The Villatte conspiracy was political ambition, not racial solidarity or conflict

Evidence

The Villatte affair has traditionally been interpreted as racial conflict pitting mulattoes against blacks. Laveaux supported such an interpretation and was seconded by Henry Perroud, who wrote indignantly that the men of color to whom France had given so much had turned against the metropole, while the “African chiefs” had “respected the representatives of the Republic.” … While it is tempting to explain the conflict in such terms, and to naturalize the differences between Africans and mulattoes, the reality was more complex. Laveaux listed among Villatte’s fellow conspirators several men who were not mulattoes, including several leading black officers and one officer who declared that his “only regret was that he had been born white.” … Louverture, meanwhile, had more in common with men like Villatte than with the ex-slave, often African-born, troops he led to the rescue of Laveaux. Indeed his policies toward ex-slaves were in line with those of colored leaders such as Rigaud, who probably had a hand in encouraging the Villatte conspiracy. — Dubois, Laurent, Avengers of the New World_ The Story of…, 698

Categorization

• XREF: Complicates any simple black-vs-mulatto reading of the revolution; connects to Dubois’s broader thesis about color lines being politically constructed rather than natural.
• QUESTION: How exactly did Rigaud’s interests align with Villatte’s conspiracy? The author asserts a probable hand but leaves the mechanism vague.