By OSWALD T. BROWN
WASHINGTON, D.C., June 20, 2022 – By Bahamian ethnic standards Henry Milton Taylor, William “Bill” Cartwright and Cyril St. John Stevenson – the three founders of the Progressive Liberal Party (PLP), the first organized political party in The Bahamas – could have passed for white, had they chosen to do so. However, although racism was as entrenched and rigidly enforced in The Bahamas in 1953 when the PLP was founded, Taylor and Stevenson never pretended to be white, even though at times Cartwright seemed to struggle with his racial identity.
Several years before Taylor, Stevenson and Cartwright established the PLP, a group of prominent Black Bahamians took a stand against members of the white minority population who legislatively governed The Bahamas – under the colonial rule of Great Britain – with policies akin to the racist rules white plantation owners imposed on their slaves when slavery was sanctioned by law in the United States
The Citizens’ Committee was formed in 1950 after the government of the day refused to allow the movie “No Way Out,” in which Bahamian actor Sidney Poitier made his movie acting debut. Poitier gave a riveting performance as a doctor who becomes involved in a racially controversial issue that sparks a race riot, and the government of the day initially banned “No Way Out” from being shown in theatres in The Bahamas.
Headed by Maxwell Thompson, who had an iconic legal career as a Magistrate, the Citizens’ Committee included a number of other prominent black Bahamians such as Dr. Cleveland Eneas, Kendal Isaacs, Randol Fawkes, Leon McKinney, and H.W. Brown. Because of their agitation, the political power structure relented, and “No Way Out” was eventually shown in theatres in Nassau.
The Citizens Committee continued to agitate for social and political change and although not all of them got involved in front-line politics, individually they made tremendous contributions in the political arena.
Incidentally, because of the racist policies that existed at the time, movies were first screened for one week at the segregated whites-only Savoy Theatre on Bay Street before being sent Over-The-Hill to be shown at the Capitol Theatre, Cinema Theatre and the Paul Meeres Theatre. Following a series of demonstrations, however, the Savoy Theatre was integrated in 1962.
Doing my research for this article on the early years of the PLP, my journalistic mentor Sir Arthur Foulkes—who was a member of National Committee for Positive Action (NCPA), an activist group in the PLP – was an extremely valuably source of information. I had planned to quote extensively from an article he wrote in January of 1999, when he was Bahamas High Commissioner in London, in response to a column written by our friend P. Anthony White in The PUNCH, but while reading his brilliantly crafted, historically accurate journalistic masterpiece, I decided that it would be a travesty to just refer to portions of it, so I have decided to run it in its entirety under his byline and with the headline that he used when he sent it to the media. Here it is:
SETTING THE RECORD STRAIGHT ABOUT
SIR STAFFORD, SIR HENRY AND THE NCPA
By ARTHUR A. FOULKES
LONDON, England — The issue of The Punch dated 18 January 1999 carries a piece by my friend P. Anthony White headed “Glimpses of the real roots of revolution” in which he makes certain comments about Sir Stafford Sands, Sir Henry Taylor and the National Committee for Positive Action. When I read it my mind turned immediately to George Orwell’s famous novel Nineteen Eighty-Four and the quotation: “Who controls the past controls the future; who controls the present controls the past.”
In 1949 Orwell imagined a totalitarian government of 1984 which rewrote history on a daily basis to suit the vacillating policies of the regime. All of which was watched over by Big Brother to ensure that no-one should interfere with his controllers of history. Fortunately, in our democratic Bahamas at the end of the twentieth century there is no Big Brother, so controlled versions of history can be effectively challenged.
Mr. White launches an attack on the NCPA saying that it “was not simply a youth arm of the party but a deliberate weapon of destruction for the likes of Taylor and Stevenson” and that “the NCPA was an evil and malicious orchestration which, upon reflection, did more to harm racial and political relations than any other grouping before or since.”
These statements amount to a gross misrepresentation. The NCPA, of which I was a member, was not a “youth arm” of the PLP nor was it organized to destroy anybody, nor was it racist. It was formed to fight a cause.
Mr. White makes the false assertion that Sir Stafford “wisely recognized that racial separation could easily be ruinous to the Bahamian economy.” Sir Stafford’s view was precisely the opposite. His position was that to allow black Bahamians and black foreign visitors into the hotels as guests or patrons would chase away white visitors and bring ruin to our tourist trade!
Not only were black Bahamians not allowed in hotels, they were barred from certain Bay Street restaurants and a movie house. Discrimination in these places came to a crashing end in 1956 as a result of the historic anti-discrimination resolution moved by Sir Etienne Dupuch in the House of Assembly. But Sir Stafford remained in power and remained racist.
Up until his defeat on 10 January 1967 he showed not the slightest intention of repudiating his racist policies with its vicious and demeaning propaganda principally, but not exclusively, in The Nassau Guardian. Witness Pete Knaur, a Guardian reporter whose infamous Knaur Report was mentioned recently in the press, and the pseudonymous propagandist Dinghy Joe, who was particularly nasty in his attacks on Sir Henry.
MODERATE WHITES
There were white Bahamians in the ruling group who urged upon Sir Stafford restraint and reform and who on occasion even openly opposed him. Among them were Sir Roland Symonette, Donald McKinney, Dr. Raymond Sawyer, Basil Kelly, Geoffrey Johnstone and the wise and generous Sir George Roberts.
Sir Stafford never listened to the voices of moderation in own party. His response to demands for female suffrage was that women would get the vote “over my dead body”. But there was one power greater than Sir Stafford. The British Government appointed him Leader for the Government in the House and forced him to introduce the bill which allowed Bahamian women to vote for the first time in the 1962 general elections.
I recall another historic incident. The front page lead story in Bahamian Times of 29 January 1966 is headed “Conflict Splits UBP Government”. There is a picture of Sir Roland with the caption “… objections unheeded” and one of Sir Stafford with the caption “… with majority”.
Sir Stafford had arranged with the Mafia in 1965 to introduce Las Vegas-style casino gambling to the Bahamas and had exposed the country to the first great political scandal in its modern history. The story of Sir Stafford’s one million dollars in “legal fees” for this dirty deal got intense media attention on both sides of the Atlantic and contributed to the defeat of the UBP in 1967. Sir Stafford was not only racist, he was also corrupt.
But the point of this story is that the Premier, as Sir Roland was at the time, was either not consulted or not heeded by his arrogant and powerful Minister, Sir Stafford. He could not dismiss his Minister who had a majority in the party so Sir Roland stunned the community by attending a prayer meeting on the Western Esplanade to demonstrate against the gambling deal!
Mr. White says that Sir Stafford “knew that Europeans, so soon released from racist Hitlerism, had little tolerance for bigotry in any of its forms.” What Europeans is he talking about?
Not Sir Winston Churchill who referred to Mahatma Gandhi as “a half-naked kaffir” and declared that he was not made His Majesty’s Chief Minister to preside over the dissolution of the Empire!
Not Field Marshall Bernard Montgomery who described Africans as half-savages!
Not those who greeted West Indians – who had fought for Britain and who went back to Britain to help rebuild the Mother Country – with signs of “No Irish, no dogs, no niggers”!
Not British politician Enoch Powell who was so bothered by the growing number of West Indians in England that he was moved to make his infamous “Rivers of Blood” speech!
Up to this very day that romanticized view of a Europe which learned its lesson from Hitler simply – and sadly – does not exist.
THE DILEMMA
Mr. White suggests that “a sensible compromise” to “the impending dilemma” was being contemplated by Sir Stafford and Sir Henry. What “impending” dilemma is he talking about? The country was already in a dilemma. I described it this way in Bahamian Times 18 December 1965 (typographically misdated November):
“Even if the electoral system were perfect (and heaven knows it is far from that) there would still be something radically wrong in a country which elects its minority group as an overwhelming majority in government.”
The idea of Sir Stafford and Sir Henry – two great Bahamian leaders – locked away in a hotel room in London working out a sensible compromise for the nation is simply not factual. The sad truth is that Sir Henry was not in London seeking a sensible compromise, he was being compromised by Sir Stafford.
Henry Milton Taylor was a great Bahamian. In 1949 he ran for a House of Assembly seat in Long Island and campaigned against the Bay Street Boys — with all their power and money – on a bicycle. And he won.
Then Sir Henry and others whom Mr. White describes as “near-white” got together in 1953 to form the Progressive Liberal Party. The flamboyant and charming Cyril St. John Stevenson, who was later described by Rene MacColl in The Daily Express as “floridly handsome”, took over The Nassau Herald after the death of its equally flamboyant editor, J. Stanley Lowe, and The Herald became the mouthpiece of the fledgling political party.
But it was Sir Henry who carried out, almost single-handedly at first, the organization of the PLP in the out islands. I was with The Tribune during those years and frequently after work visited Sir Henry’s house on Shirley Street to talk and to run off circular letters on his old manual Gestetner.
Sir Henry had a personality of almost childlike simplicity and was undoubtedly a very sincere person. Despite our widening political differences my affection for him never wavered. I spent some delightful hours with him before he retired to Long Island. We talked about the “old days”, of course, but at that time he seemed more interested in discussing some three or four manuscripts for books he had written but not yet published.
NCPA ENCOURAGED
The NCPA was formally recognized by the PLP in 1959 when Warren Levarity and I were elected as the group’s first official representatives on the National General Council. Others were already in the NGC in other capacities. We had been encouraged by Sir Henry and others including an Englishman by the name of Johnny Purkiss. (His friends will be delighted to know that Mr. Purkiss is alive and well in Britain).
Some in the party thought we should take to the streets but the nearest we came to that was in staging a small demonstration at the arrival in Nassau of President John F. Kennedy in 1962. Instead, we took to thinking – and reading – and we helped to develop the PLP into an instrument of political fulfillment for the Bahamian majority.
I am proud of the contribution my colleagues and I were permitted to make to that historic process. Those who out of conviction opposed us, I respect. Those who had conviction but lacked the courage to join us missed a great moment in history.
Mr. White mentions that Sir Stafford had bought Sir Henry a few new suits for his London trip and says that “many of the younger PLP blacks were resentful to how well Taylor seemed to be getting along with Bay Street”.
He fails utterly to comprehend the commitment, the spirit of sacrifice and the passion which motivated the group he now seeks to misrepresent. We were not interested in compromising with an uncompromisingly racist and corrupt regime. Neither were we interested in converting them to better ways.
In our study of the Westminster parliamentary system of government we found nothing to point us in that direction. But we found plenty to suggest that if you did not like your government you had every right to work for its defeat at the polls.
To achieve this we vigorously supported the leadership of Sir Lynden Pindling. He was the first prominent black professional to join the PLP immediately upon his return from Britain in 1953 and we shared with him the belief that the UBP could be defeated within the system. We did not see the PLP as a pressure group nor as an instrument of compromise. We saw it as the next government, the majority government of the Bahamas.
SIR CECIL CALLS
Sir Stafford, in plotting to compromise Sir Henry, was motivated by nothing more than delaying that inevitability. The PLP had ushered in party politics and some of us felt that for PLP politicians to serve on government boards was quite inconsistent. But Sir Henry accepted Sir Stafford’s appointment to the Advisory Committee to the Development Board and took the London trip.
Sir Cecil Wallace Whitfield, who was in London reading law at the time, called us in Nassau on behalf of Bahamian students who were associated with our group and who had visited Sir Henry at his hotel. They were so disturbed that they demanded one of us come to London and that assignment fell to Sir Clement Maynard who was able to fly at concessionary rates.
I was the first to bring all of this to the attention of our supporters and to take public issue with Sir Henry in a speech on the Southern Recreation Grounds. Incidentally, as soon as Sir Cecil had qualified as a lawyer, Sir Stafford offered him a job in his chambers! Sir Cecil declined the offer.
Before my friend attempts again to broach the history of the NCPA I would advise him to talk with people who are happily still alive and who can help him with the truth: Jeffrey M. Thompson, Warren Levarity, A. Loftus Roker, Dr. Eugene Newry, Father Anthony Roberts, Sir Clement Maynard, Perry Christie and many others.
I believe that the vast majority of Bahamians – black and white – really do not harbour racial animosities. We have a golden opportunity to build a truly democratic and humane society based not on accidents like colour, ethnic origin and gender but on being Bahamian. We should be grateful to God for the chance to do this in such a rich and beautiful country. To accomplish this noble mission we need not lie about our history and we need even less to fight ancient battles all over again. London, January 1999
