By that time, Mittie Maude Lena Gordon of the PME had suspended her emigration campaign, shifting her focus to more pressing personal concerns. Her efforts to collaborate with Japanese activists in the years leading up to and during World War II had drawn the attention of federal officials, who had begun to build a case against the black nationalist leader during the early 1940s. After the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941, federal authorities began to crack down on black activists like Gordon who seemed to justify Japan’s actions. According to one FBI informant who discreetly attended one of Gordon’s meetings in Chicago in 1941, the black nationalist leader had not only dissuaded her supporters from serving in the U.S. Army but also offered a positive outlook on Pearl Harbor, arguing that “on December 7th, 1941, one billion black people struck for freedom.”99 Gordon later denied making this statement, but her earlier letters to Japanese activists provided the FBI officials with sufficient evidence to bolster their case. Moreover, several black activists in Chicago shared accounts of Gordon endorsing Afro-Asian solidarity and dissuading her members from fighting in the U.S. military with FBI officials.
FIGURE 15. Mittie Maude Lena Gordon’s arrest photo. Afro-American, October 7, 1942.
On September 20, 1942, Gordon was arrested in Chicago, along with her husband, William, and two PME leaders—David Logan and Seon Jones—and charged with the crimes of sedition and conspiracy.100 Their arrests coincided with the FBI’s crackdown on over eighty black activists, including several members of the Nation of Islam (NOI). After making various appearances at the PME’s public meetings, FBI officials later raided Gordon’s home and confiscated the organizational records, including hundreds of letters sent to Gordon and other leaders in the movement. Many of these items were used as evidence in the subsequent trial that began on January 25, 1943. Unable to afford the costs of litigation, PME leaders filed a motion to appeal in forma pauperis and were represented by Chicago attorney Lloyd T. Bailey. During the trial, which lasted three weeks, the prosecution displayed letters from PME leaders and other writings in an attempt to highlight the organization’s support for Japan and resistance to military service. Several witnesses, including Gordon’s archrival Ethel Waddell—who by that time was busy helping revive UNIA chapters in the U.S. Midwest—testified in support of the prosecution.101 Despite an appeal in the months that followed, the court maintained Gordon’s guilt, sentencing her to two years in prison.102 Her colleague, Seon Jones, received the same sentence while her husband was given three years of probation and David Logan was found not guilty. On January 17, 1944, the court ordered Gordon to enter the Federal Reformatory for Women in Alderson, West Virginia.
As Gordon sat in a prison cell for almost two years, Amy Jacques Garvey began to use her networks and political savvy to help revive the Greater Liberia Bill. There is no evidence to suggest that the two women were in contact with each other, but Jacques Garvey certainly admired Gordon’s leadership and praised her efforts to pass the Greater Liberia Bill.103 In March 1944, Jacques Garvey wrote a detailed letter to Bilbo, attempting to forge an alliance with the senator based on their mutual interests in “race integrity” and black emigration. “I feel that we are both sincerely interested in the success of the Repatriation Bill,” she wrote to Bilbo. “In view of our interest,” she continued, “I am sure you will welcome suggestions.” Reminding Bilbo about her years of extensive travel, political activism, and international influence, Jacques Garvey proceeded to lay out a number of suggested changes to the bill—including changing its name. “The word Repatriation, to many of my people is misinterpreted to mean forcing them out of America,” she carefully pointed out. Thus, she advised Bilbo to rename the Greater Liberia Bill to “A Bill to Establish an Independent Democratic Nation in Africa for people of African descent.” “The name is long,” she admitted, “but it implies the purpose of the bill.” After suggesting more than twenty changes to the bill, Jacques Garvey expressed optimism about its future, insisting that the world war strengthened, rather than hampered, the proposal. With a “publicity campaign” and a “brand new name,” Jacques Garvey optimistically predicted that all “oppositionist[s] [would] fall for it.”104
As she waited for a response from Bilbo, Jacques Garvey began using her global networks to garner support for the Greater Liberia Bill. In April 1944, she wrote to Harold Moody, a Jamaican doctor and civic leader who served as president of the League of Colored Peoples, a London-based Pan-Africanist organization.105 Detailing her multiple efforts to improve the lives of black men and women in the diaspora through a myriad of initiatives, Jacques Garvey laid out her arguments in support of Bilbo’s bill. She described the bill as “the best plan” that would “ease the . . . problems” of black Americans and other people of African descent. She also requested Moody’s help to obtain data on “the emasculation of our Race.”106 “Thirteen million African-Americans lynched, ostracized, and frustrated,” Jacques Garvey argued, “would find an outlet for their professionals, skilled experts and industrious and intelligent members in a country, in which they can . . . rise to the highest posts within the government.” Therefore, the prospect of relocating to West Africa, she insisted, provided a viable means for black men and women both to escape the harsh realities of life in the United States and to have economic and political autonomy.
Moreover, she envisioned the bill as an opportunity for the United States to “develop West Africa from Gambia to Equatorial Africa . . . [and] send experts in all branches of government and for security, to teach and train Africans and Colonists from America to take over their country eventually.” Ultimately, Jacques Garvey believed that skilled black emigrants from the United States would play a crucial role in making West Africa “a progressive, Democratic nation.”107 Her comments revealed her civilizationist views toward indigenous Africans—ideas that were characteristic of other black nationalists, including her late husband, Marcus Garvey. Not long after writing to Moody, Jacques Garvey reached out to C. V. Jarrett, editor of the African Standard in Freetown, Sierra Leone, expressing a sense of optimism about the future of people of African descent. “For a solution of the conditions of our people in America,” she wrote, “I present the Greater Liberia Bill, sponsored by an American Senator.”108
Significantly, Jacques Garvey also used this opportunity to present her proposal for an amendment to the Atlantic Charter. Introduced in August 1941 by Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill, the Atlantic Charter represented one of the most significant World War II documents, laying out a set of principles that would ultimately guide the Allied powers toward peace and stability.109 Among the charter’s stipulations was its emphasis on political self-determination. The document declared that Roosevelt and Churchill “respect the right of all peoples to choose the form of government under which they will live.” For people of color, including millions living under the heel of colonialism in Africa, Asia, and the Caribbean, the charter’s introduction in 1941 was a pivotal development. Not surprisingly, it became a significant organizing tool, galvanizing activists across the African diaspora and resulting in the resurgence of Pan-Africanist sentiments.110
While the charter symbolized the United States’ and Britain’s commitment to human rights, freedom, and justice, it ultimately excluded people of color.111 In the immediate aftermath of the charter’s debut, Churchill publicly declared before the British Parliament that it was not “applicable to colored races in colonial empire.” Though Roosevelt later argued that the charter’s provision should include colonized nations, the lack of consensus on the issue underscored the persistence of the twentieth-century global color line that ultimately marginalized the needs and concerns of people of color.112 During this period, activists in various civil rights organizations, including the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and the National Negro Congress (NNC), agitated for the inclusion of colonized nations in the Atlantic Charter. In a 1943 speech, NAACP leader Channing Tobias passionately a
rgued that the charter was a monumental development—so significant that black people would be willing to “live, work, fight and, if need be, die for.”113 Jacques Garvey certainly embraced this point of view, calling on Roosevelt and Churchill to recognize the rights and liberties of colonized peoples across the diaspora. In July 1944, three months after contacting C. V. Jarrett, she drafted A Memorandum Correlative of Africa, the West Indies and the Americas, a crucial Pan-Africanist document that identified the loopholes in the Atlantic Charter and called for the creation of an African Freedom Council—comprising both African and European leaders—to oversee African colonies.
Among the many stipulations of the Memorandum, which included a call for the unification of “Africans the world over,” Jacques Garvey also promoted the Greater Liberia Bill.114 She envisioned the bill as a significant part of the “rehabilitation of Africa.” In her view, Bilbo’s proposal for voluntary emigration signified a larger commitment to securing black political and economic self-determination.115 Though she fully understood the controversies—and certainly the contradictions—associated with promoting the senator’s bill, Jacques Garvey attempted to convince other black leaders to rally around it. Writing to Hilbert Keys, a Garveyite residing in Delaware, Jacques Garvey explained her position on the issue: “Senator Bilbo’s bill is the happy solution to the problem of the conditions of our people in the United States of America” and “would bring about a practical effort . . . [to establish an] independent, Democratic Nation on the West Coast of Africa.”116 Though she lauded the Greater Liberia Bill, which would help to establish “an Independent Democratic Nation for Negroes,” Jacques Garvey offered a scathing critique of the bill’s sponsor in her letter to Keys. “I do not know if you quite understand,” she wrote to Keys, “[Bilbo] is very unpopular, every speech of his is more rabid anti-Negro, even if he does not realize it.” Conceding that “it is [still] his bill,” Jacques Garvey laid out a strategic plan for promoting it but cautioned, “Connecting him with the bill . . . is hopeless. . . . We must be diplomatic . . . in the way we present [it].”117
Jacques Garvey continued to galvanize support for the Greater Liberia Bill by advising Keys to organize black activists from his base in Delaware and encouraging him to revive The African magazine in order to promote the bill.118 “You must be diplomatic,” she cautioned, “and act as a real statesman for Africa.”119 She also wrote to members of the Garvey Club in New York, reiterating her favorable position on the Greater Liberia Bill. Though members of the club supported the basic principles of her Memorandum, they unequivocally resisted Jacques Garvey’s decision to support the senator’s bill. Writing to Jacques Garvey in August 1944, James A. Blades Jr., one of the leaders of the club, challenged Jacques Garvey’s position in no uncertain terms. “As a good Christian would you accept a plan from the devil as to how you may get to heaven?” he asked rhetorically. “To put it another way,” he added, “would you appeal to the devil for a solution as to how to solve your problems?” “That is what you are asking the Garvey Club to do when you suggested the insertion of the Bilbo Bill in the Africa Freedom Charter,” Blades concluded. Recounting Bilbo’s controversial political career and his virulent racist comments and reminding Jacques Garvey of her late husband’s commitment to black self-sufficiency, Blades contended that any connection to the Greater Liberia Bill would ultimately undermine black nationalists’ efforts. In Blades’s view, Jacques Garvey’s decision to link herself—and, by extension, the “movement and [Garveyite] philosophy”—with an avowed white supremacist was entirely wrong-headed and counterproductive.120 Ironically, Blades overlooked Marcus Garvey’s own early efforts to court white supremacists to advance his political goals.
With her characteristic tact, Jacques Garvey sent a carefully crafted four-page response to her critic. “You seem to have gotten quite a load off your chest in the one letter,” she began, “too bad we could not meet personally.” “But it is for this and other important reasons,” she continued, “why my movements are so much hampered.” After briefly summarizing Blades’s points of contention, Jacques Garvey reminded Blades that she advocated the bill—not the bill’s sponsor. Moreover, she disputed Blades’s assertion that she was “looking to Bilbo for a solution to our problem.” “I regard his Bill,” she clarified, “as fashioned by him as a means to induce our people in America to build their future in Africa.” “Yes, Mr. Blades,” she responded to Blades’s curt question, “if the Devil, in trying to rid himself of those who stand in his way, send them to purgatory; it is for wise men to use the free transportation and other subsidies, and make purgatory a real Heaven.”121
Jacques Garvey’s response to Blades captures the complexity of her political ideas and the extent of her pragmatic political strategizing during this era. Like Gordon, Waddell, and other black nationalist women activists, Jacques Garvey was not oblivious to Bilbo’s underlying goals or the inherent contradictions of such an alliance, but she also reasoned that in the fight for universal black liberation, allies might come from the most unlikely places. Thus, she expressed a willingness to “use the free transportation and other subsidies” from white supremacist collaborators, who, irrespective of their ulterior motives, could serve a far greater purpose.
Although Jacques Garvey adamantly supported the Greater Liberia Bill, which she viewed as a culmination of her late husband’s efforts, she began to feel disheartened following her tense exchange with Blades and other Garveyite leaders.122 Mirroring her earlier critiques of male Garveyites in the women’s page of the Negro World, Jacques Garvey expressed frustration about “our [Black] men” in a letter to Keys.123 She declared, “They are breaking my body by being dead-weight to carry all the time. So selfish, self-seeking, so slow, so lazy, I chafe under restraint, that I cannot use some kind of superhuman effort to kick them into action.” “My men!” she lamented, “I weep to think, what an apology they are for real, strong, self-asserting men.” Reassuring Keys that he was an exception to the rule, Jacques Garvey enthusiastically encouraged him to “go forward” with the important task of promoting the Greater Liberia Bill and thereby advancing “race freedom.”124
Despite Jacques Garvey’s vigorous defense of Bilbo’s Greater Liberia Bill, she never actually received a response from the senator. Her earlier letter, dated March 26, 1944, along with a follow-up letter requesting copies of his bill, went unanswered. The senator’s silence may have been a result of his increasing health-related issues during this period—Bilbo would undergo a medical operation in August of that year. However, it is also likely that he was put off by the assertive tone of Jacques Garvey’s letter—or simply resistant toward the idea of associating with the Jamaican activist in crafting U.S. legislation.125 Though he welcomed new black supporters, Bilbo certainly preferred to ally himself with individuals who appeared to acquiesce with, rather than challenge, his proposals. Moreover, his earlier experiences with Gordon might have fueled some misgivings about forging an alliance with another assertive black nationalist woman activist.
Whatever the reason for Bilbo’s silence, Jacques Garvey was undeterred in her stance on the bill. She acknowledged that Bilbo failed to respond to her letters but continued to emphasize her political support, attempting to draw a distinction between the bill and its sponsor. In a letter to Keys in June 1944, Jacques Garvey carefully advised, “All your comments and arguments . . . must confine itself with the text of the Bill . . . make no mention of Bilbo’s name.”126 Jacques Garvey’s advice to Keys underscores how the activist hoped to capitalize on the bill without evoking its sponsor. Unlike Mittie Maude Lena Gordon, who had publicly lauded the senator’s proposal in an effort to attain her goals, Jacques Garvey employed a “new [covert] strategy” that aimed to “swing [the bill] entirely out of the atmosphere of Southern prejudice and hate.” By the act of concealing or, at the very least, downplaying the connection between the bill and the white supremacist senator, Jacques Garvey hoped to garner widespread support from blacks in the
diaspora. She also reasoned that if the bill were implemented, it would serve as a “small amount in recompense for services rendered under slavery.”127 From her vantage point, then, the Greater Liberia Bill, which would allocate federal funds to establish a black nation-state in West Africa, represented a small yet significant step toward redressing hundreds of years of racial and economic exploitation.
By August 1944, the growing tensions surrounding Senator Bilbo’s bill began to weigh heavily on Jacques Garvey. Though she had vigorously defended her decision to include the bill in her Memorandum, she ultimately decided to remove it, recognizing that it would only fuel more conflict and division.128 She was not, however, willing to break ties with white supremacist collaborators. Maintaining essentialist and biologically based views on race—despite shifting perceptions on race in mainstream black thought during this period—Jacques Garvey continued to pursue collaborations with ardent white separatists. In subsequent years, Jacques Garvey reestablished contact with Earnest Cox, who remained committed to the cause of black emigration from his base in Richmond, Virginia.
Black Nationalist Women and Pan-Africanist Discourses
For black activists who viewed Jacques Garvey’s focus on the emigration bill as a significant distraction or even departure from her Pan-Africanist and anticolonialist politics, her involvement in the Fifth Pan-African Congress would have dispelled any concerns. Indeed, as she worked to revive the Greater Liberia Bill, Jacques Garvey was also working to bring the Fifth Pan-African Congress to fruition, using her diasporic networks and skills as a writer. The congress, held in Manchester, England, in 1945, was arguably the most significant of the series of Pan-African events held during the twentieth century. After the first 1900 Pan-African Conference led by Trinidadian lawyer Henry Sylvester Williams in London, four Pan-African Congresses followed between 1919 and 1927—three held in Europe and one held in the United States. The Fifth Pan-African Congress, scheduled for 1945, was organized by Trinidadian journalist George Padmore with the assistance of Kwame Nkrumah and W. E. B. Du Bois.129 During World War II, Du Bois invited Jacques Garvey to serve as the Congress’s coconvener, a position she eagerly accepted. Although she could not afford travel expenses to England, she did much of the legwork for planning the event in the months preceding it. Among other things, Jacques Garvey offered detailed suggestions on crafting the invitation letter for the significant gathering and insisted that black women be included in the program.130 On October 15, 1945, the Fifth Pan-African Congress began at the Chorlton Town Hall in Manchester with Jacques Garvey still in Jamaica.
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