The Marcus Garvey and Universal Negro Improvement Association Papers, Vol. III: September 1920-August 1921

By Marcus Garvey

This is the third volume of Robert A. Hill's massive ten-volume survey of Marcus Mosiah Garvey and the extraordinary mass movement of black social protest he inspired. Hill brings together a wealth of original documents-speeches, letters, newspaper articles, intelligence reports, pamphlets, and diplomatic dispatches--to provide a record of the period between the first and second international conventions of the Universal Negro Improvement Association. The success of the August 1920 convention, as documented in Volume II, justified Garvey's expanded emphasis on African redemption and established his movement's substantial following in black communities around the world. And by the time of the August 1921 convention, the UNIA was the major political force among blacks in the postwar world.   As Volume III reveals, however, there arose signs of crisis in the movement. Garvey's lieutenants began to doubt both the financial health of the Black Star Line and the wisdom of Garvey's methods of raising money for his Liberian colonization and trade scheme. Soon the entire Black Star Line enterprise hovered on the brink of bankruptcy and a steep decline in the shipping business made prospects for the Black Star Line even less promising. But Garvey capitalized on the momentum gathered at the August 1920 convention and spent much of his time in a new round of promotional tours devoted to selling Black Star Line stock, shoring up weak UNIA divisions, and chartering new ones. This gave J. Edgar Hoover his long-awaited opportunity to remove Garvey from the Afro-American political scene. When Garvey embarked on a promotional tour of the West Indies and Central America in February 1921, the United States government, with some assistance from the British, attempted to keep Garvey from returning to the country.   Garvey's trip was to mark a turning point in the history of the UNIA. Garvey's lieutenants, who were charged with running the UNIA during his absence, frequently clashed over unclear lines of authority. This also created severe difficulties for the Black Star Line and the UNIA's Liberian project. Under these circumstances, Garvey asked for and received, from the 1921 convention, control over all UNIA and Black Star Line finances as a means of centralizing all authority in his hands. At the same time Garvey launched an attack at the convention against those black leaders, including W. E. B. Du Bois, whom he perceived as opponents of the UNIA. He further initiated a controversial campaign to label these political opponents as advocates of "social equality" between the races, while offering as an alternative his philosophy of "racial purity."   This volume is the third of six that focus on America; the seventh and eighth focus on Africa, and the last two on the Caribbean. In Volume III, Robert Hill documents the complexities and turmoil of the Garvey movement from 1920 to 1921, as an unfolding drama emerges that pits American and European political, diplomatic, and economic interests against the first comprehensive expression of the modern black struggle for freedom.

This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press's mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1984.
This is the third volume of Robert A. Hill's massive ten-volume survey of Marcus Mosiah Garvey and the extraordinary mass movement of black social protest he inspired. Hill brings together a wealth of original documents-speeches, letters, newspaper articl

• Language: English
• Publisher: University of California Press
• Release date: Sep 1, 2023
• ISBN: 9780520342255

Marcus Garvey

Robert A. Hill is Associate Professor of History and Director of the Marcus Garvey and Universal Negro Improvement Association Papers Project, the University of California, Los Angeles. Tevvy Ball and Erika Blum are Associate Editors of the African volumes of the Marcus Garvey and Universal Negro Improvement Association Papers Project.

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THE

MARCUS GARVEY

AND

UNIVERSAL NEGRO

IMPROVEMENT ASSOCIATION

PAPERS

SUPPORTED BY

The National Endowment for the Humanities

The National Historical Publications and Records Commission

SPONSORED BY

The University of California, Los Angeles

EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD

HERBERT APTHEKER

MARY FRANCES BERRY

JOHN W. BLASSINGAME

JOHN HENRIK CLARKE

EDMUND DAVID CRONON

IAN DUFFIELD

E. U. ESSIEN-UDOM

VINCENT HARDING

RICHARD HART

THOMAS L. HODGKINt

ARTHUR S. LINK

GEORGE A. SHEPPERSON

MICHAEL R. WINSTON

Marcus Garvey during his trip to the Caribbean

MARCUS GARVEY

AND

UNIVERSAL NEGRO

IMPROVEMENT ASSOCIATION

PAPERS

Volume III

September 1920—August 1921

Robert A. Hill

Editor

Emory J. Tolbert

Senior Editor

Deborah Forczek

Assistant Editor

University of California Press

Berkeley Los Angeles London

University of California Press Berkeley and Los Angeles, California

University of California Press, Ltd.

London, England

The preparation of this volume was made possible in part by a grant from the Program for Editions of the National Endowment for the Humanities, an independent federal agency. In addition, support was also received from the National Historical Publications and Records Commission, Washington, D.C., and the University of California, Los Angeles.

Documents in this volume from the Public Record Office are © British Crown copyright 1920 and 1921 and are published by permission of the Controller of Her Britannic Majesty’s Stationery Office.

Designed by Linda M. Robertson and set in Galliard type.

Copyright © 1984 by The Regents of the University of California

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data

Main entry under title:

The Marcus Garvey and Universal Negro Improvement Association papers.

ï. Garvey, Marcus, 1887-1940. 2. Universal Negro Improvement Association—History—Sources. 3. Black power—United States— History—Sources. 4. Afro-Americans—Race identity—History— Sources. 5. Afro-Americans—Civil rights—History—Sources.

6. Afro-Americans—Correspondence. I. Hill, Robert A., 1943- • H. Garvey, Marcus, 1887-1940. HI. Universal Negro

Improvement Association.

E185.97.G3M36 1984 305.8'96073 82-13379

ISBN 978-0-520-05257-4

Printed in the United States of America

18 19 20 21 22

3 4 5 6 7 8 9

To

C. L. R. James

CONTENTS

CONTENTS

ILLUSTRATIONS

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

INTRODUCTION

EDITORIAL PRINCIPLES AND PRACTICES

TEXTUAL DEVICES

SYMBOLS AND ABBREVIATIONS

Repository Symbols

MANUSCRIPT COLLECTION SYMBOLS

Descriptive Symbols

Published Works Cited

Other Symbols and Abbreviations

CHRONOLOGY

Editorial Letter by Marcus Garvey

Reports by Special Agent p.138

Editorial Letter by Marcus Garvey

Marcus Garvey to Leo Healy

Auckland C. Geddes to Earl Curzon of Kedleston1

Report by Special Agent p.138

Statement by Edwin P. Kilroe

Report by Special Agent p.138

Speeches by Marcus Garvey1

E. G. Woodford to A. Philip Randolph

Speech by Marcus Garvey

Report by Special Agent p.138

Reports by Bureau Agent H. J. Lenon

A. M. Brookfield, British Consul for Georgia, to Auckland C. Geddes

Report by Special Agent p.138

O. M. Thompson to Louis LaMothe

Arthur L. Lewis to the Editor, BUFFALO AMERICAN

Gilbert Grindle to Lord Charles Hardinge,1 Under Secretary of State, British Foreign Office

Report by Bureau Agent H. J. Lenon

Report by Special Agent p.138

Report by Bureau Agent S. Busha

Report by Special Agent J. G. Tucker

Report by Special Agent p.138

O. M. Thompson to Hugh Mulzac

Report by Special Agent p.138

Editorial Letter by Marcus Garvey

Letter to the Editor, Negro World

O. M. Thompson to Leo Healy

Reports by Special Agent p.138

Rev. E. J. Echols1 to Marcus Garvey

Editorial in the Buffalo American

Reports by Special Agent p.138

Report by Special Agent J. G. Tucker

John Wesley Cromwell to William H. Ferris

Report by Bureau Agent H. S. White

Marcus Garvey to Rev. E. J. Echols

Report by Bureau Agents A. A. Hopkins and E. J. Kosterlitzky1

Editorial Letter by Marcus Garvey

O. M. Thompson to Hugh Mulzac

Marcus Garvey to Leo Healy

Reports by Special Agent p.138

W. E. B. Du Bois to Lloyd’s Register

W. E. B. Du Bois to North American Shipping Corporation

Report of UNIA Meeting

Report by Special Agent S-A-I-I

Report by Bureau Agents A. A. Hopkins and E. J. Kosterlitzky

Reports by Special Agent S-A-I-I

Negro World Advertisement

Report by Special Agent S-A-I-I

W. Ë. B. Du Bois to the Canadian Department of Corporations

W. E. B. Du Bois to Messrs. Furners, Withy and Company

Report by Bureau Agent William C. Sausele

W. E. B. Du Bois to the New York State Department of Commerce

Report by Special Agent p.138

W. E. B. Du Bois to the American Bureau of Shipping

O. M. Thompson to Leo Healy

Report by Special Agent p.138

Editorial Letter by Marcus Garvey

Report by Special Agent p.138

Circular Letter by Marcus Garvey

Report by Bureau Agent H. J. Lenon

Report by Bureau Agents A. A. Hopkins and E. J. Kosterlitzky

Col. Matthew C. Smith, Military Intelligence Division, to Lewis J. Baley, Chief, Bureau of Investigation

Report by Special Agent p.138

Robert C. Bannerman, Chief Special Agent, Department of State, to Special Agent Robert S. Sharp, New York

J. Edgar Hoover to William L. Hurley

Lewis J. Baley to L. H. Kemp, Jr., Bureau of Investigation

L. H. Kemp, Jr., to Lewis J. Baley

Special Agent Frank C. Higgins to Special Agent Robert S. Sharp

Special Agent Robert S. Sharp to Robert C. Bannerman

Report by Special Agent J. G. Tucker

O. M. Thompson to Leo Healy

Report by Bureau Agent William C. Sausele

Gabriel M. Johnson to President C. D. B. King of Liberia

Report by Special Agent p.138

Editorial Letter by Marcus Garvey

NEGRO WORLD NOTICES

Report by Bureau Agent L. H. Kemp, Jr.

Reports by Special Agent p.138

Meeting Announcement

Editorial Letter by Marcus Garvey

Report by Special Agent p.138

Report by Special Agent J. G. Tucker

Report by Special Agent p.138

O. M. Thompson to Leo Healy

William L. Hurley to J. Edgar Hoover

Rev. C. S. Smith to the Editor, Worlds Work

Report of Marcus Garvey’s Speeches in Cleveland

Report by Bureau Agent H. J. Lenon

Marcus Garvey to Gabriel M. Johnson

Report by Bureau Agent Adrian L. Potter

Raymond Sheldon to the Director, Military Intelligence Division

Sir James Willcocks, Governor General of Bermuda, to the British Secretary of State for the Colonies

Wilford H. Smith to Arthur B. Spingarn

O. M. Thompson to Leo Healy

Report by Special Agent p.138

Madarikan Deniyi to the Richmond Planet

Reports by Special Agent p.138

Marcus Garvey to Gabriel M. Johnson

J. D. Gordon to John Milton Scott

Speech by Marcus Garvey

Marcus Garvey to Cyril A. Crichlow, UNIA Resident Secretary to Liberia

Marcus Garvey to Gabriel M. Johnson

Credential for Cyril A. Crichlow from Marcus Garvey

Marcus Garvey to Gabriel M. Johnson

Editorial Letter by Marcus Garvey

Speech by Marcus Garvey

Bureau of Investigation Report

Speech by Marcus Garvey

Report by Special Agent p.138

Editorial Letter by Marcus Garvey

MARCUS GARVEY N. AMY GARVEY

Arthur B. Spingarn to Wilford H. Smith

Report by Bureau Agent James O. Peyronnin

Report by Bureau Agents A. A. Hopkins and E. J. Kosterlitzky

J. Edgar Hoover to Lewis J. Baley

Report by Special Agent p.138

Speech by Marcus Garvey

UNIA Division News

UNIA Announcements

MARCUS GARVEY V. AMY GARVEY

Speech by Marcus Garvey

Report by Special Agent p.138

Speech by Marcus Garvey

Gloster Armstrong to Auckland C. Geddes, British Ambassador, Washington, D.C.

CIRCULAR

J. Edgar Hoover to Lewis J. Baley

Negro World Editorial Cartoon

Negro World Advertisements

Report by Bureau Agents A. A. Hopkins and E. J. Kosterlitzky

Marcus Garvey’s Farewell Speech

Report by Special Agent p.138

J. Edgar Hoover to Anthony Caminetti, Commissioner General of Immigration

J. Edgar Hoover to William L. Hurley

Lewis J. Baley to the Bureau of Investigation, Jacksonville, Florida

BSL Announcement

Report by Special Agent p.138

Charles L. Latham, American Consul, Kingston, Jamaica, to Charles Evans Hughes,1 United States Secretary of State

Editorial Letters by Marcus Garvey

BSL Announcement

Report by Special Agent p.138

Report by Bureau Agent Adrian L. Potter

Howard P. Wright, Bureau Agent in Charge, to Lewis J. Baley

Gabriel M. Johnson to Marcus Garvey

Alfred Hampton, Assistant Commissioner General, Bureau of Immigration, to J. Edgar Hoover

Edgar Collier to James Weldon Johnson, Secretary, NAACP

Archibald Johnson to the Richmond Planet1

Report by Bureau Agents A. A. Hopkins and E. J. Kosterlitzky

Robert Adger Bowen to J. Edgar Hoover

Reports by Special Agent p.138

J. Edgar Hoover to George F. Ruch

George Cross Van Dusen, Military Intelligence Division, to J. Edgar Hoover

First Negro World Spanish Section

J. Edgar Hoover to William L. Hurley

Walter C. Foster to Lewis J. Baley

Report by Bureau Agent Erle O. Parrish

News Report of Garvey’s Arrival in Jamaica

Marcus Garvey to the Gleaner

Gabriel M. Johnson to Marcus Garvey

Schedule of Garvey’s Speeches

Report of UNIA Meeting, Kingston, Jamaica

J. Edgar Hoover to William L. Hurley

Wilbur J. Carr to Charles L. Latham

Report by Special Agent p.138

Report by Bureau Agents A. A. Hopkins and E. J. Kosterlitzky

Speech by Marcus Garvey

John A. Soulette to the Gleaner

Negro World Front Page

Inspector McGerrity to the Inspector General of Jamaica

Report of UNIA Meetings at Kingston and Morant Bay, Jamaica

Report of Meetings at Montego Bay and Port Antonio, Jamaica

UNIA to Cyril A. Crichlow

Elie Garcia to Cyril A. Crichlow

J. Edgar Hoover to William L. Hurley

Article in the Chicago Whip

Universal Negro Catechism

Elbert W. Moore to W. E. B. Du Bois

Report by Bureau Agents A. A. Hopkins and E. J. Kosterlitzky

Open Letter by Rev. Ernest Price

John E. Bruce on Bishop C. S. Smith

Colonial Secretary, Kingston, to Clerk, Parochial Board, St. Ann’s Bay, Jamaica

Capt. Adrian Richardson to O. M. Thompson

Marcus Garvey to the Gleaner

Robert P. Skinner,1 American Consul General, to J. Butler Wright,2 American Charge d’Affaires

Rev. Ernest Price to the Gleaner

W. E. B. Du Bois to C. D. B. King

Charles L. Latham to Julius D. Dreher,1 American Consul General, Colon, Panama

Alfred E. Burrowes to the Gleaner

Marcus Garvey to the Gleaner

Memorandum by the Division of Western European Affairs, Department of State

Marcus Garvey to the Black Star Line, New York Office

T. M. Reddy to Lewis J. Baley

Report of UNIA Meeting

Report by Bureau Agent A. A. Hopkins

Charles L. Latham to Charles Evans Hughes, Secretary of State

E. Blackwell, British Home Office, to the British Colonial Under Secretary of State

Charles L. Latham to Charles Evans Hughes

William L. Hurley to J. Edgar Hoover

Gabriel M. Johnson to the UNIA

Walter C. Thurston to Charles Evans Hughes

Stewart E. McMillin, American Consul, to H. Boschen, Manager Agent, United Fruit Company, Port Limón, Costa Rica

Elie Garcia to Gabriel M. Johnson

Walter C. Thurston to Charles Evans Hughes

Memorandum from the Military Intelligence Division

Article by William Pickens

Capt. Adrian Richardson to the Black Star Line, New York Office

Report by Bureau Agent Claude P. Light

Report by Bureau Agent H. B. Pierce

Capt. Adrian Richardson to the Black Star Line, New York Office

O. M. Thompson to Marcus Garvey

Marcus Garvey to the Black Star Line, New York Office

O. M. Thompson to Marcus Garvey

O. M. Thompson to the Black Star Line, Havana

O. M. Thompson to Capt. Adrian Richardson

Charles Evans Hughes to the American Legation, San Jose, Costa Rica

Report by Special Agent p.138

Marcus Garvey to the Black Star Line, New York Office

Speeches by Marcus Garvey at Colon, Panama

Gabriel M. Johnson to the UNIA

George Washington to Harry Daugherty, Attorney General1

Report by Special Agent p.138

Walter C. Thurston to Stewart E. McMillin

Stewart E. McMillin to Walter C. Thurston

Lt. Comdr. C. M. Hall to Rear Adm. M. Johnston1

Elie Garcia to Gabriel M. Johnson

Walter C. Thurston to Charles Evans Hughes

Speeches by Marcus Garvey in Panama

Gabriel M. Johnson to the UNIA

Report by Bureau Agent Adrian L. Potter

Memorandum from the Military Intelligence Division

Newspaper Report

Maj. Norman Randolph to the Director, Military Intelligence Division

Charles L. Latham to Charles Evans Hughes

William C. Matthews, UNIA Assistant Counsel General, to the Department of State

Cyril A. Crichlow to Marcus Garvey

William L. Hurley to J. Edgar Hoover

Charles Evans Hughes to Charles L. Latham

J. H. Irving to the Detective Inspector, Jamaica

J. Edgar Hoover to William L. Hurley

Memorandum by John Cooper Wiley, Division of Western European Affairs, Department of

Précis of Correspondence1

Report by Bureau Agent C. E. Breniman

Gabriel M. Johnson to the UNIA Executive Council

M. B. O’Sullivan, Acting Deputy Inspector General, to the Inspector General, Jamaica

Charles L. Latham to Charles Evans Hughes

Report by Special Agent p.138

Charles Evans Hughes to Stewart E. McMillin

Reports by Special Agent p.138

Marcus Garvey to William H. Ferris, Literary Editor, Negro World

Robert Woods Bliss to Joseph L. Johnson,1 United States Minister Resident and Consul General, Liberia

Marcus Garvey to the Gleaner

Report by Special Agent p.138

Constantine Graham, British Charge d’Affaires, Panama, to Earl Curzon of Kedleston

Lewis J. Baley to William B. Matthews, Bureau of Investigation

Lewis J. Baley to William B. Matthews

Henry P. Fletcher, Under Secretary of State, to Herbert Hoover, Secretary of Commerce1

Report by Special Agent J. T. Flournoy

Report of Liberty Hall Meeting

Charles L. Latham to Charles Evans Hughes

J. Edgar Hoover to William L. Hurley

AFRICAN PRINCE FLAYS GARVEY

Black Star Line Circular

Marcus Garvey to Charles L. Latham

Affidavit by UNIA Members

W. E. Wilson to Marcus Garvey

C. H. Calhoun, Chief of Division of Civil Affairs, to the Chief Customs Inspector, Cristobal, Panama Canal Zone

Report by Special Agent p.138

Marcus Garvey to Charles L. Latham

Report by Special Agent J. T. Flournoy

Sen. William B. McKinley to the Department of Justice

A. J. Tyrer, Acting Commissioner of Navigation, Department of Commerce, to Collector of Customs, New York

Charles Evans Hughes to Charles L. Latham

Charles L. Latham to Charles Evans Hughes

Charles L. Latham to Charles Evans Hughes

William C. Matthews to Harry A. McBride, Visa Control Office, Department of State

Gabriel M. Johnson to Cyril A. Crichlow

Arthur Barclay, UNIA Legal Adviser in Liberia, to Cyril A. Crichlow

Cyril A. Crichlow to Gabriel M. Johnson

Cyril A. Crichlow to the UNIA Executive Council

Charles L. Latham to Charles Evans Hughes

Report by Bureau Agent L. J. Barkhausen

UNIA Executive Council to Gabriel M. Johnson

H. M. Daugherty, Attorney General, to Sen. William B. McKinley

Report by Special Agent J. G. Tucker

Charles L. Latham to Charles Evans Hughes

Report by Bureau Agent Madison Ballantyne

Report by Special Agent J. G. Tucker

Report by Special Agent p.138

Negro World Editorial

Charles L. Latham to Charles Evans Hughes

Charles L. Latham to Charles Evans Hughes

J. Preston Doughten, Visa Office, to Richard W. Flournoy, Jr., Office of the Solicitor, Department of State, and William L. Hurley

Cyril A. Crichlow to the UNIA Executive Council

Reuben Vassall, Detective and Acting Corporal, to the Deputy Inspector General, Kingston, Jamaica

Cyril A. Crichlow to Joseph L. Johnson

W. E. B. Du Bois to the Editor, New York Age

Richard W. Flournoy, Jr., to J. Preston Doughten

Charles L. Latham to Charles Evans Hughes

Marcus Garvey to Charles Evans Hughes

Wilford H. Smith to Marcus Garvey

Fred K. Nielsen, Solicitor, Department of State, to Richard W. Flournoy, Jr.

William W. Heard, American Vice-consul, Kingston, Jamaica, to Charles Evans Hughes

William L. Hurley to Harry A. McBride

Cyril A. Crichlow to Marcus Garvey

Henry P. Fletcher, to Charles L. Latham

Report by Special Agent J. G. Tucker

Report by Special Agent J. T. Flournoy

William W. Heard to Charles Evans Hughes

John C. Wiley to William L. Hurley

William L. Hurley to J. Edgar Hoover

Report by Bureau Agent Leon E. Howe

A. Rudolph Silverston to Albert D. Lasker, Chairman, United States Shipping Board

William L. Hurley to J. Edgar Hoover

William Smith to Charles Evans Hughes

William L. Hurley to Harry A. McBride

Cyril Henry to O. M. Thompson

Elie Garcia to J. Harry Philbin,1 Manager of Shipping Sales, United States Shipping Board

Report by Special Agent p.138

Albert D. Lasker to A. Rudolph Silverston

Report of Interview

W. J. H. Taylor, British Vice-consul, to Tom Ffennell Carlisle,1 British Consul, New Orleans

Reports by Bureau Agent Leon E. Howe

A. Rudolph Silverston to J. Harry Philbin

Report by Bureau Agent Louis Loebl

Cable by Marcus Garvey

Report by Special Agent p.138

Charles J. Scully to Frederick A. Wallis, Commissioner of Immigration, Ellis Island

CHARLES J. SCULLY TO LEWIS J. BALEY

Marcus Garvey to Charles Evans Hughes

Report by Special Agent p.138

Charles J. Scully to Lewis J. Baley

Speech Announcement

Speeches by Marcus Garvey

Report by Special Agent p.1381

Memorandum from Clifford Smith, Secretary, United States Shipping Board

Speech by Marcus Garvey

J. Edgar Hoover to William L. Hurley

William C. Matthews to William H. Ferris

Speech by Marcus Garvey

Report by Special Agent p.138

Second Annual Report of the Black Star Line

E. R. Conners, Master, S.S. Kanawha, to Charles L. Latham

Marcus Garvey to E. T. Chamberlain, Commissioner of Navigation

O. M. Thompson to Marcus Garvey

Reports by Special Agent p.138

Article by John E. Bruce

A Membership Appeal from Marcus Garvey to the Negro Citizens of New York1

Convention Parade of the U.N.I.A.

Article in the Negro World

Keynote Speech by Gabriel M. Johnson, UNIA Potentate

Opening Speech of the Convention by Marcus Garvey

Marcus Garvey to Warren G. Harding

Marcus Garvey to Charles Evans Hughes

Marcus Garvey to Eamon de Valera

Marcus Garvey to George V of England

Marcus Garvey to Mahatma Gandhi1

Report by Special Agent p.138

Article in the New York Globe

Convention Report

Speeches by Marcus Garvey and Charles H. Duvall

Convention Report

Editorial Letter by Marcus Garvey

Capt. Adrian Richardson to Marcus Garvey

J. Harry Philbin, United States Shipping Board, to A. Rudolph Silverston

J. Harry Philbin to the Treasurer, United States Shipping Board

Official Convention Report by Marcus Garvey

Marcus Garvey to President C. D. B. King

UNIA Auditor General’s Report

Annual Report of the UNIA High Chancellor

Speech by Marcus Garvey at the Opening of the Women’s Industrial Exhibit

Joseph A. Yard to Warren G. Harding

Reports by Special Agent p.138

Negro World Front Page

Warning to the Negro Public of America

Negro World Advertisement

Article by the African Blood Brotherhood

ABB Bulletin

Official Report by the UNIA Secretary-General’s Department

Lewis J. Baley to Frank X. O’Donnell

Convention Reports

J. Edgar Hoover to William L. Hurley

Gabriel L. Dennis, Secretary, Liberian Plenary Commission, to William C. Matthews

Report by Bureau Agent Leon E. Howe

Report by Bureau Agent F. M. Ames

Speech by Marcus Garvey

Cyril V. Briggs to Marcus Garvey

Convention Reports

Article by H. Vinton Plummer

Convention Speech by Rose Pastor Stokes1

Convention Reports

Charles L. Latham to Charles Evans Hughes

Black Star Line to Henry C. Von Struve, American Consul, Antilia, Cuba

Article in the Negro World

First UNIA Court Reception

Joseph P. Nolan to J. Harry Philbin

Black Star Line to Henry C. Von Struve

Convention Reports

Henry C. Von Struve to the Black Star Line

Henry Bailey to Charles L. Latham

Edward J. Brennan to William J. Burns

Report by Bureau Agent W. S. Bachman

Report by Bureau Agent Edward Anderson

Report by Special Agent p.138

Report by Bureau Agent F. B. Faulhaber

Henry C. Von Struve to H. H. McGinty

Black Star Line to Henry C. Von Struve

Norman Thomas to James Weldon Johnson

Edward J. Brennan to William J. Burns1

Report by Special Agent p.138

William J. Burns to Frank Burke

Report by Bureau Agent F. M. Ames

Speech by Marcus Garvey

Draft Memorandum by John Cooper Wiley

African Redemption Fund Appeal by Marcus Garvey

APPENDIX I Revisions to the Constitution and Book of Laws1

APPENDIX U Finances of the Black Star Line, Incorporated

APPENDIX III Bureau of Investigation Summary of the Minutes of Black Star Line Board of Directors’ Meetings, 20 October 1920-26 July 1921

APPENDIX TV Delegates to the 1921 UNIA Convention

INDEX

ILLUSTRATIONS

Marcus Garvey during his trip to the Caribbean (frontispiece)

Courtesy of the George A. Weston Papers

Capt. Hugh Mulzac

Cleveland Gazette, 6 October 1923

Black Star Line Office

Philosophy and Opinions

S.S. Phyllis Wheatley

NW, 19 February 1921

UNIA Delegation to Liberia, 1921

Philosophy and Opinions

C. D. B. King

Liberians Past and Present (London: Diplomatic Press, 1939)

Edwin Barclay

Liberians Past and Present

Momolu Massaquoi

The Republic of Liberia (Hamburg: n.p., 1926)

F. E. R. Johnson

Liberians Past and Present

Map of the Caribbean area

Courtesy of Army Map Service, Corps of Engineers

Harbour Street in Kingston after the 1907 Earthquake

National Library of Jamaica

Rev. Ernest Price

Courtesy of the Price family

Alexander Bedward

Courtesy of the Institute of Jamaica

J. M. Price

Courtesy of the National Library of Jamaica

Marcus Garvey and UNIA members on a railway car in Costa Rica

Courtesy of the UNIA Hall, Port Limón, Costa Rica

Marcus Garvey addressing a crowd in Port Limón

Courtesy of Amy Jacques Garvey

THE MARCUS GARVEY AND UNIA PAPERS

Isaiah Morter

Philosophy and Opinions

Black Cross Nurses unit

NW, 19 February 1921

Robert Lincoln Poston

UNIA 1922 Almanac

Ulysses S. Poston

NW) 8 July 1922

Sumio Uesugi

Courtesy of Alumni Office, Denison University

George A. Weston

George A. Weston Papers

Marcus Garvey and Adrian F. Johnson in 1921 Convention Parade

Daily News, 2 August 1921

Convention Composite

New York World, 2 August 1921

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The editors wish to thank the institutions and individuals whose generous assistance advanced the research and editorial preparation of the present volume. Important documents were provided by the National Archives and Records Service, Washington, D.C.; Washington National Records Center, Suitland, Maryland; Manuscript Division of the Library of Congress; Federal Archives and Records Service, Bayonne, New Jersey; New York County Clerk’s Office, New York; Division of Old Records of the Hall of Records, New York; University of Massachusetts Library, Amherst; University of Southern California, Los Angeles; Public Record Office, Kew, Surrey, England; and the Jamaica Archives, Spanish Town. We are deeply indebted to the archivists of these institutions for their responses to our many requests and for their continued interest in the project.

Information used to prepare annotations was provided by the staff of the Library of the Honourable Society of the Middle Temple, London; League of Nations Archives, Geneva; British Foreign and Commonwealth Office Library, London; Baptist Missionary Society Archives, London: Island Record Office, Spanish Town, Jamaica; National Library of Jamaica, Kingston; National Library of Canada, Ottawa; Federal Archives and Records Service, Bayonne, New Jersey; Moorland-Spingam Research Center of the Howard University Library; Special Collections Division of George Washington University; Louisville Free Public Library, Kentucky; Rhode Island Historical Society, Providence; Detroit Public Library; Museum and Library of Maryland History, Baltimore; University Registrar and Divinity School Library of the University of Chicago; Alumni Office of Denison University, Granville, Ohio; Monmouth County Historical Society, Monmouth, New Jersey; B. F. Jones Memorial Library, Aliquippa, Pennsylvania; Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture of the New York Public Library; Indianapolis Public Library; Illinois State Archives and Illinois State Historical Library, Springfield; United States Army Military History Institute, Carlisle Barracks, Pennsylvania; National Personnel Records Center (Military Personnel Records), St. Louis; Department of Military Affairs of the Military Records and Research Library, Boone National Guard Center, Frankfort, Kentucky; and the New York City Department of Health. We should also like to thank the reference staff of the University Research Library at the University of California, Los Angeles, for their assistance. The archival staff of the National Historical Publications and Records Commission, Washington, D.C., continues to give indispensable aid to the project, and we gratefully acknowledge their assistance. Even though the staff has greatly decreased in numbers as a result of federal budget cutbacks, they continue undiminished in their dedication.

Helpful data for use in annotations also came to us from Prof. Randall K. Burkett, College of the Holy Cross, Worcester, Massachusetts; Prof. Tom Shick, University of Wisconsin-Madison; and Prof. Franklin W. Knight, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore. We also wish to thank Prof. Ralph Watkins of the State University of New York College at Oneonta for bringing the Buffalo American newspaper to our attention and for providing us with prints of relevant articles; Mother Ella Bell, Newark, New Jersey, for her recollections of her father-in-law, Rev. J. D. Barbour; and Rev. Mark A. Peachey of Triumph, the Church of the New Age, Newark, New Jersey, for kindly arranging the interview with Mother Bell; the late Rev. George A. Weston of Antigua, West Indies, for great generosity with his time over a series of lengthy interviews; Canute Parris, Babylon, New York, and St. Clair Drake, Palo Alto, California, for making available copies of their tapes of interviews with Rev. George Weston; Prof. Gregson Davis, Stanford University, for granting us access to his collection of Rev. George Weston’s papers; the Rerrie family, St. Ann’s Bay, Jamaica, for information about Garvey’s father; the late Rupert Jemmott, Long Island, New York, for his vivid reminiscences about the 1921 UNIA commission to Liberia, of which he was a member; Lionel M. Yard, Brooklyn, for allowing us to use his research materials concerning Amy Ashwood Garvey; Andrew Reed, Point Alfred, South Africa, for material on Bennet Newana; and H. P. Jacobs, Kingston, Jamaica, for information regarding various Jamaican personalities and events. We also wish to thank Dr. Peter D. Ashdown, Arundel, Sussex, England, for allowing us to consult his unpublished essay Marcus Garvey, the UNIA, and the Black Cause in British Honduras. We wish to thank Una Mulzac, New York, for information on her father, the late Hugh N. Mulzac. In addition, we acknowledge with gratitude the research assistance of W. F. Elkins, London. Sharon Burke, New York, also rendered invaluable help in researching UNIA case files in New York City, and we express our appreciation to her.

Permission to publish was gratefully received from the Public Record Office and from the Jamaica Archives. David Graham Du Bois, Cairo, Egypt, kindly granted permission to publish letters by W. E. B. Du Bois. The Federal Bureau of Investigation generously provided the photographic prints of the Black Star Line promotional brochure that is herein reproduced in facsimile. We should also like to thank the family of Rev. Ernest Price, the Alumni Office of Denison University, the Institute of Jamaica and the National Library of Jamaica for their assistance in our photographic research.

We would like to acknowledge the many debts we have incurred in the promotion and marketing of the first two volumes. We are happy to thank Harlan Kessel, Sales and Promotion Manager, University of California Press, and his exemplary staff: Anne Evers, Marta Gasoi, Patricia Malango, and Amanda Mecke. Special thanks must also be accorded to Kwaku Lynn, KPFK Radio, Hollywood, California, who has been most generous to the project in disseminating information about the volumes. Finally, we would like to acknowledge Bernard Hoyes, Los Angeles, for his oil painting of Marcus Garvey, reproduced on the dust jacket of all of the volumes.

The staff of the Marcus Garvey and Universal Negro Improvement Association Papers project has contributed their usual skill and dedication to the preparation of Volume III. The editors wish to express appreciation for the work of Diane Lisa Hill, Ruth Schofield, Michael Furmanovsky, Margaret Brumfield, and Robin Edelson. We also acknowledge the assistance of Gregory A. Pirio, Assistant Editor of the African series of the edition, for his help with the annotations treating Liberia, South Africa, and the Congo (Zaire).

The National Historical Publications and Records Commission, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the University of California, Los Angeles, have sustained the project with their support, and we are deeply grateful for their continuing commitment.

INTRODUCTION

The third volume of The Marcus Garvey and Universal Negro Improvement Association Papers documents the period between the first and second international conventions of the UNIA. The success of the August 1920 convention justified Garvey’s expanded emphasis on African redemption and established his movement’s substantial following in scores of black communities around the world. By the time the August 1921 convention came around, the UNIA was the major political force among blacks in the postwar world. Circulation of the Negro World, the movement’s newspaper, increased from twenty-five thousand at the start of 1921 to seventy-five thousand copies by the middle of the year, so that not only did it become self-supporting, it also contributed over $1,000 every month to the UNIA's general treasury. Counting newspaper employees and distributors, along with officials and staff members of the Black Star Line and the UNIA, William Ferris, the Negro World’s literary editor, estimated that by July 1921 Garvey’s movement provided employment for nearly two hundred persons in New York and nearly two hundred others in various parts of the world.

Even as the second convention deliberated, however, there arose ominous signs of crisis within the movement. Garvey’s lieutenants began to express doubts about the financial health of the Black Star Line and about the wisdom of Garvey’s methods in raising money for his Liberian colonization and trade scheme. At the same time, the UNIA’s various fund-raising projects had not been able to support the over $70,000 in annual salaries promised to UNIA officials who had been elected by the 1920 convention. By the end of August 1921, the Tarmouth (the BSL’s flagship) was no longer in service, and the Kanawha (a yacht) was disabled and tied up in Cuban waters; the Shadyside (the Hudson River excursion boat), meanwhile, was losing money. At this point, the entire BSL enterprise hovered on the brink of bankruptcy. Moreover, a steep general decline in the shipping business made prospects for the Black Star Line even less promising.

The momentum gathered at the August 1920 convention allowed Garvey and his aides to begin a new round of promotional tours devoted to selling Black Star Line stock, shoring up weak UNIA divisions, and chartering new divisions. The current volume documents the activities and growth of UNIA divisions in Buffalo; Chicago and Danville, Illinois; Key West, Jacksonville, and Miami, Florida; Louisville, Kentucky; Los Angeles; Okmulgee, Oklahoma; Philadelphia; Pittsburgh; and Springfield, Massachusetts. Clear evidence of the movement’s growth came at the 1921 convention, when the UNIA secretary-general reported that the number of divisions increased from 95 in 1920 to 418 in 1921, with an additional 422 UNIA branches awaiting charters from the parent body in New York.

From September 1920 to August 1921, BSL stock sales totaled $55,147, a difficult achievement in the face of high black unemployment during the postwar economic slump. Garvey introduced new financial schemes during this time. In October 1920 he replaced his Liberian Liberty bonds promotion with the Liberian Construction Loan, a plan to raise $2 million to finance a UNIA loan to Liberia. In order to stimulate sales and contributions, Garvey issued a circular letter on 1 December 1920 calling for $250,000 by midJanuary to secure a ship to convey workmen and materials to Liberia. At this point the Black Star Line and the Liberian Construction Loan were, for all practical purposes, one and the same promotion; indeed, the UNIA Liberian loan campaign was as much concerned with staving off the financial crisis of the Black Star Line as with financing construction in Liberia.

J. Edgar Hoover’s long-awaited opportunity to remove Garvey from the Afro-American political scene came when Garvey embarked on his promotional tour of the West Indies and Central America in February 1921. Hoover had come to believe that the Garvey movement in America was subsidized to some extent by the British government; another government official voiced the equally farfetched suspicion that Garvey might have been working as part of an international Jewish conspiracy aimed at fomenting revolution. On the basis of these suspicions as well as on evidence of Garvey’s radical influence in the black community, Hoover sought the cooperation of the United States State Department to bar Garvey from reentering the United States by denying him a visa. Yet the State Department eventually abandoned the policy of exclusion it had established at Hoover’s request and allowed Garvey to reenter the United States. Hoover retaliated by refusing to honor the State Department’s request for the Bureau of Investigation’s aid in blocking the admission of the UNIA potentate, Gabriel M. Johnson, who arrived from Liberia in July 1921 to attend the August UNIA convention. Johnson’s brother, F. E. R. Johnson, was in the United States at that time as a member of the Liberian Plenary Commission negotiating for a United States government loan, and the State Department believed that he was also working on behalf of the UNIA to further its cause in Liberia. Thus, the attempt to keep the UNIA potentate out of the United States supported a larger diplomatic scheme aimed at keeping Garvey and the UNIA from launching their construction program in Liberia. In this context, State Department policymakers viewed Garvey’s readmission as less significant than Gabriel Johnson’s, a conclusion that greatly displeased Hoover.

INTRODUCTION

Garvey faced a curious dilemma in his decision to risk a trip away from the United States despite the sober warnings of his aides, many of his followers, and the black press. Although his advisers anticipated the United States government’s attempt to keep him out of the country with the assistance of the British, Garvey knew that without a major fund-raising tour in previously untapped regions, the Black Star Line would soon go under.

Garvey’s speeches in the countries that he visited—Cuba, Jamaica, Costa Rica, Panama, and British Honduras (Belize)—challenged local audiences to pursue a new religion and new politics and to struggle against the old-time order of things. Beyond its promotional function, Garvey’s tour formed part of a wider UNIA diplomatic offensive: while Garvey was mobilizing support in the Caribbean, UNIA officials in New York were lobbying the visiting Liberian Plenary Commission, which included President C. D. B. King, and the UNIA's delegation in Liberia was asking the Liberian cabinet to set aside land and accommodations for the UNIA construction and colonization program. Garvey’s trip also marked a major turning point in the history of the UNIA. Garvey’s lieutenants, who were charged with running the UNIA and the Black Star Line during his absence, frequently clashed over unclear lines of authority. At the same time, a quarrel over questions of authority between Cyril Crichlow, Garvey’s resident commissioner in Liberia, and Gabriel Johnson and George O. Marke, UNIA potentate and supreme deputy potentate, created severe difficulties for the UNIA, leaving the UNIA’s Liberian project at a standstill. Under these circumstances Garvey asked the 1921 convention for control over all UNIA and BSL finances as a means of centralizing authority in his hands. The convention granted him that control and at the same time approved changes in the UNIA Constitution that increased the power of the parent body in New York. According to Garvey’s plan, UNIA employees would be recruited from those who passed a UNIA civil service examination, and the executive secretaries of local divisions would be civil servants who would handle all local records and report directly to UNIA headquarters.

When the movement was starting to founder in New York, however, Garvey was preoccupied in the Caribbean with problems of his own. Constant breakdowns of the S.S. Kanawha and numerous stops for expensive repairs led Garvey to accuse the ship’s captain and engineer of incompetence and sabotage. Garvey also encountered colonial authorities throughout the region who viewed his presence with concern: in the case of Bermuda, where he planned to make the first stop of his tour, officials denied him permission to land. Nonetheless, the tour marked a significant political triumph for Garvey. Large crowds greeted him in Cuba, Jamaica, and British Honduras, and thousands mobbed him in Costa Rica and Panama. In addition, he raised funds by selling substantial amounts of BSL stock and raised even greater sums from the gate receipts at his public speeches.

Prior to Garvey’s embarking on his Caribbean tour, his speeches revealed an impressive knowledge of world events and developments on the African continent, especially those that pointed toward an increasing spread of the movement. Examples of the Garvey movement’s impact in Africa appeared in newspaper reports and official correspondence from South Africa and the Belgian Congo (Zaire), as well as in correspondence from UNIA representatives in Liberia. Yet Garvey’s speeches on the eve of his departure also revealed his growing concern about the political consequences of leading a radical movement. American consular officials would later repeatedly deny Garvey’s requests for a visa, lengthening his planned five- week tour to over four months. When Garvey finally returned to New York, in mid-July 1921, his Caribbean experience had given him an even greater appreciation of the level of official antagonism that his movement had provoked.

Perhaps as important as the ever-present threat of increased official repression was the financial crisis that faced the Black Star Line on Garvey’s return. The decisive blow came when negotiations with the United States Shipping Board failed to produce the long-awaited ship for the African transatlantic route. Garvey went before the 1921 UNIA convention without the long-promised Phyllis Wheatley, which many delegates expected to see when they arrived in New York.

Facing these mounting troubles, Garvey announced his intention at the outset of the convention to expose and remove unworthy officials of the movement. A series of important resignations followed, including those of the UNIA assistant president general, Rev. John Dawson Gordon, and the UNIA chaplain general, Rev. George Alexander McGuire. McGuire had played a notable leadership role in the UNIA, and while Garvey was away during the spring of 1921, McGuire wrote two important works for the UNIA, The UniversidNegro Catechism (New York: UNIA, 1921), which drew heavily from the work of J. A. Rogers, and The Universal Negro Ritual (New York: UNIA, 1921).

Garvey also encouraged a freewheeling interrogation of the UNIA's top officials in public sessions of the convention. Garvey himself did not escape criticism, since a number of delegates opposed his methods and ascribed some of the Black Star Line’s troubles to his failures. This was particularly the case with the delegates from the UNIA’s Los Angeles division.

Garvey’s most outspoken challenge at the convention came from the African Blood Brotherhood. The ABB’s leader, Cyril Briggs, had joined the Workers’ party in the spring of 1921. Shortly thereafter, his offers of unity with Garvey and the UNIA became more tinged with criticism, and his ideological differences with the UNIA’s program became more pronounced. Garvey had invited the ABB to send delegates to the 1920 UNIA convention. When he repeated the gesture in 1921, the ABB delegates took the opportunity to raise embarrassing questions about the Black Star Line in convention sessions. Realizing that in 1921 Garvey would not publish official convention news bulletins like those that had appeared during the 1920 convention, Briggs published his own official-looking series of special bulletins, empha-

xccvi

sizing controversies on the convention floor. Five days before the convention ended, Garvey expelled the ABB delegates.

With his Liberian plans in disarray and some of his key assistants removed, Garvey launched an aggressive attack at the convention against those black leaders whom he perceived as opponents of the UNIA. He charged them with misrepresenting the UNIA before the United States government and thereby causing his difficulties in reentering the country. Garvey also initiated a controversial campaign to label these political opponents as advocates of social equality between the races, while offering as an alternative his philosophy of racial purity.

Garvey focused his attacks upon W. E. B. Du Bois, whose Second PanAfrican Congress opened its first session in London during the final days of the 1921 UNIA convention. Throughout the fall of 1920 Du Bois undertook an extensive investigation of Garvey and of the finances of the Black Star Line, and the results were published in a major two-part article in the December 1920 and January 1921 issues of the Crisis, Angered by Du Bois’s criticisms and by what he believed was Du Bois’s excessive influence on United States officialdom, Garvey hoped to discredit Du Bois and his PanAfrican Congress while establishing the UNIA as the sole legitimate vehicle of African redemption, and to neutralize government opposition to his efforts.

The white press began to deepen its coverage of Garveyism during the months immediately after the 1920 convention, and in some cases these publications deviated from the earlier seriocomic approach to the UNIA by examining Garveyism as a major movement contending for support among postwar blacks. A few in-depth reports on the UNIA’s history and objectives appeared as a result. During the same months that Du Bois published his report on the Garvey movement in the Crisis, a white journal, the World’s Work, published a two-part article on the UNIA, an article that pleased Garvey so much, he recommended it to Negro World readers. Between August 1920 and August 1921, articles on Garvey and the UNIA also appeared in Life, Current Opinion, Literary Digest, Independent, World Tomorrow, and Overseas (a British journal).

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EDITORIAL PRINCIPLES AND

PRACTICES

I. Arrangement of Documents

Documents are presented in chronological order according to the date of authorship of the original text. Enclosures and attachments to documents, however, do not appear in strict chronological sequence, but are printed with their original covering documents. Enclosures have been set in italic type in the table of contents for identification.

The publication date of news reports and periodical articles is given on the place and date line within square brackets. In the case of news reports and periodical articles containing the date of original composition, that date chronologically supersedes the date of eventual publication and is printed within double square brackets on the place and date line of the document.

In the case of reported speeches, the date of publication supersedes chronologically the date of original delivery and is printed within single square brackets on the place and date line of the document.

Bureau of Investigation reports that give both the date of composition and the period covered by the report are arranged according to the date of composition.

Documents that lack dates and thus require editorial assignment of dates are placed in normal chronological sequence. When no day within a month appears on a document, it is placed after the documents specifically dated on the latest date within that month. Documents that carry only the date of a year are placed according to the same principle. Documents that cover substantial periods, such as diaries, journals and accounts, will appear according to the date of their earliest entries.

When two or more documents possess the same date, they are arranged with regard to affinity to the subject of the document that immediately precedes them or that which immediately follows them.

THE MARCUS GARVEY AND UNIA PAPERS

II. Form of Presentation

Each document is presented in the following manner:

A. A caption introduces the document and is printed in a type size larger than the text. Letters between individuals are captioned with the names of the individuals and their titles; captions, however, include a person’s office only upon that person’s first appearance. The original titles of published materials are retained with the documents; however, the headlines of some news reports are abbreviated or omitted, in which case this is indicated in the descriptive source note to the document.

B. The text of a document follows the caption. The copy text of letters or reports is taken from recipients’ copies whenever possible, but in the absence of a recipient’s copy, a file copy of the letter or report is used. If the file copy is not available, however, and a retained draft copy of the letter is found, the retained draft copy is used as the basic text.

C. Following the body of the text, an unnumbered descriptive source note describes editorially the physical character of the document by means of appropriate abbreviations. Moreover, a repository symbol gives the provenance of the original manuscript or, if it is rare, printed work. Printed sources are identified in the following manner:

1. A contemporary pamphlet is identified by its full tide, place and date of publication, and the location of the copy used.

2. A contemporary essay, letter, or other kind of statement that appeared originally in a contemporary publication is preceded by the words Printed in …, followed by the title, date, and, in the case of essays, inclusive page numbers of the source of publication.

3. A contemporary printed source reprinted at a later date, the original publication of which has not been found, is identified with the words Reprinted from …, followed by the identification of the work from which the text has been reproduced. The same applies to any originally unpublished manuscript printed at a later date.

D. Numbered textual annotations that explicate the document follow the descriptive source note. The following principles of textual annotation have been applied:

1. Individuals are identified upon their first appearance, with additional information about them sometimes furnished upon their later appearance in a document where such data provide maximum clarification. Pseudonyms are identified, wherever possible, by a textual annotation.

2. Reasons for the assignment of dates to documents or the correction of dates of documents are explained in those instances where important historical information is involved.

EDITORIAL PRINCIPLES AND PRACTICES

3. Obscure allusions in the text are annotated whenever such references can be clarified.

4. Printed works and manuscript materials consulted during the preparation of textual annotations appear in parentheses at the end of each annotation. Frequently used reference works are cited in an abbreviated form, and the complete table may be found in the list of Published Works Cited in the section on Symbols and Abbreviations.

E. Garvey’s appeal case (Marcus Garvey v. United States of America, no. 8317, Ct. App., 2d Cir., 2 February 1925) contains the complete transcript of his original mail fraud trial (United States of America v. Marcus Garvey et al., C31-37 and C33-688, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York, May 1923). Trial documents reprinted in the volume and references to the trial in annotations to documents are taken from the transcript used in the appeal case.

III. Transcription of Text

Manuscripts and printed material have been transcribed from the original text and printed as documents according to the following principles and procedures:

A. Manuscript Material

1. The place and date of composition are placed at the head of the document, regardless of their location in the original, but exceptions are made in the cases of certificates of vital registration and documents in which original letterhead stationery is reproduced. If the place or date of a letter (or both) does not appear in the original text, the information is supplied and printed in italics at the head within square brackets. Likewise, if either the place or date is incomplete, the necessary additional information is supplied in italics within square brackets. Superscript letters are brought down to the line of type, and terminal punctuation is deleted.

In the case of Bureau of Investigation reports that were submitted on printed forms, the place and date are abstracted and placed at the head of each document, while the name of the reporting agent is placed at the end of the document on the signature line.

The formal salutation of letters is placed on the line below the place and date line, with the body of the text following the salutation.

The complimentary close of letters is set continuously with the text in run-in style, regardless of how it was written in the original.

THE MARCUS GARVEY AND UNIA PAPERS

The signature, which is set in capitals and small capitals, is placed at the right-hand margin on the line beneath the text or complimentary close, with titles, where they appear, set in uppercase and lowercase. Terminal punctuation is deleted.

When a file copy of a document bearing no signature is used to establish the text but the signatory is known, the signature is printed in roman type within square brackets.

The inside address, if significant and not repetitive, is printed immediately below the text.

Endorsements, docketings, and other markings appearing on official correspondence, when intelligible, are reproduced in small type following the address, with appropriate identification. In the case of other types of documents, such as private correspondence, endorsements and dockets are reprinted only when they are significant.

Minutes, enclosures, and attachments are printed in roman type following their covering documents and placed after the annotation material of their covering documents. Whenever minutes, enclosures, or attachments are not printed, this fact is always recorded and explained. Whenever a transmission letter originally accompanying an enclosure or attachment is not printed, the omission is noted and the transmission document identified and recorded in the descriptive source note.

2. Printed letterheads and other official stationery are not reproduced, unless they contain significant information, in which case they are reprinted above the date line. In cases where they are not reprinted, they are sometimes abstracted, and the information is placed in the descriptive source note. Printed addresses are reproduced only upon the first appearance.

3. In general, the spelling of all words, including proper names, is preserved as written in the manuscript and printed sources. Thus, personal and place names that are spelled erratically in the original texts are regularized or corrected only in the index. However, serious distortion in the spelling of a word, to such an extent as to obscure its true meaning, is repaired by printing the correct word in italics within square brackets after the incorrect spelling. Mere slips of the pen or typographical errors are corrected within the word and printed in roman type within square brackets; however, some typographical errors that contribute to the overall character of the document are retained.

4. Capitalization is retained as in the original. Words underlined once in a manuscript are printed in italics. Words that are underlined twice or spelled out in large letters or full capitals are printed in small capitals.

EDITORIAL PRINCIPLES AND PRACTICES

5. Punctuation, grammar, and syntax are retained as found in the original texts. In the case of punctuation, corrections that are essential to the accurate reading of the text are provided within square brackets. If, however, a punctuation mark appears in a document as a result of typographical error, it is corrected in square brackets or, in some instances, silently deleted.

6. All contractions and abbreviations in the text are retained. Abbreviations of titles or organizations are identified in a list of abbreviations that appears at the front of the volume. Persons represented by initials only will have their full names spelled out in square brackets after each initial on their first appearance.

7. Superscript letters in the text are lowered and aligned on the line of print.

8. Omissions, mutilations, and illegible words or letters have been rendered through the use of the following textual devices:

a) Blank spaces in a manuscript are shown as [ ]. If the blank

space is of significance or of substantial length, this fact is elaborated upon in a textual annotation.

b) When a word or words in the original text must be omitted from the printed document because of mutilation, illegibility, or omission, the omission is shown by the use of ellipses followed by a word or phrase placed in square brackets in italics, such as: … [rom],… [ilùgibU],… [remainder missing].

c) Missing or illegible letters of words are represented by suspension points within square brackets, the number of points corresponding to the estimated number of letters omitted. The same holds true for missing or illegible digits of numbers.

d) All attempts have been made to supply conjecturally missing items in the printed document, according to the following rules:

(1) if there is no question as to the word, the missing letter is supplied silently;

(2) if the missing letter(s) can only be conjectured, the omission is supplied within square brackets and printed in roman type. Uncertainty of the conjecture, however, is indicated by a question mark within the square brackets in the document.

(3) if the conjectured word(s) is highly uncertain, it has been rendered in italics within the square brackets.

9. Additions and corrections made by the author in the original text have been rendered as follows:

a) Additions between the lines are brought onto the line of type and incorporated into the body of the text within diagonal lines / /.

b) Marginal additions or corrections by the author are also incorporated into the printed document and identified by the words [in the margin] italicized in square brackets. Marginal notes made by

THE MARCUS GARVEY AND UNIA PAPERS

someone other than the author are treated as an endorsement and are printed following the text of the document.

c) Words or groups of words deleted in the original, as in a draft, are restored in the printed document. The -canceled- word or phrase is indicated by canceled type at the place where the deletion occurs in the original text. If a lengthy deletion is illegible, this is indicated by the words [deletion illegible].

B. Printed Material

Contemporary printed material has been treated in the same manner as were original texts and has been transcribed according to the same editorial principles as was manuscript material.

1. In the case of originally published letters, the place and date of composition are uniformly printed on the place and date line of the document, regardless of where they appear in the original, and placed within double square brackets. Those elements that have been editorially supplied are italicized.

2. Newspaper headlines and subheads are printed in small capitals. Headlines are punctuated as they are in the original; however, they are reproduced in the printed document in as few lines as possible. Unless the headline would otherwise become distorted, ornamental lines appearing within the headlines are not retained.

3. Words originally printed in full capitals for emphasis or for other reasons are usually printed in small capitals. Boldfaced type that appears within the text is retained.

4. The signature accompanying a published letter is printed in capitals and small capitals.

5. Obvious typographical errors and errors of punctuation, such as the omission of a single parenthesis or quotation mark, are corrected and printed within square brackets in roman type.

6. In the case of a printed form with spaces to be filled in, the printed words are designated in small capitals, while the handwritten or typewritten insertions are designated in italics with spaces left before and after the small capitals to suggest the blank spaces in the original form.

TEXTUAL DEVICES

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SYMBOLS AND ABBREVIATIONS

Repository Symbols

The original locations of documents that appear in the text and annotations are described by symbols. The guide used for American repositories has been Symbols of American Libraries, eleventh edition (Washington, D.C.: Library of Congress, 1976). Foreign repositories and collections have been assigned symbols that conform to the institutions’ own usage. In some cases, however, it has been necessary to formulate acronyms. Acronyms have been created for private manuscript collections as well.

Repositories

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Manuscript Collection Symbols

SYMBOLS AND ABBREVIATIONS

Descriptive Symbols

The following symbols are used to describe the character of the original documents:

Published Works Cited

Other Symbols and Abbreviations

included are abbreviations that are used generally throughout annotations of the text. Standard abbreviations, such as those for titles and scholastic degrees, are omitted. Abbreviations that are specific to a single annotation appear in parentheses after the initial citation and are used thereafter in the rest of the annotation.

I

SYMBOLS AND ABBREVIATIONS

Monetary Symbols

li

CHRONOLOGY

September 1920-August 1921

CHRONOLOGY

CHRONOLOGY

THE PAPERS

VOLUME III

September 1920-August 1921

Editorial Letter by Marcus Garvey

[[New York, Sept. 1, 1920]]

To the Negro People of the World, Greeting:

We hereby beg to inform you that acting under instructions from the Universal Negro Improvement Association and African Communities League of the World, an international convention of Negroes, representing every country in the world, was called, and said convention was held in New York, United States of America, in sitting from the ist to the 31st of August, 1920.

The purpose of the convention was to elect world leaders for the Negro people of the world. After several weeks of discussion and probing into the merits of the most able representatives of the race, the convention elected the following dignitaries as leaders of the Negro people of the world, and now we have it in authority from the convention to present to you these honorable personages that you may know them and govern yourselves accordingly by their ruling. There has been disputed leadership of the Negro people in all countries heretofore, but through the effort of this international convention the problem of leadership has been settled once and for all, and all Negroes in all parts of the world are requested to obey the rulings and advice given by the following dignitaries according to the authority vested in them.

His Highness, Gabriel Johnson, Potentate of the Universal Negro Improvement Association and African Communities League, was elected world leader, and he shall have under his command all the Negro peoples of the world.

His Highness, G. O. Marke, was elected Supreme Deputy Potentate, and ranks second in authority to His Highness, the Potentate.

The Potentate’s proclamation on all matters pertaining to the race shall be respected by all Negro[e]s of the world.

His Excellency, J. W. [H]. Eason, was elected leader of the fifteen million Negroes of the United States of America, and his command shall be obeyed in all matters pertaining to the race.

His Excellency, Marcus Garvey, was elected Provisional President of Africa, and his ruling on all things African pertaining to a free and independent republic shall be obeyed by all Negroes.

His Excellency, R. H. Tobitt, was elected Leader of the Negroes of the West Indies, Eastern Province, and his command on all things pertaining to the race shall be obeyed by all in those sections.

His Excellency, John Sydney Debourg, was elected Leader of the Negroes of the West Indies, Western Province, South and Central America, and his ruling in all matters pertaining to the race shall be obeyed by those in the section.

The time has come for the race to establish centralized authority in the control of its own affairs and this convention with the power vested in it through its accredited delegates, did elect and inaugurate into office the dignitaries herein mentioned. The following is a list of the Universal Movement for the Redemption of the Negro Race:

His Highness, the Potentate, Leader of the Negro Peoples of the World—GABRIEL JOHNSON.

His Highness, the Supreme Deputy Potentate—G. O. MARKE.

His Excellency, the President General of the Universal Negro Improvement Association and African Communities League— MARCUS GARVEY.

His Excellency, the Provisional President of Africa—MARCUS GARVEY.

His Excellency, Leader of the American Negroes—JAMES w. H. EASON.

His Excellency, Leader of the West Indies, Eastern Province—R. H. TOBITT.

His Excellency, Leader of the West Indies, Western Province—j[OHN] SYDNEY DEBOURG.

Right Hon. Assistant President General—j. D. GORDON.

Right Hon. Secretary General—J. D. BROOKS.

His Honor, The Assistant Secretary General—j. B. YEARWOOD.

Right Hon. High Chancellor—GABRIEL EMANUEL STEWART. Right Hon. Counsel General—WILFORD HORACE SMITH. His Honor, The Assistant Counsel General—WM. c. MATTHEWS.

Right Hon. Auditor General—ELI [E] GARCÍA.

Right Hon. Commissioner General—[F]. WILCOM ELLEGOR.

His Grace, The Chaplain General—GEO. ALEXANDER MCGUIRE, D.D.

Right Hon. International Organizer—HENRIETTA VINTON DAVIS.

Right Hon. Surgeon General—D. D. LEWIS, M.D.

Right Hon. Speaker of the House of Convention—FREDERICK AUGUSTUS TOOTE.

Right Hon. Minister of Legions—CAPT. E. L. GAINES.

These are the only accredited leaders of the Negro peoples of the world as elected by the House of Deputies in convention assembled from August ist to 31st, 1920.

All members of the race will also uphold and give their support to the Declaration of Rights, which is now being published for universal circulation and which is published in another part of this paper. Yours fraternally, MARCUS GARVEY, Chairman of Convention. JAS. D. BROOKS, Secretary

Printed in NW, 11 September 1920. Original