I Am For The Whites Because I Am White

Truguet: ‘It would at any rate be best to postpone the plan; the moment is unfavourable.’

The First Consul objected to the adjournment, and added: ‘People suppose that the colonists are on the side of the English; but I can say that at Martinque there are the best-disposed citizens. The partisans of the English are well known; they are far from numerous. So when they sent M. Dubuc here, they wrote to inform me that he was a friend of the English. The agents of the Government have been received with the greatest enthusiasm by the inhabitants.’

Truguet: ‘Not by the greater number.’

The First Consul (growing warm): ‘See how things are misrepresented! There are persons who are determined to find only partisans of the English in the colonies, in order that they may have a pretext to oppress them. Well, Mr. Truguet, if you had come into Egypt to preach up the freedom of the negroes or Arabs, we should have hung you up at the mast-head. It has been so contrived, that all the whites should be delivered over to the ferocity of the blacks, and yet it is thought strange that they should be dissatisfied. Well then, had I been at Martinique, I should also have been on the side of the English, because above all things it is necessary to save one’s life. I am for the whites, because I am white; I have no other reason, yet that is reason good enough. How was it possible to grant liberty to the Africans, to men without any kind of civilization, who did not even know what a colony meant, or that there was such a place as France? It is quite evident, that those who proposed the emancipation of the blacks must wish for the slavery of the whites; but after all, do you suppose that if the majority of the Convention had seen what they were doing and been acquainted with the colonies, they would have persisted in granting freedom to the negroes? Doubtless not; but few persons were in a situation to foresee the consequences at the time, and a sentiment of humanity always appeals powerfully to the imagination. But at present, for anyone to persist in these principles, is to shew a want of good faith; it is mere pride and hypocrisy. Without going so far, would you have consented, would you have suffered, that the French should have been brought in subjection to the Italians, to the Piedmontese? We might have been well treated; they might have made of us what the blacks have made of the whites. We have been obliged, on the contrary, to take strong measures of precaution, and to keep them in a state of dependence; and even had it been necessary to let all Italy perish or sacrifice two soldiers of my army, I would have let all Italy perish; because before all things, I am of my army and for my army. To this day even it is necessary to have an eye on that country; nevertheless they are whites like us, a civilized people, and our neighbours.’

-excerpted from “Life of Napoleon Bonaparte, V.2” by William Hazlitt (1829)