5.2 Jamaica Letter

Use the excerpt below and your knowledge of world history to answer all parts of the question that follows.

“We are, moreover, neither Indian nor European, but a species midway between the legitimate proprietors of this country and the Spanish usurpers. In short, though Americans by birth we derive our rights from Europe, and we have to assert these rights against the rights of the natives, and at the same time we must defend ourselves against the invaders. This places us in a most extraordinary and involved situation… The role of the inhabitants of the American hemisphere has for centuries been purely passive. Politically they were nonexistent. We are still in a position lower than slavery, and therefore it is more difficult for us to rise to the enjoyment of freedom… We have been harassed by a conduct which has not only deprived us of our rights but has kept us in a sort of permanent infancy with regard to public affairs.” The Jamaica Letter, Simón Bolívar, 1815

Identify and explain ONE example of how Bolívar’s Jamaica Letter represented Enlightenment ideals.

Identify and explain ONE issue seen in the Jamaica Letter that caused the Latin American Revolutions.

Identify and explain an ADDITIONAL cause of the Latin American Revolutions.