>>2672111It's true that Haiti had a revolutionnary movement that started before the French Revolution, so yes, in that view, saying that it's merely an extension is generally ignorant of historical reality.
But it's also obvious that the form the revolution took was inspired by the French one. For exemple the revolutionnaries argued in favor of equality between all men based on the Declaration of the right of Men and Citizen, that the national assembly has expicitly rejected for Black Haitians.
So, when they rebelled in 1791, the Haitians were not asking for independance, but an end to slavery. They supported Louis XVI, who they viewed a moderating force against the relatively harsher local governor. This believed this because Louis XVI has signed on and accepted many of the revolutionnary demands, including the creation of a constitutional monarchy, he was viewed at the time as a progressive monarch. (He was secrely conspiring to bring back absolutism, but Haitians didn't know this) This meant that they were backing the revolution, not the reaction. While when Louis XVI got his head chopped up, the white owners sided with the British against the Republic. Louverture did help the Spanish at the time tho, as he yet didn't trust the French.
But once the revolution in France radicalised further, with Robespierre and the Jacobins in charge, they abolished slavery and Louveture realigned himself with France and refused to proclaim the independance of Haiti, instead seeing himself as a french citizen. It's only in 1801, so at the start of Napoleon's consulate, that he declared independance.
Even then, he justified himself using the univerallist principles of the French revolution, and he obviously turned against it when it was going back against those ideals.
I don't get why you're quoting CLR James at me, his most famous book is called "The Black Jacobins" And if anything he criticises the race war representation of the conflict, and puts the revolution back in the context of the Atlantic and French revolutions. If anything, he argues that the Haitians better represented those ideals then the French did. Not that these ideals came from Haiti.