By: Dra. C. Kezia Zabrina Henry Knight
Genesis of the Day…
It has been a pertinent conduct of the UN General Assembly to distinguish from an international profile one day for humanity to agree and raise its voice in unison for the abolition of slavery.
This day has been chosen since 1985, in commemoration of December 2th, 1949, the date on which the United Nations General Assembly approved the Convention for the Suppression of the Traffic in Persons and of the Exploitation of the Prostitution of Others.
The day is a claim focused on the eradication of all contemporary forms of slavery such as human trafficking, sexual exploitation, the worst forms of child labor, forced marriage and the forced recruitment of children for use in armed conflict. Certainly “the practices of slavery constitute an insult to our common humanity since no human being should be the property of another.”
Background of abolitionist foundations in diverse contexts
It should be noted that abolitionist principles began to be internationally visible since the 18th century in interdependence with the slave ecosystem. In this sense, the reformist Portuguese prime minister, the Marquis de Pombal, abolished slavery in Portugal and in the colonies of India on February 12th, 1761, which is why this country is considered a pioneer in the legal practice of abolitionism.
In the European context, although the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, approved by the French National Constituent Assembly on August 26th, 1789, stands out as one of the fundamental documents regarding universal rights; It was not until February 4th, 1794, at the National Convention that slavery was abolished.
Later in the United Kingdom, in 1807 the slave trade was prohibited on British ships through the Slave Trade Act. As a consequence, on August 23th, 1833, the Slavery Abolition Law was passed, by which from August 1st, 1834, all the captives of the British colonies were free.
In the American context, abolitionist legislative thought and practice began on November 16th, 1780 with Túpac Amaru II – seldom referenced – who as part of his revolution issued the “Freedom Band” in Tungasuca (Cusco) where he proclaimed the abolition of slavery for the first time on the continent, giving freedom to the Afro-descendants that the aborigines encountered and added to the insurgency.
This liberating process was curtailed by the Spanish during the Viceroyalty of Peru. As a consequence, Chile becomes the first country in Latin America to officially institute it.
In 1823, José Miguel Infante presented a bill to Congress that proposed the total abolition of slavery, approved on July 24th of that same year. Thus, all those born from 1811 onwards, and their descendants, were free.
On the other hand, in the United States of America abolitionist legislative thought had a complex pattern of behavior. So, when all the states north of Maryland abolished slavery between 1789 and 1830, gradually and over different periods of time, the status remained intact in the south, and the customs and thinking in defense of slavery behaved in tension with the anti-slavery attitude of the north.
It was not until 1863 with the Emancipation Proclamation, promulgated by President Abraham Lincoln, that the freedom of the enslaved was declared in 1863 and took effect at the end of the Civil War in 1865.
In this same year, in the context of the insular Caribbean an abolitionist thought in interrelation with the metropolis, and under observance of the Spanish legislature, is distinguished. So, on April 2nd, 1865, the Spanish Abolitionist Society was created at the initiative of the Puerto Rican Julio Vizcarrondo, and in 1872 a bill to abolish slavery was drawn up in Puerto Rico, which was finally approved on March 25th, 1873.
From a similar pattern of behavior, under colonial control, Cuba, institutionalized a reformist, gradual and furtive decree on the abolition of slavery, so, on February 17th, 1880, the Spanish courts only approved the law of “Patronatos”, signed by King Alfonso XII himself, who essentially maintains slavery practices.
It was not until 1886, in the Fertile Truce, a period between wars, in a context of palliative measures in the face of patriotic, anti-slavery, abolitionist and anti-colonial effervescence that the Queen Regent María Cristina signed a Royal Order that put an end to the Patronages.
Cuban counter-hegemonic abolitionist thought
However, in a context of systemic slavery, during the Ten Years’ War – an irrefutable manifestation of the emergence of a long-standing process of insurgency, maroon, independence and rebellion – a novel articulation between the most distinctive of Cuban thought was shown with the presence of the popular strata as protagonists of their own emancipation.
These essential components spiced up the first Mambisa Constitution of Guáimaro in 1869 anchored on a radically abolitionist and counter-hegemonic platform.
In this sense, the feedback with the legislative codes of the diverse contexts, the projection of achieving altruistic goals in tension with the colonial rule and the making of recurrent decisions in the belligerence process endowed this Constitution with a complex structure and functioning pattern.
The issues of the abolition of slavery and the condition of subject of rights of the ex-slave behaved as capital axes, where Guáimaro transferred the moderations.
While the gradual processes of the emancipation of the captive were debated, overlapping their rights of human nature before the economic interests of the owner, this Constitution establishes unprecedented breaks with previous constitutions and projects by establishing in its article 24: All the inhabitants of the Republic are entirely free.
Later in article 26 it determines that: The Republic does not recognize dignities, special honors, or any privilege. Thus, the principles that generate equity and social equality, respect for human dignity and its relationship with the universal rights and duties of man, form a notable part of the constitutional text of Guáimaro which ruled in Cuba from April 1869 until February 1878.
In this same context, around the peace of the Zanjón Pact, (1878), the objection was precisely from an abolitionist and counter-hegemonic thought and action as a moral support.
This thought promoted the imperishable Protest of Baraguá led by Major General Antonio Maceo y Grajales in tension with a conditional peace proposed by the Spanish General Arsenio Martínez Campos. As a result, a new Constitution emerged: Baraguá, on March 23th, 1879 with a new Government.
Its articles are distinguished as a differentiated subsystem of the previous Constitution, but equally interrelated. It generated its own pattern of organization with an article of six pertinent sections and with a short, medium and long-term historical scope where it establishes that without independence and without the consent of the people and government, peace would be impossible.
Article 3 states: The Government is empowered to make peace on the basis of independence; proceed verifiable by democratic control with article 4 which determines: You will not be able to make peace with the Spanish Government without the knowledge or consent of the people.
Thus, Cuban abolitionist thought from socio-historical points of view in contexts of systemic slavery and domination constitutes an essential contribution to the legislative development in favor of the rights of equity, social justice and respect for the dignity of human beings. Tribute systematized in the following Constitutions.
A proposal…
It would be appropriate to deepen the focus at the local level beyond countries, on the concrete practices of modern slavery to institute articulations with transdisciplinary academic teams and diverse entities from neighborhoods, communities or other denominations, formal and informal leadership with the objective of instructing citizens on the behavior patterns of modern slavery for its final abolition.
Bibliography
Torres-Cuevas, Eduardo y Suárez, Reinaldo (2018) El libro de las constituciones. Tomo I. Editorial Imagen Contemporánea, La Habana.
Translated by: Aileen Álvarez García
