jealousy on our account. but in truth we as sincerely wish their restoration, and their connection with you, as you do yourselves.

1. Origin/Purpose: Based on the source, what is Jefferson’s point of view towards the events in Haiti?

Origin: What is the contextualization Jefferson is writing in?

Purpose: What may have been Jefferson’s objective in writing this letter?

2. Limitations: What limitations exist in the origin and purpose of Jefferson’s letter?

Unit Essential Question: Is nationalism the most powerful force in shaping the geopolitical world?Aim: How did independence movements in Latin America compare to the French Revolution?

Haiti, 1794-1804In the late eighteenth century, the majority of French people lived on

land owned by the nobility. They were barefoot and lived on black bread, and it was common for them to be strapped to a plough to pull a cart like an ox. Laws were designed to preserve not just the wealth, but also the status of the nobility. However tough life was for peasants, they were lucky not to be part of another group governed by royalist France, the slaves. In the seventeenth century, French buccaneers sailed to the Caribbean island of San Domingo (later renamed Haiti) and fought the British and Spanish for the island. By 1695 the western half of the island was theirs, where they cultivated a coffee crop, then sugar, and then imported slaves from West Africa to pick it. Twenty percent of slaves died en route. Once there, they worked on sugar plantations every minute there was light. San Domingo turned into one of the wealthiest colonies in the Americas, producing half of all sugar and coffee exported to Europe and the United States. This wealth was the result of the work of the enslaved Africans who were brutality treated.

Some slaves were compelled to wear masks to stop them from eating the sugar. Punishment included applying burning wood to the victim’s buttocks. Salt, peppers, lemon and ash were poured on to bleeding wounds as extra punishment. There were regular cases of slaves having burning wax poured on to them by their masters, of being burned alive, of being filled with gunpowder and blown up, of being buried up to their necks and covered in sugar to attract wasps.

In 1791, a revolt broke out in the San Domingo (Haiti). It had taken two months for news of the storming of the Bastille to reach the slave island. The National Assembly in Paris authorized the setting up of a similar assembly in San Domingo, except that any election would be solely for the whites. The mulattos were the mixed-race section of the population, the product of decades of illicit relationships between masters and slaves. There were around 15,000 of them, divided by how dark-skinned they were. One that was three-quarters Black was deemed slightly inferior to one half Black, and so on, with the intermediate shades creating 128 degrees of blackness. Mulattos were forbidden to carry a sword or to wear European clothes. They were forbidden to play European games, and if a white man entered their house they were forbidden to sit at the table with him. Both slaves and mulattos began plotting their own rebellions when it reached both groups that they would be denied citizenship rights promised by the leaders of the French Revolution. As the revolt spread, enslaved Africans rose up against their French masters. During the uprising there was cruelty from both sides. Sugar cane fields and plantation houses were burned and captives were raped, murdered, and hung.

People of African ancestry outnumbered Europeans on the island by about 10 to 1. In 1794, the First Republic in France abolished slavery in its colonies. However, while mulattos were granted full political rights, nothing was mentioned of the rights of blacks. By January 1800, Toussaint L’Ouverture, a former slave and the leading general of the black revolt, became the undisputed leader of the entire island. The son of slaves, L’Ouverture learned to read and write from a Roman Catholic priest. Because of his education and intelligence, he had gained popularity during his recruitment, training, and leadership of the rebel army. By 1797 L’Ouverture led an army of 20,000 that controlled most of San Domingo, and in 1801 he declared a constitution that granted equality and citizenship to all residents of San Domingo. He stopped short of declaring independence from France, however, because he did not want to provoke the new French leader, Napoleon Bonaparte into attacking the island. Nevertheless, in 1802 Napoleon dispatched 40,000 troops to restore French authority in the French colony, overthrow the government of Toussaint L’Ouverture, and restore slavery on the island. L’Ouverture was captured and sent to France where he died in a French prison. However, the rebels continued to fight in his name, and by the end of 1803 the French forces were defeated. On New Year’s Day 1804, President Jean Jacques Dessalines declared the birth of the free republic of Haiti. Haiti became the second independent republic in the Western Hemisphere, and the only successful slave revolt in history.

Unit Essential Question: Is nationalism the most powerful force in shaping the geopolitical world?Aim: How did independence movements in Latin America compare to the French Revolution?

The BIG Ideas: The insurrection on the French colony of San Domingo was the first successful slave revolt in history, and the only slave revolt that resulted in the creation of a new, independent nation-state: the Republic of Haiti, the first ever black republic. The Haitian Revolution was the largest slave revolt in history. It's success shocked slave owners throughout North and South America, and helped to influence a wave of revolutions in other Latin American colonies. When the independence movements began in the late 18th century, Latin America contained two large and productive colonial empires, the Spanish and the Portuguese. Under the system of colonialism, these territories were subject to extensive and complex networks of control by Spain and Portugal.After achieving independence, Spanish Americans generally divided into liberal and conservative factions within their new nations.The new nations also faced economic problems. Ports and roads were not sufficiently developed, and economies were not usually well-balanced, since the colonial system had emphasized mostly exports of cash-crops. Because of centuries of colonial rule, Spanish Americans had little experience in representative government. Countries that could not control their military forces often ended up controlled by them. Many nations came to be ruled by military strongmen, caudillos, independent leaders who dominated local areas by force in defiance of national policies. Caudillos appealed to different factions and sometimes seized national governments to impose their concept of rule setting a pattern that continued in places into the 20th century.The new republics had varying degrees of increased freedoms for Native Americans, mestizos, people of color, and women, but ultimately remained stratified, with the creoles benefitting the most. The influence of the Roman Catholic Church remained.

Mexico, 1810-1823

In 1810 Mexico was Spain’s wealthiest and most populous colony. Its silver mines were the richest in the world, and the colony’s capital, Mexico City, was larger than any city in Spain. Mexico also had the largest population of Spanish immigrants among the colonies. When news of Napoleon’s invasion of Spain reached Mexico, conservatives Spaniard in Mexico City overthrew the local viceroy, thinking him too sympathetic to the creoles. This action by Spanish loyalists underlined the new reality: with the king removed from his throne by the French, colonial authority now rested on brute force.

The first stage of the revolution against Spain occurred in central Mexico, where ranchers and farmers had aggressively forced Indian communities from their traditional agricultural lands. Crop failures and epidemics afflicted the region’s rural poor, while miners and the urban poor faced higher food prices and rising unemployment as well. With the power of colonial authorities weakened by events in Spain, anger and fear spread through towns and villages in central Mexico.

On September 16, 1810, the parish priest of the small town of Dolores, Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla, rang the church bells and attracted a crowd. In a fiery speech he urged the crowd to rise up against the oppression of Spanish officials. Tens of thousands of the rural and urban poor soon joined his movement. While they lacked military discipline and weapons, they knew who their oppressors were, the peninsulares and creoles who owned the ranches and mines. Recognizing the threat posed by the angry masses following Hidalgo, most wealthy Mexicans supported the Spanish authorities. The military tide quickly turned, and Spanish forces captured and executed Hidalgo in 1811.

The revolution continued under the leadership of another priest, Jose Maria Morelos, a former student of Hidalgo’s. A more adept military and political leader than his mentor, Morelos created a formidable fighting force, and in 1813 convened a congress that declared independence and drafted a constitution. Despite these achievements, loyalist forces defeated and executed Morelos in 1815. Although small numbers of insurgents continued to fight Spanish forces, colonial rule seemed secure in 1820, but news of the military revolt in Spain unsettled the conservative groups who had opposed Hidalgo and Morelos. In 1821, Colonel Agustin de Iturbide and other loyalist commanders forged an alliance with insurgents to declare Mexico’s independence. The conservative origins of Mexico’s independence were made clear by the decision to create a monarchial government, and crown Iturbide emperor. In early 1823, however, creole elites deposed Iturbide and Mexico became a republic. Two years later the southern regions of the Mexican empire declared their own independence. They formed a Central American Federation until 1838, when they split into the independent states of Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica. Brazil, to 1831

Independence came to Portuguese Brazil at the same time as to Spanish colonies, but by a different process. When Napoleon invaded Portugal in 1807, the royal court fled Lisbon (the capital of Portugal), and established a government in exile in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The arrival of the Portuguese royal

Unit Essential Question: Is nationalism the most powerful force in shaping the geopolitical world?Aim: How did independence movements in Latin America compare to the French Revolution?

family in Brazil in 1808 helped maintain the loyalty of the colonial elite, but after Napoleon was defeated at Waterloo, the Portuguese government called for King Joao VI to return to Portugal. At first he resisted, but a liberal revolt in Portugal forced the king to return to Portugal in 1821 to protect his throne. He left his son Pedro in Brazil as regent (someone who rules on behalf of a monarch).

By this date, the Spanish colonies along Brazil’s borders had experienced ten years of revolution and civil war, and some, like Argentina, had gained independence. Unable to ignore these struggles, some Brazilians began to reevaluate Brazil’s relationship with Portugal. Many resented their homeland’s economic subordination to Portugal.

Unwilling to return to Portugal and committed to maintaining his family’s hold on Brazil, Pedro aligned himself with rising separatist sentiment, and in 1822 declared Brazilian independence. Pedro’s decision launched Brazil on a unique political trajectory. Unlike its neighbors, which became constitutional republics, Brazil gained independence as a constitutional monarchy with Pedro I, son of the king of Portugal, as emperor.

Pedro I was committed to both monarchy and to liberal principles. The constitution of 1824 provided for an elected assembly and granted rights to the political opposition, but Pedro made enemies by protecting the Portuguese who remained in Brazil from arrest and seizure of property. Pedro I also opposed slavery, even though the slave-owning class dominated Brazil. In 1823, he anonymously published an article that characterized slavery as a “cancer eating away at Brazil.” The intensification of slavery as Brazil’s primary form of labor came along with the expansion of coffee growing. In provinces of Rio de Janeiro and then Sao Paulo, coffee estates, or fazendas, began to spread toward the interior as new lands were opened. By 1880 coffee made up more than 60 percent of Brazil’s exports. For humanitarian and economic reasons, Great Britain pressured Brazil to end the slave trade from Africa during the 19th century, but the slave trade continued on an enormous scale up to 1850. More than 1.4 million Africans were imported to Brazil in the 50 years of the trade, and even after the trans-Atlantic slave trade ended, slavery continued. At mid-century, about one-fourth of Brazil’s population was still enslaved. Brazil did not finally abolish slavery until 1888.

The conflict between liberalism and conservatism became increasingly complicated, with the army suppressing movements for social reforms. A vocal minority that sought the creation of a democracy used this to rally public opinion against the emperor. Confronted by street demonstrations, Pedro I abdicated the throne in 1831 in favor of his five-year-old son Pedro II. After a nine-year regency, Pedro II assumed full powers as emperor of Brazil and reigned until overthrown by republicans in 1889.

Mexico, 1810-1823 Brazil, to 1831In what ways was each independence movement part of the political and intellectual changes in the Western World during the 18th- and early 19th centuries?

Compare and contrast each revolution to the French Revolution.

What changes and continuities are exemplified by each revolution?

Pedro I is surrounded by a cheering crowd after giving news of independence.