“When we recollect how nearly similar the situation of the Southern States and St. Domingo are in the profusion of Slaves,” South Carolina’s governor wrote to the colony’s General Assembly in September 1791, “we cannot but sensibly fear for your situation.” The thousands of white French colonists who fled Haiti and arrived in American communities after a particular moment of disruption in June 1793 were met with open arms, receiving support from private groups, state governments, and the U.S. Congress alike. In 1859, 68 years after the initial insurrections, a proslavery writer would describe John Brown's raid as “nothing more nor nothing less than an attempt to do on a vast scale what was done in St. Domingo in 1791.” A pro-Confederate cartoon in 1863 showed Abraham Lincoln penning the Emancipation Proclamation with his foot on the Constitution, the devil on his desk, and a blood-drenched picture of Haiti over his shoulder. The Trump Administration’s decision to grant Afrikaners refugee status flies in the face of U.S. procedures and practice in place since the 1980 Refugee Act, which, in accordance with the international definition, defines a refugee as a person with a “well-founded fear of persecution.” This initiative bears many of the hallmarks of a Trump policy—it originates from a selective understanding of the realities on the ground; it has been conveyed, explained, and rationalized via a blend of bullying and bluster; above all, it is driven by a venal self-interest.
Author: James Alexander Dun / Made by History
Published at: 2025-06-09 20:28:38
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