Check out PBS's EGALITE FOR ALL with author Laurent Dubois

Friday, January 30, 2009; PBS

EGALITE FOR ALL:

Toussaint Louverture and the Haitian Revolution

It was the only successful slave insurrection in history. It grasped the full meaning of French revolutionary ideas — liberté, eqalité, fraternité — and used them to create the world's first Black republic. It changed the trajectory of colonial economics...and led to America's acquisition of the Louisiana territory from France. "It" was the Haitian Revolution, a movement that's been called the true birth moment of universal human rights. Vaguely remembered today, the Haitian Revolution was a hurricane at the turn of the nineteenth century — traumatizing Southern planters and inspiring slaves and abolitionists, worldwide.

Égalité for All: Toussaint Louverture and the Haitian Revolution explores this history through music, voodoo ritual, powerful re-creations, and insightful writers and historians.

To watch Egalite For All, check your local listings.