GARVEY, MARCUS MOZIAH
Marcus Garvey was a charismatic leader who preached black pride and economic self-sufficiency. He is internationally recognized as the organizer of the first significant movement of black nationalism in the United States.
Marcus Moziah Garvey was born on August 17, 1887, in St. Ann’s Bay, Jamaica, to Marcus
Moziah Garvey, a stonemason, and Sarah Jane Richards, a domestic and farmer. He and his sister Indiana were the only two of the eleven Garvey offspring to reach adulthood. As a child, he used his father’s extensive library to educate himself. When Garvey was 14, he went to work as a printer’s apprentice. In 1908, he participated in the country’s first Printers Union strike; when
the strike failed, the union disbanded. Because
he had been one of the strike leaders, Garvey
found himself blacklisted. He began working at
the GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE and briefly
published his own small journal, Garvey’s
Watchman. Garvey then traveled through Central
America and lived in London from 1912 to
1914, where he attended Birkbeck College. During
this period he was exposed to the problems
engendered by RACIAL DISCRIMINATION and
first began to think about ways to help black
persons become economically self-sufficient.
Garvey returned to Jamaica in 1914 and
established the Universal Negro Improvement
Association (UNIA). He cofounded the UNIA
with Amy Ashwood, who was the association’s
first secretary, and who would later become Garvey’s
first wife.At the time, most of Africa’s countries
were colonies under the domination of
European nations. The purpose of the UNIA,
whose motto was “One God, One Aim, One Destiny,”
was to promote black nationalism throughout
the world by establishing an African country
where blacks would run their own government.
In 1916, Garvey moved to the United States
and toured the country, espousing the Back-to-
Africa movement. In 1917, he started a chapter
of UNIA in New York City, setting up headquarters
in Harlem. To build economic self-reliance,
the UNIA started several businesses including
the Negro Factories Corporation (NFC) and a
steamship company called the Black Star Line.
Garvey also began publishing the Negro World,
in 1918, a journal that advocated his ideas for
African nationalism and served as the voice of
the UNIA.
Around this same time, the UNIA achieved
one of its most ambitious goals—it reached an
agreement with the African nation of Liberia to
make land available for black people who would
come to that country from the United States and
the Caribbean, as well as from countries in Central
and South America. In Garvey’s view,
Liberia would be a beacon of hope drawing new
groups of settlers who would create their own
culture and civilization.
In 1920, the UNIA held its first international
convention at Madison Square Garden in New
York City, during which Garvey laid out his
plans for an African nation-state. The association
adopted a constitution, a Declaration of
Rights of the Negro Peoples of the World, as well
as a national flag. The UNIA also elected officials
for its provisional government, with Garvey
serving as Provisional President of Africa.
By the early 1920s, the UNIA developed an
ardent following, with 700 branches in 38 states
and more than 2 million members. The association
drew adherents not only from the United
States, but also from Canada, Caribbean countries,
and throughout the African continent. A
consummate showman, Garvey loved to put on
parades and street celebrations in Harlem where
he and other members of the UNIA “nobility”
appeared in elaborate military uniforms, along
with banners and vividly decorated automobiles.
From the outset, however, Garvey ran into
opposition from both whites who were frightened
at the idea of black solidarity and blacks
who viewed INTEGRATION into the American
mainstream as the key to progress.
Before the UNIA could move forward with
its resettlement plans, problems began to
mount. The Liberian government withdrew its
approval for repatriating the new settlers. In
1922, Garvey was convicted for MAIL FRAUD
concerning the Black Star Line and, in 1925, he was jailed in Atlanta, Georgia. In 1927, President
CALVIN COOLIDGE commuted Garvey’s five-year
sentence. Garvey was labeled an undesirable
alien and deported to Jamaica.
In 1929, Garvey toured Canada and Europe
giving lectures. In 1930, he ran in the general
election for a seat in Jamaica’s legislature, but
was defeated. Further attempts to launch a
newspaper and a magazine met with failure as
did his creation of an organization that was supposed
to provide job opportunities for the
poverty-stricken rural inhabitants of Jamaica.
In 1935, Garvey moved to England. He continued
to hold UNIA conventions and to make
speeches to dwindling numbers of people. Garvey
died in London on June 10, 1940. Although
Garvey was mostly ignored toward the end of
his life, his dedication to black pride and selfsufficiency
made him a national hero in Jamaica.
Garvey and his movement were celebrated in the
music of such reggae stars as Bob Marley and
Burning Spear. Adherents of the BLACK POWER
MOVEMENT of the 1960s acknowledged their
debt to Garvey’s nationalist crusade as did
blacks fighting for independence from colonial
rule in Africa. As of 2002, the UNIA still functioned
with Garvey’s son, Marcus Garvey Jr., as
president.
FURTHER READINGS
Cronon, Edmund, and John Hope Franklin. 1969. Black
Moses: The Story of Marcus Garvey and the Universal
Negro Improvement Association. 2d ed. Madison: Univ.
of Wisconsin Press.
Jacques-Garvey, Amy, ed. 1992. Philosophy and Opinions of
Marcus Garvey. New York: Atheneum.
Marcus Garvey Library. Available online at
