This Week In Black History January 1-7, 2025

Mamie Till-Mobley watches the body of her son, Emmett, being lowered into his grave. Robert Abbott Sengstacke/Getty Images JANUARY 1 1804—Jean Jacques Dessalines pro­claims the independence of Haiti from France. The island nation, after the United States, becomes the second independent republic in the Western Hemisphere. The chief slogan of his in­dependence speech was “Live free or die.” The Haitian war of independence had actually begun in August of 1791. The leader and greatest hero of that war was a former slave who worked as a car­riage driver—Toussaint L’Ouverture. As a general, L’Ouverture was comparable to, and in some respects superior to, Amer­ica’s George Washington and France’s Napoleon Bonaparte. However, under the ruse of discussing peace, L’Ouver­ture was tricked into traveling to France where he died in prison in April of 1803. The Haitians nevertheless prevailed over the French under the leadership of Des­salines and he was able to declare inde­pendence on this day in 1804. 1854—Lincoln University becomes one of the first institutions of higher learning for Blacks in America when it is incorpo­rated as Ashmun Institute in Oxford, Pa., on this day in 1854. 1863—The Emancipation Proclamation becomes law. Like many of the pro-Black measures taken by President...