1862-00-00: (The United States Finally Grants Haiti Diplomatic Recognition, Fifty-Eight Years After Independence, the Slaveholding States Having Seceded and …

1862-00-00: (The United States Finally Grants Haiti Diplomatic Recognition, Fifty-Eight Years After Independence, the Slaveholding States Having Seceded and Removed the Political Obstacle That Had Blocked Recognition Since Jefferson): In 1862, the United States finally granted Haiti diplomatic recognition, fifty-eight years after Dessalines had proclaimed independence at Gonaïves. The recognition was made possible by the American Civil War: eleven slaveholding southern states had seceded from the Union, and with them gone, the political bloc that had blocked recognition since Thomas Jefferson refused it in 1804 no longer controlled the Senate. The recognition was not an act of moral awakening. It was a strategic calculation by the Lincoln administration, which needed Caribbean allies and could no longer afford to let the slaveholders’ veto determine American foreign policy. Geffrard welcomed the development and allowed the Union Navy’s West Indian Squadron to use Cap-Haïtien as its headquarters for the duration of the war. The United States sent Ebenezer Bassett, one of the first African American diplomats, to serve as ambassador to Haiti in 1869. The relationship between the two nations, born of strategic convenience rather than genuine respect, would remain defined by American condescension and Haitian vulnerability for the next century and a half.