From Slavery to Citizenship: Juan José Nieto’s Intervention in the Official Act of Slaves’ Emancipation in the Republic of the New Granada, 1852

This paper analyzes the trajectory of Juan José Nieto, an Afro-Colombian politician and writer who was the interim governor of Cartagena, Republic of New Granada (current Colombia). It centers on his speech welcoming the abolition of slavery on May 21st, 1851, which addresses the process of self-identification as a strategy for fostering citizenship consciousness among African descendants. Using tools from socio-critical theory, intellectual history, and identity theory, I examine Nieto’s discourse in two moments. First, I focus on the historical context of the speech. Despite his ethnic and social origins, Nieto became governor of Cartagena due to his participation in the liberal reforms that gained momentum in 1849. Nieto used literacy to promote modern social structures in Colombia, not only in his discourse as a performative act but also by founding the newspaper “La Democracia” and “Sociedad democrática,” an organization that aimed to educate the Black population in the principles of French enlightenment and English liberalism. In the second part, I study how Nieto proposed the transition of enslaved individuals to their new roles, highlighting the importance of self-construction based on individual effort.

Nieto’s speech provides significant insight into the meanings of Black freedom in Latin American countries. It was uncommon for someone of African descent to address enslaved individuals from an official position. Unlike other writers of the period, Nieto sought to empower freed individuals in civil life instead of just emphasizing how afro-descendants compromised the new republic. However, embracing citizenship implied renouncing ethnic identities and adopting universal values. Nieto's speech sheds light on how black communities have used literacy to interact with state power while struggling for self-determination.