Freedom; the Driving Force Behind Everything

From grade school, everyone learns the story of civil rights activist, Martin Luther King Jr.—growing up he faced racial discrimination, and as an adult he fought to put an end to it. Similar to MLK, 18^th century liberator of slaves, Toussaint Louverture, faced unfair treatment as a child and grew up to fight against it as an adult. Louverture spent his childhood as a slave on the Caribbean island of Hispaniola where he lived under French rule in Saint Domingue. Soon after Louverture’s owner set him free, word got to Saint Domingue about the French Revolution, a movement that liberated thousands of French slaves. Yet regardless of the fact that Saint Domingue belonged to France, its slaves remained bound. Angered by white refusal to end slavery in Saint Domingue, Louverture emerged as a leader in the movement to free its slaves. In his efforts to liberate the slaves of Saint Domingue, Louverture sided with and against French forces, depending on whether or not they followed in suite with this cause. Toussaint Louverture should be remembered primarily as a liberator of slaves who, in this pursuit, also took position as ruler of Saint Domingue and military commander. (Background Essay)

 

Toussaint Louverture should be remembered chiefly for his role as a freer of slaves. In the Timeline of Abolition in Saint Domingue, it is depicted that Louverture first joins the revolution in 1791, when he leads troops to fight against France for the abolition of slavery in Saint Domingue. In 1794, when the revolutionary government in France abolishes slavery in all of its colonies, it says that Louverture stops his revolt against French colonial troops. This proves that everything Louverture did was in the pursuit of liberating slaves. When France supports this cause, he sides with them. When France refuses to free Saint Domingue slaves, he fights against their colonial troops. After the slaves of Saint Domingue have been freed, Louverture writes a letter to the French Directory to ensure that this freedom prevails. In this 1797 letter he states “We have known how to confront danger to our liberty, and we will know how to confront death to preserve it.” What Louverture is saying, is that he and the people of his island will go to any measure they have to in order to preserve freedom for all. Louverture should be remembered primarily for his role as liberator of slaves because that cause is what motivated him to do everything he did, and freedom for all slaves is the cause he would die for. (Documents A and B)

 

Although he took this position in an effort to liberate slaves, Toussaint Louverture should also be remembered as ruler of Saint Domingue. As ruler of Saint Domingue, Louverture states in “The Saint Domingue Constitution of 1801” that “Servitude is therein forever abolished.” Louverture used his power as a ruler to ensure that slaves remain liberated. A few months later, Louverture describes the harsh rules for the people of Saint Domingue and the consequences that will be enforced upon breaking them in the “Proclamation, 25 November”. Some of these rules include that children must be employed as soon as they can walk and that anyone who commits seditious libel will be brought before a military court and punished as suitable. In writing that even young children must work, Louverture diminishes the need for extra slave help, and by making seditious libel punishable, he ensures that everyone will do as he says. Toussaint Louverture should be commemorated for his role as ruler of Saint Domingue in that he used it to help protect the freedom of the slaves he had fought to free. (Documents C and D)

 

Just as Toussaint Louverture should be remembered for his role as Ruler of Saint Domingue, he should also be recognized as a military leader in the pursuit of maintaining the freedom of slaves. In Madison Smart’s 2007 biography of Louverture she discusses his response to a revolt against his military whom he had had support and enforce the use of plantations. Louverture responds by having the leader of the revolt, his own nephew, executed. Although this is a rather malicious move, it supports the idea that as a military leader he worked to maintain the liberation of slaves. Louverture knew that in order to prevent slavery from becoming necessary again, people would have to work hard on plantations so that enough profits could be made without the necessity of slave workers. By shutting down a revolt against this action and by using his own military to enforce that plantation work be carried out, Louverture worked to keep the people of Saint Domingue free from slavery. Louverture is also portrayed as a military leader trying to maintain the abolition of slavery in William Wells Brown’s “A Description of Toussaint Louverture” from The Black Man, His Antecedents, His Genius, and His Achievements (1863). When Louverture realizes that the French are coming to the port city of Samana to enslave his people, he orders his generals to abandon the towns and head for the mountains. This is yet another example of Louverture using his military leadership in an effort to keep his people free from the wraths of slavery. Louverture should be commemorated and remembered for his role as a Military Commander who acted according to his pursuit of freedom for all. (Documents E and F)

 

Although Louverture was tricked into a negotiation meeting where he was taken prisoner and sent to France where he died in 1803, he was still very influential in leading Saint Domingue to become free of slavery and eventually break away from France to become Haiti in 1804. Toussaint Louverture should be remembered mostly for his role as a liberator of slaves who also ruled Saint Domingue and was a military commander in his efforts to ensure that the abolition of slavery.