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MARCUS GARVE Y Marcus Mosiah Garve y was born in St. Ann's Bay, Jamaica, on 1 7 August 1887, th e younges t o f eleve n children . A perio d o f foreig n travel , observation, an d readin g (1909-14 ) le d hi m o n hi s retur n t o Jamaic a t o found th e Universal Negro Improvement Association, whose goal was "the general uplif t o f th e Negr o people s o f th e world," and whose motto was "One God! On e Aim! On e Destiny!" Makin g little headway at home, he moved t o Ne w York's Harle m i n 191 6 and foun d fertil e groun d fo r a n unprecedented blac k mas s movement . Branche s o f hi s U.N.I. A aros e around the country, and he raised more money than any other black person before o r since . Wit h hi s steamshi p company , th e Black Star Line, h e instilled racial pride. Garvey wa s convicte d o f mai l frau d i n 1925 . Presiden t Coolidg e commuted hi s five-yea r sentenc e i n 192 7 an d ordere d hi s deportation . Finding too much opposition to his endeavors in Jamaica, he spent the last five years of his life in relative obscurity in London, where he died on 1 0 June 1940. Bu t his decade in the United States had anticipated the modern Black Power movement by a half century. A Not e on Marcu s Garve y at Harvar d JOHN M . FITZGERALD AN D OTE Y M . SCRUGG S The standar d interpretatio n o f relation s betwee n Marcu s Garvey' s black zionism and the black intelligentsia i s that the y were antagonis tic .1 Doe s i t follow , however , tha t becaus e fe w blac k intellectual s 1 See, for example, Tony Martin, Race First: The Ideological and Organizational Struggles of Marcus Garvey and the Universal Negro Improvement Association (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1976), esp. chap. 11. Th e book is in many ways an excellent study of the Garvey movement. 190 Marcus Garvey joined Garve y that most opposed him ? O r that because a handful o f middle class blacks prominen t amon g socialists o r i n th e N.A.A.C.P . seem to have played an important role in Garvey's downfall that mos t blacks—middle class included—believed that "Garvey must go"? Large r questions obtrude themselves here. Ho w wide, after all , is the chasm between blac k nationalis m an d th e struggle fo r ful l citizenshi p right s in America ? Di d no t Garve y an d non-Garveyite s shar e th e sam e compelling desire for human dignity, especially in their condemnatio n of the treatmen t accorde d black s by whites an d in a similar desire t o advance th e interest s o f th e blac k group ? Perhap s a little-know n incident o f over a half-century ag o might help bring these issues into clearer focus . On a sprin g evenin g i n 1922, * a t th e heigh t o f hi s powe r an d influence, Marcu s Garve y cam e t o a Harvar d Universit y whic h wa s racially segregated in nearly all respects save the classroom. H e cam e to addres s th e Nile Club, a group compose d o f al l the several doze n black student s i n th e university . Followin g dinne r i n th e Harvar d Union, th e charismati c gues t o f hono r spok e a t lengt h t o th e assembled students of his program for the worldwide emancipation of the Negr o throug h th e developmen t o f racia l unit y and blac k pride . The meetin g laste d wel l int o th e evening , a good dea l o f tim e bein g devoted b y th e dynami c blac k leade r i n respondin g t o students ' questions. O f especial interes t bot h t o Garve y and th e...

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