At the end of the Civil War, Henry Garnet expressed his disappointment at what he considered to be premature celebrations of the end of slavery. Rev. Garnet urged abolitionists to retool their anti-slavery organizations to fight slavery’s continuing existence in nations such as Cuba and Brazil. At the height of Reconstruction, Garnet insisted that African Americans tie their struggles for the passage of equal-rights legislation with the Cuban liberation struggle against Spanish rule. In 1872, the popular minister helped to organize the Cuban Anti-Slavery Committee, which formed branches throughout Florida, Louisiana, New York, California and other states. The committee launched a national movement to demand that the United States extend support to the Cuban patriots fighting for independence from the Spanish Empire.
At a mass meeting held in Philadelphia in 1877, Rev. Garnet expounded on the theme that the work of slavery abolitionism was incomplete. “If the veteran abolitionists of the United States had not mustered themselves out of service,” he argued, “I believe that there would not now have been a single slave in the Island of Cuba.” Rev. Garnet continued, “We sympathize with the patriot of Cuba not simply because they are Republicans, but because their triumph will be the destruction of slavery in that land.” Cuban liberation leaders, including the great general Antonio Maceo, met with Garnet and other African American activists to form an international coalition that dramatically expanded the meaning of emancipation.
Before a standing-room only memorial service held at the Great Hall of the Cooper Union in New York City, Garnet’s compatriots in the Anti-Slavery Society observed, “Having personally experienced the woes of the down-trodden of his race, he seemed all the better fitted to sympathize with the down-trodden and afflicted in every clime…”
And yet the strength and breadth of Garnet’s advocacy helped contribute to his later obscurity. His urgings of insurrection before the war had frightened the mainstream of the abolitionist movement. And later, American historians tended focus on domestic issues during the Reconstruction period, viewing that time as a “national event,” rather than the international solidarity work he did. That view has led many to miss the way Garnet connected African American citizenship with the emancipation of people in other nations, and to gloss over the role he played.