The Amistad Case in Fact and Film Most seriously, Amistad presents a highly misleading account of the case’s
highly misleading account of the case’s historical significance, in
by Eric Foner
Historian Eric Foner, DeWitt Clinton Professor of History at Columbia University, examines the
issues surrounding the historical film Amistad. In this essay he explores the problems faced by the
producers of Amistad and the shortcomings of both the film and its accompanying study guide in
their attempt to portray history. More importantly, Foner raises questions not only about the
accuracy of details and lack of historic context, but also about the messages behind Hollywood’s
portrayal of history as entertainment. (Posted March 1998)
Compared with most Hollywood megafilms, Amistad must be considered a step forward: it’s about
slavery, not exploding volcanoes or rampaging raptors. But given that Steven Spielberg is the
director, Anthony Hopkins and Morgan Freeman the stars, and a reported $75 million was spent on
production, it can only be judged a disappointment. It does contain a few visually compelling
moments, such as the scene on a slave ship that viscerally conveys the horrors of the Middle
Passage. Overall, however, as a movie Amistad is simply a bore. As history, this account of a Cuban
slave ship seized in 1839 by its African captives, and their legal travail that ended in the U. S.
Supreme Court, also leaves much to be desired.
Amistad‘s problems go far deeper than such anachronisms as President Martin Van Buren
campaigning for reelection on a whistle-stop train tour (in 1840, candidates did not campaign), or
people constantly talking about the coming Civil War, which lay twenty years in the future. Despite
the filmmakers’ orgy of self-congratulation for rescuing black heroes from oblivion, the main
characters of Amistad are white, not black.
The plot pivots on lawyer Roger Baldwin’s dawning realization that the case he is defending
involves human beings, not just property rights, and on the transformation of John Quincy Adams,
who initially refuses to assist the captives but eventually persuades the Supreme Court to order
their return to Africa. As in Glory, an earlier film about black Civil War soldiers, Amistad's black
characters are essentially foils for white self-discovery and moral growth.
This problem is compounded by having the Africans speak Mende, a West African language, with
English subtitles. A courageous decision by Hollywood standards, this device backfired along the
way when someone realized that Americans do not like subtitled movies, as foreign filmmakers
have known for decades. In the end, most of the Mende dialogue ended up on the cutting- room
floor. Apart from the intrepid Cinque, the Africans' leader, we never learn how the captives
responded to their ordeal. It would have been far better to have the Africans speak English (the film,
after all, is historical fiction), rather than rendering them virtually mute.
the process sugarcoating the relationship between the American judiciary and slavery. The film
gives the distinct impression that the Supreme Court was convinced by Adams' plea to repudiate
slavery in favor of the natural rights of man, thus taking a major step on the road to abolition.
In fact, the Amistad case revolved around the Atlantic slave trade — by 1840 outlawed by
international
treaty — and had nothing whatever to do with slavery as an domestic institution. Incongruous as it
may seem, it was perfectly possible in the nineteenth century to condemn the importation of slaves
from Africa while simultaneously defending slavery and the flourishing slave trade within the
United States.
In October 1841, in an uncanny parallel to events on the Amistad, American slaves being
transported from Virginia to Louisiana on the Creole seized control of the ship, killing some crew
members and directing the mate to sail to the Bahamas. For fifteen years, American Secretaries of
State unsuccessfully badgered British authorities to return the slaves as both murderers and “the
recognized property” of American citizens. This was far more typical of the government’s stance
toward slavery than the Amistad affair.
Rather than being receptive to abolitionist sentiment, the courts were among the main defenders of
slavery. A majority of the Amistadjustices, after all, were still on the Supreme Court in 1857 when, in
the Dred Scott decision, it prohibited Congress from barring slavery from the Western territories
and proclaimed that blacks in the United States had “no rights which a white man is bound to
respect.”
The film’s historical problems are compounded by the study guide now being distributed to schools,
which encourages educators to use Amistad to teach about slavery. The guide erases the distinction
between fact and fiction, urging students, for example, to study black abolitionism through the film’s
invented character, Theodore Joadson, rather than real historical figures. And it fallaciously
proclaims the case a “turning-point in the struggle to end slavery in the United States.”
Most galling, however, is the assumption that a subject does not exist until it is discovered by
Hollywood. The guide ends with a quote from Debbie Allen, Amistad's producer, castigating
historians for suppressing the “real history” of African-Americans and slavery. Historians may be
guilty of many sins, but ignoring slavery is not one of them. For the past forty years, no subject has
received more scholarly attention. All American history textbooks today contain extensive
treatments of slavery, almost always emphasizing the system’s brutality and the heroism of those
who survived — the very things Amistad's promoters claim have been suppressed.
If the authors of the study guide really want to promote an understanding of slavery, they should
direct students not to this highly flawed film, but to the local library. There they will discover
several shelves of books on slavery and slave resistance, from academic tomes to works for children.
Maybe, in this era of budget cuts, some of that $75 million could have more profitably been spent on
our public libraries.
The Amistad Case: A Chronology

1837 - 1839 25,000 Africans brought to Cuba as slaves.

April 1839 Cinque captured by other Africans, taken to the slave factory in Lomboko and sold to a Portuguese slave trader.
April - June 1839 Cinque and others resold to another slave trader and put aboard the Tecora which sailed to Cuba.
June 1839 Cinque and others sold to Ruiz and Montes in Havana, Cuba. Amistad leaves Havana for Guanaja with slaves and owners.
July 1839 Mutiny led by Cinque; Amistad's captain and cook killed while two crewmen escape; Africans control Amistad.
July - August 1839 Amistad steered by Montes east by day and northwest by night, toward United States.
August 1839 Amistad captured by crew of U.S.S. Washington off of Long Island, New York; Africans held and taken with Amistad to New
London, Connecticut; Judicial hearing, presided over by Judge Judson, on the U.S. S. Washington; Africans await trial in a New
Haven, Connecticut jail.
September 1839 Lewis Tappan forms Friend of Amistad Africans Committee; Judge Thompson presides in Circuit Court hearing on Amistad
criminal case; case dismissed by Judge Thompson for jurisdictional reasons; civil case left for District Court resolution.
October 1839 Professor Josiah Gibbs locates interpreter, James Covey, and the Africans are able to tell their story; teaching Africans the
English language and Christianity began; Cinque and others file charges of assault and false imprisonment against Ruiz and
Montes.
November 1839 District Court meets and postpones case.
December 1839 Slave factory at Lomboko, Sierra Leone raided by British and all slaves there liberated.
January 8, 1840 The Amistad civil trial begins in New Haven.
January 15, 1840 Judge Hudson presiding in District Court rules the Africans are to be turned over to the President for return to Africa.
August 1840 Africans taken to Westville.
September 1840 Judge Thompson of the Circuit Court upholds District Court decision; government appeals to U.S. Supreme Court.
October 1840 John Quincy Adams convinces to join Roger Baldwin in arguing the case for the Africans before the Supreme Court.
Feb. - March 1841 Baldwin and Adams argue case before Supreme Court; Court orders Africans to be freed immediately.
Mar. - Nov. 1841 Freed Africans go to Farmington for further English and religious education; local committee plans mission establishment in
Africa.
November 1841 African survivors leave with missionaries for Africa aboard Gentleman.
January 1842 Arrive in Sierra Leone; mission experiences problems; many of the Africans abandon missionaries.
1846 Brother Raymond, founder of the mission in Sierra Leone dies of yellow fever and is replaced by George Thomas; 68 students
attend the mission; efforts to compensate Spain for the Amistad are opposed in the House by John Quincy Adams.
1860 With the election of Abraham Lincoln as President, efforts to compensate Spain for the Amistad incident come to an end.
1879 Cinque, old and emaciated, comes to the mission to die and is buried among the graves of American missionaries.
The Amistad Trials: An Account
The improbable voyage of the schooner Amistad and the court proceedings and diplomatic
maneuverings that resulted from that voyage form one of the most significant stories of the
nineteenth century. When Steven Spielberg chose the Amistad case as the subject of his 1997 feature
film (LINK TO REVIEWS), he finally brought it the attention the case had long deserved, but never
received. The Amistad case energized the fledgling abolitionist movement and intensified conflict
over slavery, prompted a former President to go before the Supreme Court and condemn the policies
of a present Administration, soured diplomatic relations between the United States and Spain for a
generation, and created a wave of interest in sending Christian missionaries to Africa.
Mutiny and Zig-Zagging to American Justice
Two sea captains, Peletiah Fordham and Henry Green, were shooting birds among the dunes at the
eastern tip of Long Island on the morning of August 26, 1839, when they were startled to encounter
four black men wearing only blankets. Once the blacks were assured through sign language that they
were not in slave-holding country, they led Fordham and Green to a point in the dunes where they
could see a black schooner, flagless with its sails in tatters, sitting at anchor a mile or so from the
beach. Another smaller boat was on the beach, guarded by more black men, many of whom were
wearing necklaces and bracelets of gold doubloons. One of the black men, who appeared to be the
leader of the group, told Fordham and Green that there were two trunks full of gold aboard the
schooner, and that they would be given to whoever outfitted them with provisions and helped them
sail back to their African homeland. Green suggested that if they got the trunks he would help them
return to Africa.
Green's and Fordham's dreams of riches were interrupted by a brig of the U. S. Coast Guard,
the Washington, which intercepted the rowboat as it made its way back to the schooner. The
commander of the brig, Lieutenant Thomas Gedney, boarded the schooner and ordered, at gunpoint,
all hands below the deck. Two Spaniards emerged from below. One was old, bearded, and sobbing.
The other was a man in his mid-twenties. Jose Ruiz, the younger man, spoke English and eagerly began
to tell the tale of mutiny, blood, deceit, and desperation aboard the Amistad.
The schooner had left Havana on June 28, bound for Puerto Principe, a Cuban coastal town. Aboard
the Amistad were five whites, a mulatto cook, a black cabin boy, and fifty-three slaves. Ruiz had bought
forty-nine adult male slaves at the Havana market. The older, bearded white, Pedro Montes, had
bought four child slaves, including three girls. On the fourth night at sea, the slaves managed to free
themselves from their irons. In the ensuing struggle, the Africans killed the captain, Ramon Ferrer,
and a mulatto cook. (According to the story later told by the Africans, the mulatto cook had told the
slaves that they would be chopped to pieces and salted as meat for the Spaniards when the ship
arrived at its destination.) Two crewman abandoned ship in the stern boat. Montes and Ruiz were
spared, apparently because their help was thought necessary in steering the ship to Africa. Montes
sailed toward Africa, but slowly and only during the day. At night, he reversed course and headed due
west, hoping to landfall in the southern United States. After six weeks of zig-zagging at sea,
the Amistad arrived in New York.
The Mutiny: Hal Woodruff mural
(What Ruiz did not say was that the slaves were were recently brought from Africa and brought to
Cuba in direct contravention of an 1817 treaty between Spain and Britain prohibiting the importation
of slaves to Spanish colonies. Using falsified passports, corrupt officials, and nighttime landings, slave
traders often were successful in eluding the British ships that patrolled waters in an effort to enforce
the importation ban.)
As Ruiz told his story, an athletic-looking black man, naked except for a gold necklace, suddenly
appeared from below and leaped off the boat. The Washington gave chase, but the man was a strong
swimmer, constantly diving as the ship neared. Tiring, the man took off his necklace, letting it--to the
dismay of Gedney--fall to the bottom of the sea. Finally, crew members recaptured the black man,
later known as Cinque, and put him into chains. The Amistad was towed to New London, Connecticut,
where its arrival would dominate the news for weeks to come.
The United States Attorney for Connecticut, William S. Holabird, ordered a judicial hearing on
the Washington. It was unclear to Holabird, as it was to many, whether a crime had been committed,
who had committed it, or whether U.S. courts even had jurisdiction. There was also the matter of
salvage rights, which were claimed by Gedney and the Washington crew. The Amistad's cargo of wine,
saddles, gold, and silk was worth an estimated $40,000 in 1839 dollars, and the slaves had a market
value of at least half that much.
The district judge for Connecticut was Andrew T. Judson, an appointee of President Andrew Jackson.
Judson was not likely to sympathize with the Africans, having six years earlier prosecuted a
Connecticut schoolmistress for establishing a school for Negroes that Judson claimed violated a state
law against encouraging black migration. (When the jury was unable to reach a verdict in the case, a
mob set fire to the schoolmistress's house.)
The Criminal Trial
On August 29, 1839, three days after the schooner's discovery, Judge Judson opened a hearing on
complaints of murder and piracy filed by Montes and Ruiz. Thirty-nine Africans (of the forty-three
who had survived the weeks at sea) were present, including Cinque, who appeared wearing a red
flannel shirt, white duck pants, and manacles. He appeared calm and mute, occasionally making a
motion with his hand to his throat to suggest a hanging.
The three principal witnesses at the hearing were the first mate of the Washington and Montes and
Ruiz. The first mate described what happened when the Amistad was first boarded. Montes and Ruiz
described the mutiny and subsequent weeks at sea. Ruiz testified:
"I took an oar and tried to quell the mutiny. I cried 'No! No!.' I then heard one of the crew cry murder.
I then heard the captain order the cabin boy to go below and get some bread to throw among the
negroes, hoping to pacify them. I did not see the captain killed."
Montes added his description of events on the fourth night at sea:
"Between three and four was awakened by a noise which was caused by blows to the mulatto cook. I
went on deck and they attacked me. I seized a stick and a knife with a view to defend myself....At this
time [Cinque] wounded me on the head severely with one of the sugar knives, also on the arm. I then
ran below and stowed myself between two barrels, wrapped up in a sail. [Cinque] rushed after me
and attempted to kill me, but was prevented by the interference of another man....I was then taken on
deck and tied to the hand of Ruiz."
After listening to the testimony, Judge Judson referred the case for trial in Circuit Court, where in 1839
all federal criminal trials were held, and ordered the Africans put into custody at the county jail in
New Haven. The Amistads became a huge attraction. As many as 5,000 people a day visited the jail.
The jailer charged "one New York shilling" (about twelve cents) for close looks at the captives. The
Africans also attracted scientific interest. A phrenologist examined the captives and took "life masks"
which were later put on public display. The New Haven jail was relatively loose. Jailers took the
children, "robust" and "full of hilarity," on wagon rides. The adults were allowed daily exercise on
New Haven's green, where their cavorting, somersaults, and acrobatic leaps surprised residents
unaccustomed to such public displays of exuberance.
Lewis Tappan
For most New Englanders the Amistads were a curiosity. For a small, but growing, group of
abolitionists, however, they were a cause and an opportunity. Abolitionist leader Lewis
Tappandescribed the capture of the Africans as a "providential occurrence" that might allow "the
heart of the nation" to be touched "through the power of sympathy." The "Amistad Committee" was
quickly formed and soon the group had enlisted legal help, including that of Roger Baldwin, who
would later become the governor of Connecticut.
Spain, meanwhile, pressed the United States to return the schooner to its Cuban owners, concede that
the U. S. courts had no jurisdiction over Spanish subjects, and return the Amistads to Havana. The Van
Buren Administration was anxious to comply with the Spanish demands, but there was this matter of
due process of law. The Administration, through District Attorney Holabird, crafted legal arguments
that it hoped would produce the results sought by Spain.
Roger Baldwin
On September 14, 1839, the Amistads were sent by canal boat and stage to Hartford for their trial in
the Circuit courtroom of Judge Smith Thompson, who also served (as was then the custom for Circuit
Court judges) as a justice on the United States Supreme Court. Holabird asked the court to turn all the
prisoners over to the President and to let him decide this matter that bore heavily on the relations
between great powers. Baldwin, for the defense, argued that "no power on earth has the right to
reduce [the Africans] to slavery" and the United States should never stoop so low as to become a
"slave-catcher for foreign slave-holders." Judge Thompson preferred to evade the larger debate over
abolition and rested his decision on jurisdictional grounds. He decided after three days of argument
that because the alleged mutiny and murders occurred in international waters and did not involve
U.S. citizens, the court had no jurisdiction to consider the criminal charges.
Judge Smith Thompson
Were the slaves "property"? That was a matter, Judge Thompson ruled, that had to be decided first in
the district court. Thompson ruled that the Africans, although no longer considered prisoners, should
be detained until the district court could decide whether they were property and--if they were
property--who owned them.
The Civil Trial: Were the Amistads Property?
The defense devoted considerable time to the task of trying to locate someone familiar with the
language spoken by the Africans. Dr. Josiah Gibbs, a Yale philologist, and a clergymen who trained the
deaf and dumb examined the Africans. They concluded that the Amistads were Mende, from a region
south of Freetown in what is now Sierra Leone. Gibbs learned to count in Mende, then wandered up
and down the waterfronts of New York counting in Mende, looking for signs of recognition among the
Africans he encountered. Finally his efforts were successful, and a Mende speaker, James Covey, was
brought to New Haven.
The full story of the Africans' adventures began to come out. The Amistad captives had first met at a
slave factory in Lomboko after having been kidnapped by African slavers. They along with about 600
other Africans were loaded aboard the Portugeese ship Tecora and taken via the infamous "Middle
Passage" across the Atlantic. The slaves were kept naked, flogged for not eating, and chained in a half-
lying position. Many died at sea and were tossed overboard. Landing at night in Havana, they were
taken to the "barracoon," or slave market where ten days later they were bought by Ruiz and Montes.
On the fourth night of the Amistad's voyage, Cinque used a nail to break the chain that fastened all the
slaves to the wall, and the mutiny began.
Life in Connecticut for the Amistads began to take on a semblance of normalcy. For two to five hours
a day they were instructed in English and theology by students of the Yale Divinity School. Bonds
between some of the Africans and their teachers began to develop. Still, it was a trying time for many
of the Amistads, experiencing their first harsh weather, exposed to new diseases, and the length of
their separation from their homeland growing with no end in sight. Tu-a became the first African to
die in New Haven, occasioning a raucous funeral that raised many New Englanders' eyebrows.
The Amistad civil trial began on November 19, 1839 in Hartford. After two days of testimony, the trial
was adjourned until January 7, 1840. In the New Haven harbor was the naval schooner Grampus, sent
there by President Van Buren to sail the Amistads back to Cuba should the court rule, as expected, in
the government's favor. Van Buren's secret orders provided that the Africans were to be rushed
immediately to the ship and placed in irons before an appeal could be filed, and that
the Grampus should sail for Havana unless an "appeal shall actually have been interposed."
President Martin Van Buren
Baldwin and the Amistads' lawyers produced several witnesses to support their claim that the
Africans were illegally imported from Africa and were therefore the property of no one. Dr. Gibbs, as
a linguistics expert, testified that the Amistads spoke Mende, not Spanish. Cinque and Grabeau,
another of the Africans, recounted (through James Covey, their interpreter) the story of their capture,
voyage across the Atlantic, sale in Havana, mutiny, and eventual arrival in Long Island. Spectators
reportedly listened to Cinque "with breathless attention." The New Haven Herald reported that he
"manifested a high degree of sagacity, of keenness, and decision." Sullivan Haley testified that Ruiz,
now back in Cuba, had admitted that the captives were not legal slaves. Francis Bacon, a local resident
who had visited the west African coast in the summer of 1839 described how Lomboko was
frequented by Cuban traders and how the slave trade was "the universal business of the country."
(The slave factory at Lomboko, incidentally, had been raided by the British one month before the trial,
and all slaves held there had been liberated.) Baldwin also introduced the deposition of Dr. Richard
Madden, an abolitionist and the British anti-slavery commissioner in Cuba. He described how Cuban
authorities "winked at the slave trade in return for $10 to $15 a slave," used fraudulent documents to
deceive inspectors, and would without hesitation kill the Amistad blacks should they be returned to
Cuba. (LINK TO MADDEN DEPOSITION) (After giving his deposition, Madden returned to London
where, in an audience with Queen Victoria, he explained the facts surrounding the Amistad Affair.)
Sketch of Cinque (or Cin-gue)
District Attorney Holabird introduced statements from the Spanish consul urging that the Amistads
be returned to Spain and presented testimony and depositions of crew members of
the Washington describing their discovery and capture of the Amistad , while Gedney's counsel tried
to establish that Cinque was himself a slave trader.
Judge Judson announced his decision on January 13, 1840, after a weekend of deliberation. He ruled
that the Amistad captives were "born free" and kidnapped in violation of international law. They had
mutinied, he said, out of a "desire of winning their liberty and of returning to their families and
kindred." He ordered that the Amistads be "delivered to President Van Buren for transport back to
Africa." He ended his opinion with the observation, "Cinque and Grabeau shall not sigh for Africa in
vain. Bloody as may be their hands, they shall yet embrace their kindred." The Grampus sailed out of
New Haven harbor without its black passengers. Van Buren was described as "greatly dissatisfied."
The Administration's Appeal to the Supreme Court
The Administration appealed Judson's decision, but it was affirmed by Circuit Judge Thompson. The
Administration again appealed, this time to the United States Supreme Court, where five of the nine
justices were southerners who either owned or had owned slaves.
After an appeal was made to the Supreme Court, Lewis Tappan visited John Quincy Adams at his home
in Massachusetts in an effort to persuade "Old Man Eloquent" to argue the Africans case in
Washington. Former President Adams, then 74 and a member of Congress, at first resisted, pleading
age and infirmity. But Adams believed firmly in the rightness of the cause, and eventually agreed to
join Baldwin in arguments before the Court. "By the blessing of God, I will argue the case before the
Supreme Court," Adams was quoted as saying. That October, 1840 date he wrote in his diary: "I
implore the mercy of God to control my temper, to enlighten my soul, and to give me utterance, that I
may prove myself in every respect equal to the task."
John Quincy Adams
The next month Adams stopped by Westville, near New Haven, to visit his clients. He found them all
in a thirty-foot-by-twenty-foot room, taken up almost entirely by thirty-six cots. Adams shook hands
with Cinque and Grabeau, telling them "God willing, we will make you free." Later, Adams would
receive touching letters from two of the younger Africans, Ka-le and Kin-na.
Kinna
On Monday, February 22, 1841, arguments began in the Supreme Court's crowded chamber in the
U.S. Capitol. (Among those in attendance was Francis Scott Key, author of the "Star Spangled Banner"
and now an attorney, who approached Adams and offered his advice on the case.) Attorney General
Henry Gilpin, arguing for the government, told the Court that it should not "go behind" the Amistad's
papers and make inquiry as to their accuracy, but should accept them on their face in order to show
proper respect for another sovereign nation. Roger Baldwin followed Gipin, making many of the same
arguments that been persuasive in the district and circuit courts. (LINK TO BALDWIN ARGUMENT).
John Quincy Adams began his argument on February 24th. He did not disappoint. He argued that if
the President had the power to send the Africans to Cuba, he would equally as well have the power to
seize forty Americans and send them overseas for trial. He argued that Spain was asking the President
to "first turn man-robber,...next turn jailer,... and lastly turn catchpole and convey them to Havana, to
appease the vengeance of the African slave-traders of the barracoons." He attacked the President for
his ordering a naval vessel to stand ready in New Haven harbor, he attacked a southern intellectual's
defense of slavery, and he quoted the Declaration of Independence: "The moment you come to the
Declaration of Independence, that every man has a right to life and liberty, an inalienable right, this
case is decided. I ask nothing more in behalf of these unfortunate men than this Declaration."
Adams ended his Supreme Court argument on a personal, reflective note:
"May it please your Honors: On the 7th of February, 1804, now more than thirty-seven years past,
my name was entered, and yet stands recorded, on both the rolls, as one of the Attorneys and
Counselors of this Court. Five years later, in February and March, 1809, I appeared for the last time
before this Court, in defense of the cause of justice, and of important rights, in which many of my
fellow-citizens had property to a large amount at stake. Very shortly afterwards, I was called to the
discharge of other duties--first in distant lands, and in later years, within our own country, but in
different departments of her Government. Little did I imagine that I should ever again be required to
claim the right of appearing in the capacity of an office of this Court; yet such has been the dictate of
my destiny--and I appear again to plead the cause of justice and now of liberty and life, in behalf of
many of my fellow men, before the same Court, which in a former age, I had addressed in support of
rights of property. I stand again, I trust for the last time, before the same Court--hic caestus,
artemque repono. I stand before the same Court, but not before the same judges--nor aided by the
same associates--nor resisted by the same opponents. As I cast my eyes along those seats of honor
and of public trust, now occupied you, they seek in vain for one of those honored and honorable
persons whose indulgence listened then to my voice. Marshall--Cushing--Chase--Washington--
Johnson--Livingston--Todd-- Where are they? . . . Where is the marshal--where are the criers of the
Court? Alas! where is one of the very judges of the Court, arbiters of life and death, before whom I
commenced this anxious argument, even now prematurely closed? Where are they all? Gone! Gone!
All gone!-- Gone from the services which, in their day and generation, they faithfully rendered to
their country. . . . In taking, then, my final leave of this Bar, and of this Honorable Court, I can only
ejaculate a fervent petition to Heaven, that every member of it may go to his final account with as
little of earthly frailty to answer for as those illustrious dead, and that you may, every one, after the
close of a long and virtuous career in this world, be received at the portals of the next with the
approving sentence, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant; enter thou into the joy of they Lord.'"
Justice Joseph Story
On March 9, 1841, the Supreme Court announced its decision. Justice Story, speaking for the Court,
said that the Amistads were "kidnapped Africans, who by the laws of Spain itself were entitled to their
freedom." As justification for the Court's decision, Justice Story relied largely on the narrower
arguments of Roger Baldwin, rather than the "interesting remarks" of John Quincy Adams. (LINK TO
SCT DECISION) The Africans were free: they could stay or they could return to Africa. (The decision
was, of course, by no means a repudiation of slavery, and clearly implied that if the Amistads had been
brought from Africa prior to the 1820 treaty banning importation of slaves, they would have been
considered property of Ruiz and Montes and been returned to Cuba.)
Reactions to the decision varied. Adams wrote that he was filled with "great joy." The Amistads were
described as "ecstatic." Lewis Tappan and other evangelical abolitionists saw an opportunity for
the Amistads to become the key to an effort to bring Christianity to black Africa. The Spanish
government angered and somewhat mystified by the Court's action, began a long series of
unsuccessful diplomatic efforts to obtain indemnification for loss of the Amistad and her cargo.
Epilogue
Efforts began to raise the money necessary to transport the Amistads back to their Mende homeland.
Some local residents complained when the need for money caused some of the Africans to begin to
charge for jumping, talking, and singing. Cinque asked $3 for a song. The Amistad Committee put
together a sort of traveling show, holding church "meetings" in which the Africans would describe
their homes and their kidnapping, sing native songs, and read from the Bible. Cinque quickly
developed a reputation as a powerful orator.
The Amistads, strangers in a strange land, were not without their problems. One of the Amistads, Fon-
ne, drowned in a pond, an apparent suicide. Grabeau was the victim of an assault. Others were the
victims of racial taunts. Cinque was involved in a brawl with some local rowdies. It was, everyone
recognized, time to go. Tappan redoubled efforts to recruit missionaries to accompany the Africans
back to Sierra Leone.
"Return to Mendeland" (Hale Woodruff mural)
In November, 1841, the ship Gentleman was chartered for $1840 to carry the Africans back to
Freetown, where the Governor of Sierra Leone said the group would be met and guided on a four-day
journey to Mendeland. After a moving and tearful round of goodbyes, the thirty-five surviving
Africans of the Amistad and four American missionaries boarded the Gentleman, bound for West
Africa. (Only one African, Sarah, would ever return to America. She attended Oberlin College.)
After fifty days at sea, the Gentleman put down anchor in Freetown harbor. It didn't take long for the
missionaries to realize they had their work cut out for them. After disembarking, some of the Africans
began to strip and engage in "heathenish dancing." British missionaries in Freetown told the
Americans that their plan to establish a mission in Mendeland was folly. Soon the missionaries wrote
letters complaining of their Amistad students: some fell back to their "licentious habits," some
disappeared, some were just trouble. Others, such as Kin-na, were clearly torn by the pull of two
different worlds, becoming an ordained minister but practicing polygamy. The missionaries also
contended with rats (Brother Raymond killed 164 in a single day), the 175 annual inches of rain,
malaria and yellow fever ("black vomit.") One by one, the missionaries died and were replaced by
others. With the new arrivals, the character of the mission might also change. Tolerance might turn
to hell-fire and ex-communication.
The last of the Amistad Africans to have contact with the mission was Cinque. In 1879, old and
emaciated, he stumbled into the mission to die and was buried among the graves of the American
missionaries.
Although every American President from the time of the Amistad decision of the Supreme Court until
1860 urged that Spain be compensated, efforts to appropriate funds for such a purpose were
consistently stymied in the House. John Quincy Adams led the opposition to compensation efforts
until his death in 1847, calling the proposal "a robbery of the people of the United States." With the
election of Abraham Lincoln in 1860, Spain's efforts came to an end.
The first Amistad case
After sixty days at sea, the Amistad came aground at Montauk Point, on New York's Long Island;
several of the slaves left the ship to get fresh water. The Spanish owners of the ship, Pedro Montez
and Jose Ruiz, asked the officers of the United States survey ship Washington to help them recover
control of the ship from the slaves.
Thomas Gedney and Richard Meade, the Washington's officers, assisted Montez and Ruiz and re-
captured the ship. Meanwhile, Henry Green and Pelatiah Fordham -- who had nothing to do with
the Washington, separately captured the Africans who had come ashore for water.
The ship was piloted to New London, Connecticut, for a trial concerning the rights and ownership of
the ship and its cargo. The African slaves were placed in the custody of the U.S. marshalls until the
end of the trial.
A brief discussion of the law of salvage
Admiralty law, which is the body of law that governs ships on the high seas, has a doctrine
of salvage. Under the salvage doctrine, persons who secure ships which are sinking or out of control
are entitled to a portion of the goods on that ship. (This rule was created to give people incentives to
save sinking ships and other vessels in trouble.)
Typically, a salvager sues in court to have his rights as a salvager declared. If he is successful, the
court sets the dollar amount to which he is entitled, and orders a sale of the ship and its cargo.
 More on salvage
A brief discussion of the law of slavery in 1841
In 1841, both slavery and slave trade were legal in Spain, provided the slaves were of Spanish origin
(or originated in Spanish overseas territories). Both Montez and Ruiz were Spanish citizens,
the Amistadwas a Spanish ship, and the slaves were bought and sold in Cuba, which was then a
Spanish territory.
However, under the law of the United States, slave trade was illegal in 1841. Accordingly, one
important legal question was whether the Africans were Spanish citizens -- and therefore
susceptible of "slave" status -- or of African or some other status, and therefore not slaves under U.S.
or Spanish law.
If the slaves were property, the law of salvage would apply to them, and they would be sold along
with the cargo.
 More on slavery
Back to the story -- the lawyers enter the picture
Gedney and Meade sued in U.S. District Court, stating that since they had helped Ruiz and Montez,
they were entitled to a portion of the value of the Amistad's cargo.
Green and Fordham filed a response to Gedney and Meade's claim, stating that they (Green and
Fordham) had helped rescue the cargo of the ship by capturing the Africans who had come ashore.
Green and Fordham therefore claimed a portion of the value of the cargo as well.
Ruiz and Montez sued separately in U.S. District Court, stating that the slaves were their private
property. Under a U.S. treaty with Spain Ruiz and Montez claimed that the slaves could not be
included in the salvage sale of the ship.
The Spanish government also made a request. Spain argued that, since the Amistad was rescued by a
U.S. government-owned armed ship, the United States was obligated under international treaty to
return the ship and its cargo to the Spanish owners. An attorney for the United States government
appeared before the court and presented this request. This attorney also argued that, if the Africans
could not legally be returned to Ruiz and Montez, the court should order them sent back to Africa.
The Africans also responded to the claim. They argued that, since they were free men in their native
Africa, and since they had been kidnapped from Africa by the Spanish slave traders, and since slave
trade was illegal in New York (where the Amistad had landed), they should be released from custody
and set free.
The district court rules for the Africans
The district court judge ruled that the slaves were free men, and ordered them released from prison.
He also ordered that the United States government transport them back to Africa. He then ordered
that the salvage claims of Gedney and Meade be taken from the remaining cargo of the Amistad, and
rejected all other salvage claims.
The United States attorney appealed the court's decision, demanding that the United States be free
to return the slaves to Spain, under its treaty obligations. The Circuit Court -- the next highest court -
- affirmed the district court's decision and rejected the United States arguments. The United States
then appealed the decision to the U.S. Supreme Court.
The Supreme Court hears the case
The United States argued that its treaty with Spain required it to return ships and property seized
by U.S. government vessels to their Spanish owners.
The Supreme Court called the case "peculiar and embarrassing." It ruled for the Africans, accepting
the argument that they were never citizens of Spain, and were illegally taken from Africa, where
they were free men under the law.
The Supreme Court accepted that the United States had obligations to Spain under the treaty, but
said that that treaty "never could have been intended to take away the equal rights of [the
Africans]."
The Supreme Court also rejected a fairly novel argument by the United States. The U.S. argued that
the Africans should not be freed because, in commanding a slave ship and piloting it into the United
States, the Africans violated the laws of the United States forbidding slave trade. The Supreme Court
stated that the slaves could not "possibly intend to import themselves into the United States as
slaves, or for sale as slaves."
Once the Supreme Court finally affirmed the freedom of the slaves, they sailed back to Africa on the
ship Gentleman.