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From the Haitian Revolution to Appomattox: Law, Slavery, and Citizenship in the Atlantic World, 1791–1865

Dr Philip Kaisary

Fulbright Fellowship
£44,117

Philip Kaisary received a Fulbright award for one year, commencing in August 2015 at Vanderbilt University, Tennessee. This project will focus on the constitutionalism of the Haitian Revolution (1791–1804) and the interpretative archive it generated in the United States through 1865. Philip will explore Haiti’s early constitutions in order to examine how the former slaves of St Domingue sought to codify in law their vision of freedom. This project will thereby provide a more complete critical picture of how constitutionalism, nationality, and citizenship figured in the jigsaw puzzle of Haitian, U.S., and Atlantic politics in this period, arguing that the birth of the world’s first black republic generated an enduring ideological inheritance and blazed a radical trail long into the 19th century Atlantic world.