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Complexity and Contradiction in World History: Slavery, Enlightenment and Revolution

Tasks (You have 10 minutes to complete the following. You will be graded.) For the documents below: 1. Determine each documents perspective on slavery. Does the author support or oppose slavery? For what reasons does the author support or oppose slavery? Demonstrate you understand this by grouping those that oppose slavery together in one group and those that support slavery together in another. Use a t-chart to speed up your analysis. 2. Determine the POV for two documents on both sides of the debate (4 total). Jot down quickly what the POV of the author/creator is, and how it affects that authors opinion on the issue of slavery. 3. If you finish early, begin to ask yourself the questions we will discuss as a group: What contradictions are on display here? How does this make analysis of revolution and enlightenment more complex?

DOCUMENTS
Document 1 -- Louis de Jaucourt, "The Slave," Encyclopedia, 1755
(The Encyclopedia was a famous Enlightenment text)

Everything concurs to let humans enjoy dignity, which is natural. Everything tells us that we cannot take away from a person that natural dignity which is liberty. Document 2 -- Jean-Jacques Rousseau, The New Heloise, 1761

(Rousseau was one of the leading intellectual figures of the Enlightenment)

I have seen those vast unfortunate lands that seem only destined to be inhabited by slaves. I have averted my eyes from that sordid sight with loathing, horror and pity; and seeing one fourth of my fellow humans changed into beasts for the service of others, I have grieved to be a human.

Document 3 -- Denis Diderot, "Natural Liberty," Encyclopedia, 1765

(This excerpt is also taken from the Encyclopedia see #1)

Why did the Christian powers not consider that their religion, independent of natural law, was fundamentally opposed to Black slavery? The answer is that those nations needed slaves for their colonies, their plantations, and their mines. Document 4 -- Abb Guillaume Raynal, Essay on the Administration of Saint Domingue, 1781

(Raynal was a French Enlightenment priest and historian who collaborated with Diderot (see #3) on a history of the European colonies in the Americas)

White people are incapable of working in the field under the hot sun in Saint Dominque; thus to make the best of this precious soil, it has been necessary to find a particular species of laborers. Saint Domingue is a milder climate for the slaves than the hot climate from which they have been transplanted. Document 5 -- Count Mirabeau, Speech to the National Assembly, July 1789

(Mirabeau was a moderate reformer in the early French Revolutionary government who favored a the establishment of a constitutional monarchy)

I demand to know how the twenty White people here from the colonies can be said to represent the people of color from whom they have received no authority. I demand to know by what right the 23,000 White voters have refused their fellow citizens the right to name representatives and have arrogated to themselves the right to choose representatives for those whom they have excluded.

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Document 6 -- A delegate from Bordeaux (France), Speech to the National Assembly, March 1790 The abolition of slavery and the slave trade would mean the loss of our colonies; the loss of the colonies would strike a mortal blow to commerce, and the ruin of commerce would result in stagnation for the merchant marine, agriculture, and the arts. Five million French citizens exist only by the trade they bring. The colonies bring in an annual income of more than 200 million livres. Document 7 -- A delegate of the Owners of Property in the French Colonies of America Residing in Bordeaux, Speech to the National Assembly, date unknown (1790?) End our fears by declaring that your proclamation on the Rights of Man does not extend to the Black people and their descendants. We have not enslaved them, but we discovered them in the hardest and cruelest slavery, and transplanted them to French colonies, under a kind of humane government, where, indeed, they work, but they live without fear for tomorrow. Document 8 -- Antoine Barnave, Report by the National Assembly's Committee on the Colonies, 1790 We have reached this level of prosperity thanks to our colonies. If someday they must gain independence, we must make sure to postpone that day so that we will be able to lose them without an economic shock and without a disturbance to our political existence.

Document 9 SLAVES DELIVERED BY FRENCH SHIPS

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Document 10 -- Maximilien Robespierre, Speech to the National Assembly, May 1791

(Robespierre was one of the most radical leaders of the French Revolution)

I am here to defend the Declaration of the Rights of Man. Let the colonies perish if the planters, with their threats, try to force us to legislate in their private interest! I declare in the name of the Assembly, in the name of those members of the Assembly who do not want to destroy the Constitution, I declare in the name of the entire nation which wishes to be free, that we will not sacrifice to the colonial deputies. I say that any other course, whatever it might be, is preferable.

Document 11 -- Henri Christophe, Manifesto, 1814

(Christophe, a former slave, fought with LOuverture in the Haitian Revolution; in this excerpt he recollects events in Haiti following Frances capture of LOuverture)

At the same time, notice was given to arrest all suspected persons throughout the island. All those who had shown brave and enlightened souls, when we claimed for ourselves the rights of men, were the first to be seized . . . At first they [the French] desired to sell them into strange colonies; but, as this plan, did not succeed, they resolved to transport them to France, where overpowering labor, the galleys, chains, and prisons, were awaiting them. Document 12 -- Nicolas Maurin, lithograph of Toussaint LOuverture, (1832)

(After the loss of Saint Dominque, the French press described LOuverture as "a villain . . . this serpent which France has warmed in her bosom". Note the profile in this 1832 French portrait of Toussaint.)

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DBQ: Slavery during the Enlightenment and the French Revolution

Directions: The following question is based on the accompanying Documents 1-12. (Some of the documents have been edited for the purpose of this exercise.)
QUESTION: Analyze the views of those addressing the issue of slavery during the Enlightenment and the French Revolution. In doing so, explain how the authors of these documents thought the abolition of slavery would affect the existing economic, political and social order. (Extension: In what way does the French governments response to the events of the Haitian Revolution reflect or challenge those views?)

Historical Background. During the Enlightenment (1750s-1770s), French intellectuals addressed the
institution of slavery. The issue remained important through the French Revolution, when the French National Assembly adopted the Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen (published in August 1789), which begins: "All men are born free and remain free and equal in rights." [HINT: Pay attention to the DATE of this document when answering the question!] The Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen raised issues concerning the French colonies in the West Indies, including Saint Domingue (now Haiti). French merchants supplied these islands with slaves, and French planters used the slaves to maintain their sugar and coffee plantations. The populations of these colonies included African slaves, French colonists, mulatto (people of mixed white and black ancestry) landholders and freed blacks. Slaves, mulattos, and freed Black people had no political rights. Early in 1791, mulattos from Saint Domingue sent a delegation to the National Assembly in Paris to secure the rights enumerated in the Declaration. They were refused. Once back in Saint Domingue, the mulattos rebelled against the white planters, but the revolt was quickly and brutally suppressed. The leaders were executed as a warning to future revolutionaries. Late in 1791 the French National Assembly did decide to grant civil rights to all mulattos and blacks born of free parents. [They did not abolish slavery at that time.] Whites in Saint Domingue were enraged and civil war broke out. Complicating matters further, slaves in Saint Domingue also rebelled that year, led by the brilliant slave general Toussaint LOuverture. LOuverture declared independence from France and after many years of battle, the Republic of Haiti (formerly Saint Domingue) was established in 1804. The slave rebellion in Haiti scared white elites all over the Caribbean. France itself abolished slavery in its colonies in 1794. However, that did not stop Napoleon Bonaparte from reinvading Haiti and capturing LOuverture in 1802. He died in a Parisian prison.

To the right: THE EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY ATLANTIC CIRCUIT