Blaise Diagne

Blaise Diagne (13 October 1872 – 11 May 1934) was a Senegalese-French politician, born at Gorée, who sat as deputy for the Four Communes of Senegal in the French Chamber of Deputies from 1914 until his death — the first person of full West African descent elected to the Chamber, and the first African to hold a position in the French government. He carried the 1916 law that granted full citizenship to the residents of the Four Communes, was the leading recruiter of West African soldiers for France in the First World War, served as under-secretary of state for the colonies in 1931–1932, and was mayor of Dakar from 1920 to 1934. ^{1 2}

He was born at Gorée under the name Galaye M'Baye, the son of Niokhor Diagne, a Lebu cook and sailor, and of Gnagna Anthony Preira, a Manjack woman of Guinea-Bissau origin. Adopted as a child by the Crespin family, a mixed-race family of notables of Gorée and Saint-Louis who were Christians, he was baptised "Blaise" and educated by the Christian Brothers of Ploërmel. He studied in France before joining the French customs service in 1892, serving in Dahomey, the French Congo, Réunion, Madagascar and French Guiana. In September 1899, while in Réunion, he became a freemason, joining the lodge L'Amitié of the Grand Orient de France; at Paris he was later affiliated to the lodge Pythagore, of which he became master, and he was the first African to sit on the council of the order, from 1922 to 1925. ^{1 2}

Diagne was elected to the Chamber of Deputies on 10 May 1914 as the representative of the Four Communes — Dakar, Gorée, Saint-Louis and Rufisque. He had been preceded by two mixed-race deputies, but he was the first person of full African descent to be elected. In 1914 he was also critical in the government's intervention in an outbreak of plague that struck Dakar. ^{1 2}

In 1916 he convinced the French parliament to approve the law that bears his name, granting full citizenship to all residents of the Four Communes. The extension of citizenship came during the First World War, when France needed to recruit its African population into the military, and as part of the arrangement Diagne helped organise military recruitment in Senegal; he became a leading recruiter for the French army, and thousands of black West Africans fought on the Western Front. From October 1918 to January 1920 he served as commissioner-general of the Ministry of the Colonies, with supervision of military personnel from the colonies; in 1930 he represented France in the International Labour Office; and from January 1931 to February 1932 he was under-secretary of state for the colonies, a junior cabinet position. He served as mayor of Dakar from 1920 until his death, and was re-elected deputy without interruption. ^{1 2}

He died at Cambo-les-Bains on 11 May 1934; his body was repatriated to Dakar in 1935. It is alleged that he was not buried in the Muslim cemetery of Soumbedioune in Dakar because of his freemasonry. A large boulevard and a high school in Dakar bear his name, as does Senegal's new international airport at Ndiass. ^{1 2}

He was a pioneer of African electoral politics and an advocate of equal rights for all, regardless of race, who encouraged African accommodation of French rule and the adoption of French cultural and social norms. By the later years of his life, African colonial politics had moved past him, as most Western-educated African elites embraced nationalism and worked for independence. W. E. B. Du Bois faulted him harshly for a perceived lack of commitment to African interests, writing in 1925 that "Diagne is a Frenchman who is accidentally black". The English article reports these positions; this museum records them without a verdict. ¹

His son Raoul Diagne was the first Black man to play professional football in France, winning the French title in 1936 and the French cup in 1936, 1939 and 1940 with Racing Club de France. ¹

In this museum his faith is recorded as unknown. No source read names a personal religious affiliation for him: the texts give a childhood baptism arranged by his adoptive Christian family and his adult freemasonry, and neither is an attestation of a faith; Wikidata records no religion value. ^{1 2 3}

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