AMISTAD MUTINY

In 1839 a group of Africans were KIDNAPPED from their homeland and transported to Cuba as slaves.While being transported from one port
in Cuba to another, the Africans revolted, killed
the captain and cook, and steered for the coast of
Africa. The ship was eventually boarded by U.S.
authorities in U.S. waters, and the Africans were
imprisoned. Fierce legal battles ensued regard-
ing entitlement to the Africans and the ship’s
cargo. In 1997 Steven Spielberg’s company,
DreamWorks, released a movie based upon the
uprising. The movie Amistad engendered its
own legal furor amid charges that the screenplay
plagiarized a 1989 novel.
The Ship and Slavery
In April 1839 a Spanish slaving brig with
kidnapped Africans aboard sailed from the West
African coast to Havana, Cuba. Jose Ruiz, a
Spaniard living in Puerto Principe, Cuba,
bought 49 males for $450 each. Another Spanish
planter living nearby, Pedro Montes, bought
four children, including three girls. In late June
1839 the ship Amistad sailed from Havana to
Puerto Principe. On the third night out, two
Africans named Cinque and Grabeau managed
to free and arm themselves.During the uprising,
the captain and cook were killed, but Ruiz and
Montes were spared and forced to assist in navi-
gation. The Amistad sailed east toward Africa by
day, but at night Montes and Ruiz steered the
ship north.
On August 26, 1839, the ship anchored off
Long Island and was discovered by the U.S. brig
Washington. The vessel, the cargo, and the
Africans were taken into the District of Con-
necticut.
Montes and Ruiz filed suit in federal court to
recover some of the cargo and the Africans,
asserting ownership of the Africans as their
slaves. The U.S. district attorney for the District
of Connecticut appeared on behalf of the Span-
ish government and demanded that the Africans
be handed over for trial in Cuba on murder and
PIRACY charges.
Rallying on behalf of the Africans, New York
abolitionists hired attorney Roger Sherman
Baldwin. Baldwin argued that because Spain had outlawed the African slave trade, the Africans could use whatever means possible to attainfreedom after their illegal kidnapping andenslavement. The abolitionists sought a writ ofHABEAS CORPUS relief to free the Africans pendingcharges of piracy or murder that might bebrought. The writ was denied and the Africansremained in custody but were not indicted onany criminal charges.The trial proceeded in the U.S. district courtof New Haven, Connecticut, with the litigantsdisputing what should be done with theAfricans, the cargo, and the ship. Anticipatingthat U.S. District Judge Andrew Judson wouldorder the Africans turned over for criminal proceedingsin Cuba, President MARTIN VAN BURENordered that the U.S.S. Grampus wait in the NewHaven harbor to transport the Africans to Cubaimmediately upon such a ruling.The U.S.S. Grampus waited in vain. JudgeJudson ordered that the kidnapping andenslavement had been illegal and that the UnitedStates must return the Africans to their homeland.The United States, now acting on behalf ofthe Spanish government and the claims ofMontes and Ruiz, appealed to the U.S. circuitcourt, where Judge Judson’s ruling was upheld.The United States appealed again, to the U.S.Supreme Court.JOHN QUINCY ADAMS, a member of the U.S.House of Representatives on behalf of Massachusetts,former U.S. president, and sympatheticto the abolitionist movement, joined Baldwin inrepresenting the Africans before the SupremeCourt. Adams and Baldwin contended that theAfricans should be granted their freedombecause they had exercised their natural rightsin fighting to escape illegal enslavement. TheU.S. Supreme Court opinion, delivered by JusticeJOSEPH STORY, affirmed the rulings by thelower courts, but instead of ordering the UnitedStates to return the Africans to Africa, declaredthem to be free and ordered them to be immediatelydischarged from custody (United States v.Amistad, 40 U.S. [15 Pet.] 518, 10 L. Ed. 826[1841]).While the Amistad case essentially presentedquestions of INTERNATIONAL LAW and did notinvolve any legal attacks on U.S. SLAVERY, it wasimportant in U.S. history because of the attentionand support it garnered for the abolitionistmovement.The Movie and PlagiarismThe 1997 movie by Steven Spielberg and hiscompany, DreamWorks SKG, is a fictitious renderingof the real events that ensued between 1839 and 1841. But before the movie wasreleased, an author who had written a historicalnovel about the uprising attempted to halt thefilm’s release, charging the moviemakers withCOPYRIGHT infringement. Filing suit in October1997, Barbara Chase-Riboud sought $10 millionin damages and screenwriting ACKNOWLEDGMENT,based upon alleged PLAGIARISM of hernovel, Echo of Lions. In December, a federal districtjudge declined to delay the movie’s opening,ruling that the similarities between themovie and the novel did not establish a probabilityof success for Chase-Riboud but did raiseserious questions for trial.The plagiarism suit took a strange turn inDecember 1997 when the New York Timesreported that Chase-Riboud had plagiarized severalpassages of her 1986 book, Valide: A Novel ofthe Harem, from a nonfiction book published 50years earlier. Chase-Riboud admitted to the NewYork Times that she had used material for Validewithout attribution. DreamWorks also chargedthat Chase-Riboud had taken passages for Echoof Lions from a 1953 novel, Slave Rebellion, byWilliam A. Owens, the book optioned by Amistad producers for the movie.In early 1998 Chase-Riboud and Dream-Works settled the lawsuit for an undisclosedamount. In dropping the lawsuit, Chase-Riboudstated that she and her attorneys had concludedthat neither Spielberg nor DreamWorks haddone anything improper.

AMISTAD MUTINY

AMISTAD MUTINY

AMISTAD MUTINY

Posted on October 23, 2010 by admin

AMISTAD MUTINY

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