In Toussaint’s Clause: The Founding Fathers and the Haitian Revolution, former ambassador Gordon Brown relates how America’s early leaders and their diplomatic representatives dealt with the politically sensitive issue of the 1790–1810 slave rebellion in Haiti led by Toussaint L’Ouverture. Founding fathers George Washington, John Adams, Alexander Hamilton, Thomas Jefferson, and James Madison struggled with the dilemma of how to protect America’s highly profitable trade with the rich French colony while ensuring America’s national security and maintaining its beneficial position of neutrality among the warring European powers. Southern slaveholders eyed the revolution with fear and eventually obtained a reversal of the initially bold policy of intervention that had favored the rebels.

Brown’s well-researched and lively account tells how the issue of Haiti rapidly became a lightning rod in America’s increasingly fierce partisan politics. Questions addressed include:

• How did the Founding Fathers view the black-led revolt in Haiti?
• What brought about the U.S. Navy’s intervention in Haiti’s civil war?
• How did the Haitians’ struggle help America purchase the Louisiana Territory?

Brown details the debates and the diplomacy of this crisis and the sometimes rancorous struggle between America’s early leaders. A misstep could have plunged the weak, new American republic into the maelstrom of the international struggle.