Just before the United Negro Improvement
Association (UNIA) Conference opened Marcus Garvey delivered a speech in
Madison Square Garden in August 1920. The militant black nationalist
who had created the UNIA in 1914 openly supported the Irish Republican
Army and their large scale guerilla war that had claimed the lived
of hundreds of British soldiers. In recognizing Eamon de Valera as the
president of the Irish Republic he broke ranks with the governmnet of the
United States which was not prepared to recognize
de Valera.
Think about the following
quote. How can you assess Marcus Garvey's strategy for the UNIA?
How does the quote show that Garvey influenced others, or was possibly
influenced by others. How does your conclusion
increase your knowledge of "enduring
issues?"
"... a few weeks later, Garvey was
interviewed by journalist Charles Mowbray White on his hopes for the UNIA.
Garvey told Mowbray he had already proposed that the organisations's colours
should be red, black and green.. "Garvey said red because of sympathy with
the "Reds of the World", and the Green their sympathy for the Irish in
their fight for freedom, and the Black- [for] the Negro' expalined White."