Arnold Bertram/ColumnistOn Sunday last, the 67th annual conference of the People's National Party dedicated its public session to saluting the outstanding contribution of its outgoing president, Percival James Noel Patterson to the party and the state.
For the thousands who filled the National Arena it was a moving experience as they expressed their love and appreciation for a leader, who more than any other shared their origins as well as their aspirations. For many, Patterson is a symbol of achievement, a leader who has triumphed over every adversity in his journey from the hills of Hanover to the highest executive office in the land. Their experience of him contrasts sharply with the savage critique of his tenure and legacy, which as far as they are concerned, reflects partisan loyalties as well as the prejudices associated with class and race.
Any attempt to provide a relevant framework for evaluating Patterson's tenure must begin with the fact of his roots within the Jamaican peasantry, which has its origins in the 711,000 Africans forcibly brought by European capital as slaves to the island and whose labour power created the wealth, making Jamaica Britain's most valuable colony up to the end of the 18th century. These are Patterson's roots. His great-grandfather, Richard Carter was among the earliest converts to the Baptist movement, which under William Knibb's leadership transformed large numbers of ex-slaves into communities of small
farmers with civil rights, and organised them for political action after the Franchise Act of 1840 lowered the financial requirements for voting.
The rise of the peasant class
It was out of this voter registration drive that the Jamaican peasantry recorded its first electoral success in 1847 by electing one of their own, Edward Vickars, as the first black man to the Assembly.
After the Morant Bay rebellion of 1865, crown colony government was established and as a consequence there were no elections until 1884 when representative government was restored. Despite the fact that for these elections at least half of the electorate was from the peasantry, such was the division and apathy among the voters that not one black man was elected to the Legislature until 1899 when Alexander Dixon defeated J.V. Calder in the by-elections held in St. Elizabeth.
A major factor contributing to Dixon's success was the 1,700 teachers who organised themselves into the Jamaica Union of Teachers (JUT) in 1894 providing a decentralised medium for the emerging black intelligentsia to make common cause with the Jamaican peasantry for political action.
POLITICS AND THE PEASANTRY
Patterson's antecedents were an integral part of this movement. The two generations preceding him produced six teachers, including his mother, Ina Miriamne James. Pride of place, however, goes to his maternal grandmother, Eliza Carter and her husband William James, both teachers, who were outstanding educators of the peasantry. They are still remembered in the hills of Hanover for their sterling contribution, and when Eliza died in 1939 her obituary described her as "a devoted Christian woman taking active part in everything that pertained to the upliftment of the social and spiritual life of the community."
The new opportunities in education introduced by the end of the 19th century created the basis for the children of the peasantry to demonstrate that "in intellectual capacity that is, ability to learn, to familiarise themselves with the general scholastic requirements of western civilisation, they were second to none." By the end of the 20th century the peasantry had elevated its finest sons to
national political leadership on the basis of their academic proficiency, professional competence and enthusiasm for public service.
The first was James Alexander George Smith (JAGS), born in the hills of Hanover, who after attending the Lucea Elementary School, enrolled at Rusea's High School from which he graduated in 1891. That same year he entered the Jamaica Civil Service and in 1906 enrolled at Lincoln's Inn in London, England. Four years later in January 1910, he was called to the Bar in London and then returned home for an illustrious career in politics and law. He entered the Legislature in 1917 and remained undefeated until his death in 1942.
JAGS single-handedly broke the political monopoly of the big planter class by encouraging and nurturing a generation of professionals into political representation. While J.A.G Smith held centre stage within the Legislature from 1927 to 1935 the streets belonged to Marcus Mosiah Garvey, whose exploits on the international stage preceded his entry to national politics. Before returning to Jamaica in 1927 after being deported form the United States, Marcus Garvey in the words of C.L.R James, "had placed Africa and people of African descent in the consciousness of the modern world and in such a manner that they could not be removed again."
In 1929, Garvey launched Jamaica's first national political organisation, the People's Political Party (PPP). His cultural activities at Edleweiss Park made it the centre for the performing arts within the emerging national movement. Garvey's political impact was far greater than his performance at the polls suggest. The limited franchise together with the coalition of powerful interests that opposed him were far more formidable than Garvey himself visualised.
The granting of Universal Adult Suffrage in 1934 made peasantry the single largest block of voters. It was with this newly found source of power that elevated one of their own to fill the void left by JAGS. He was Ivan Stewart Lloyd, a 39-year-old doctor stationed in St. Ann, who entered the Legislative Council in 1942, the same year that JAGS died.
Like J.A.G. Smith before him, he was never defeated at the polls. To this day there are those who contend that he was slighted in 1944 when he was not asked to lead the PNP Opposition in the House of Representatives. After failing in his bid to establish himself as Norman Manley's heir apparent after the death of Noel Nethersole in 1960, Lloyd resigned from the party he had served all his life on the same day that Michael Manley became the second president of the PNP.
Despite his outstanding service no institution bears his name, nor has any monument been erected in his honour. Fortunately, the Patterson administration in its very first year bestowed upon him the Order of Jamaica. By then his physical and intellectual powers had so deserted him that he remained ignorant of the honour bestowed.
Between Lloyd and Patterson comes the towering figure of Hugh Lawson Shearer, who epitomised the extraordinary yearning of the peasantry for empowerment and fulfilment. Shearer was never politically ambitions and would have been satisfied with a career in the labour movement had Bustamante not insisted that he become prime minister.
Shearer's weaknesses have been paraded with far more stridency than his strengths and his political conservatism has been used to deny him his due. Few realise the contribution he made as the elder statesman of Jamaican politics in his last years.
PATTERSON AMONG THE BEST
Finally, we come to Percival James Patterson, the man who successfully managed Michael Manley's campaign to become the second president of the PNP in 1969. He was then 34 years of age and was destined to succeed Lloyd as Jamaica's most outstanding political leader with roots in the Jamaican peasantry. Few Jamaicans have managed to combine as successfully as Patterson, scholarship, organising ability, strategic insight and a commitment to public service and nation building.
While Shearer preceded him to Jamaica House, in a real sense the long political journey of the Jamaican peasantry, which began with Edward Vickars in 1847 climaxed on the afternoon of March 30, 1992.
Today, 13 years later, we can all reflect on the contribution of the man who entered Jamaica house as its best prepared incumbent. Looking at the long list of colonial governors, only two can be described as Patterson's equal for either ability or achievement John Peter Grant and Hugh Foot. Among his colleagues, it is only to Norman Manley that he yields pride of place. He more so than any of his predecessors brought the Jamaican peasantry into their own, removing all barriers, which hitherto excluded them from equal access to the amenities of modern life.
However, while he carried the peasantry farthest along the road of progress and development, he would be first to admit to the contribution of those who went before him to the people from rural Jamaica. Bustamante got them off their knees in 1938; Norman Manley gave them national purpose and taught them the value of integrity and the pursuit of excellence. Michael Manley gave them the confidence to lift up their heads and demand their rights, while Seaga articulated the validity of their cultural heritage. However, none could substitute for the fact that P.J. Patterson, one of their own, opened the doors for them to become creators of wealth and part owners of the country which they and their forebears had built with their blood, sweat and tears.
Arnold Bertram is a former
member of Parliament.
