: By Earle Clarke, 14/11/ 2017.
“After the Emancipation Proclamation, when the system of slavery changed from chattel slavery to wage slavery, it was realized that the Afro-American constituted the largest homogeneous ethnic group with a common origin and common group experience in the USA and, if allowed to exercise economic or political freedom, would, in a short period of time, own this country. Therefore, racists in this government developed techniques that would keep the Afro- American people, economically dependent upon the slave master—economic slaves- 20th century slaves.” The last written words of Malcolm X.
Dear reader, I could end the article right here and now, after quoting Brother Malcolm X because he has summed up the gist of the article so adequately. The thinking of the racists and the Massa’s in the USA was the thinking of the racists and the Massa’s in St. Kitts and the Caribbean. They hated the Black people with a vengeance. Let us cast our minds back to 1834 at the time of the Proclamation that slavery be ended in the British colonies. This Proclamation caused dissent amongst the slave owners in St. Kitts and the Caribbean and the rest of the British colonies across the globe who were demanding compensation for the loss of their property, for that was what we were to them. For four years, (1834-1838) they harangue Britain the mother colony for their monies before they could take the shackles from our wrists and our feet. When Britain paid the compensation, they allowed us our freedom; but we had to eat, we had to work, we had to sleep and, where could we turn to access these facilities but back to the same Massa who was compensated for our so-called freedom? While it was a fact that the chains and the shackles had been loosened from our wrists and our feet, even though Massa had been compensated for releasing us, the same Massa turned around and re-enslaved us economically. He called the shots. He paid us what he felt like paying us. We possessed no bargaining power.
There was no one to fight our cause. As I said in my first article on the subject, any rebellion was met with assassination. Just look at the scenario? Massa, who worked the hell out of us for free, was compensated for releasing us; we, the enslaved, were never paid even one cent for our free labour to him. With the compensation packet in his clutches, Massa still turned around and continued to extract cheap labour from us under his terms. He lost nothing while we lost everything. For 97 years, 1838-1935, Massa exploited our cheap labour until the brothers and sisters at Buckley’s Estate discovered the true Africanism in them and changed the course of history. For 102 years, 1838-1940 we were unrepresented; Massa did what he wanted to do with us without anyone intervening on our behalf. We were his animals even though he had sexual relations with the animal women. In 1932, Thomas Manchester a mulatto man (very light skinned but not really white) owned two small sugar estates.
Not being a true, true white person, he himself would have suffered his full share of discrimination from those who were truly white, but, because of the vast majority of Black people to the minority whites, they accepted him into their ranks, perhaps bestowing upon him the title of honorary white, in order to swell their ranks. His position as an honorary white would have given him the same feeling of ostracization (excluded from society or a group) and insecurity experienced by the Blacks to whom he gravitated, feeling their pain and suffering. My understanding is that he himself did not father children by Black women, but he had a brother who fathered many children by Black women. In feeling their pain, he opted to treat them more humanely than they were treated on the other sugar estates. This identifying with the plight of the Blacks moved him to form what was called the Workers League in 1932 which was comprised of the middle class elements in the society who were themselves ostracized and kept at arm’s length by the white population. In those days it was illegal to form Trade Unions and Political Parties.
Some of them were the off spring of Massa during the days of slavery and formed part of the mercantile (merchants) class in down town Basseterre. Others of them worked in the offices of the white business places for we must never forget that Massa owned the sugar estates and he also owned the big business places in the capital. In the heat of the Buckley’s Revolution, It was a Mr. John, Mr. Thomas Manchester Mr. Joseph Nathaniel France (who was later to become the Secretary General of the first Trade Union formed in 1940) from the Workers League along with the Minister from the Moravian Church which catered exclusively to Black people, who were there empathizing with the Black brothers and sisters at Buckley’s Estate. After empathizing with the Revolutionaries at Buckley’s Estate, the planters planned to assassinate Mr. Manchester who usually took the Old Road direction to his home in Sandy Point.
Someone pinched him about the plot and so he took the Eastern route, staying much longer to arrive home. His family had learned about the plot and was very relieved when he opened the door to the house a live man. Do you see the modus operandi of those who leave their comfort zone to work in the interest of the down trodden of the earth? We remember Fidel Castro and his brother Raul who sacrificed their comfort zone to work in the interest of the wretched of Cuba. Many attempts were made on their lives 24 years 1959-1935 after the attempt was made on Mr. Thomas Manchester’s. Because Mr. Manchester broke ranks with the white planters and formed the Workers League they lynched him financially, by forcing Barclays Bank not to afford him credit to replant his sugar cane for the upcoming sugar cane crop. The custom was that, the bank would lend monies for the planters to prepare the cane in the out of crop or dull season.
When the sugar canes were harvested in the crop season which lasted January –June or July and the sugar canes sold to the Basseterre Sugar Factory for processing, the borrowed monies would be repaid to the bank with interest. You see dear reader, the whites owned the Bank, they owned the sugar estates, they owned the business places down Town, they owned the Police, they owned the churches, they owned the Courts, they owned the Defence Force, they were the Government and they were the Judges of the Court. It is quite evident for all and sundry to conclude why the harsh sentences were unleashed upon those who participated in the Buckley’s Revolution. It was after the 1935 Buckley’s Revolution which spread like wild fire throughout the Caribbean and the Moyne Commission of Inquiry which followed thereafter, that Trade Unions and the right to form and join Political Parties were introduced in 1940. So, after that right was granted, the Workers League gave way to The St. Kitts- Nevis- Anguilla Trades and Labour Union.
In life, nothing bad happens to us. Our First National Hero Mr. Robert Llewellyn Bradshaw, met with an accident in which his right hand was severely injured at the Machine shop where he worked as a machinist. In those days, there was nothing called Work men’s Compensation! That accident played a major role in the development of Trade Unionism and Politics in St. Kitts –Nevis- Anguilla. Mr. Bradshaw joined the Union and became its President. He revolutionized the Union, turning it into a militant organization. He was compelled to do so, for he was not a man who was up for sale and he was not afraid to carry the fight to the Massa’s of the land who were the monarchs of the land. In fighting the cause of the masses of exploited, oppressed, dehumanized, degraded and unrepresented, only militancy will force the Massa’s to realize that the leaders mean business; that they are men of integrity, that they are forged from impregnable mettle; that they will stand for the right though the heavens fall.
Their people must be freed from the yoke of bondage under which the white planters held them in a strangle hold! He, comrades Southwell, Joseph N. France, Jamesie Liburd al travelled the island day in, day out, visiting the estates, suffering abuse and ridicule from Massa who despised these intruders into his domain in an effort to dwindle his economic grip on the workers who once they joined a Union would be demanding higher wages and better conditions from them. The days of paying slave like wages would be finished away with. The days of working without holidays with pay, will be over. The days of working from sunrise to sun set will be over. The days of allowing the animal Doctor to pull the baby out of the mother’s womb and send her back to work wreaking with pain will be over; a gynaecologist will have to attend her at a hospital. The days of treating the worker like an animal will be no more. The days will be no more when a worker who is sick will be forced to go to work. Massa saw his days coming to an end and he detested it. Hence the hostility towards those who were wrenching that power, that authority from him!
In 1948, 13 weeks after the 1935 Buckley’s Revolution and 8 years after the right to form and join Trade Unions was made law, the Union organized a massive 13 week strike which severely crippled the purse of the Government and the planters who realized the strength of the working class of the land. Just when the Plantocracy (planters) was about to cave in to the demands of the workers, there stepped in a treacherous black brother who advised the planters not to succumb as yet; just hold on a little longer; when his people begin feeling the pinch of hunger, they will returned to work. So said, so done. The strike petered out and the workers returned to work. The right for the ordinary working class man and woman to cast their vote was realized in 1952, four years after the 13 week strike of 1948 and 12 years after the introduction of the first Trade Union in 1940, 17 years (1935-1952) after the Buckley’s Revolution. Massa and his minions were out rightly outrageous that the Black man was given the same right like him to vote.
The Trade Union, with Mr. Bradshaw as its President, fought for that RIGHT and won. Prior to 1952, you had to be working for a certain salary per month, owned land or houses to be able to vote. If Mr. Bradshaw and his team did not agitate for this, many of us would be voteless today. It really and truly grieves my heart to see how many of us do not value that right to VOTE, selling that RIGHT for a drink of rum, a beer, $500.00. If someone pays $500.00 to vote for him, that money amounts to $60.00 per year for the FIVE years he will spend in office. What can sixty dollars per year or $5.00 per month purchase in today’s world eh? The person, who paid you for your vote, will be receiving $10,000.00(Ten thousand dollars per month flat). Compare your measly $5.00 per month you were paid to his enormous salary. Whereby VOTING was a privilege prior to 1952, it is now a RIGHT and should be highly valued and regarded and should only be cast for those who have proven themselves worthy to work in your interest and that of the country. It should not be given away willy-nilly to every Tom, Dick and Harry with a glib tongue. It should only be given to well deserving people. So, don’t waste it man, please don’t waste it.
Dear reader, in 1952 when we were afforded the RIGHT TO VOTE here in St. Kitts-Nevis, many of our Black brothers and sisters in Africa and the rest of the world, were unable to enjoy that RIGHT. The Black brothers and sisters in South Africa were only able to enjoy that RIGHT when Mandela was released from prison in 1990 after spending 27 years fighting for that RIGHT and some 38 years after we were enjoying it. Treasure that RIGHT TO VOTE!
The Education continues next week.