America’s Black Ambassadors: A Historical Snapshot

Updated: November 1, 2015

In the article below, Carlton McLellan, PhD, Founding Director of The American Ambassadors Project and Senior Fellow with the Association of Black American Ambassadors (ABAA), briefly describes the history of the more than one hundred and sixty-six black women and men who have led diplomatic delegations as U.S. Ambassadors in one hundred and eight nations around the world.

The title and rank of ambassador was only first used in U.S. diplomacy in 1893. However, from that time until 1949, no Black Americans were appointed to serve with that title and rank. Beginning in 1949 when Edward Dudley became the first, and since then, 166 black Americans have officially served as U.S. ambassadors. Prior to 1949, black Americans had served as official U.S. diplomats with the titles and ranks ranging from ministers, envoys, consuls, or Foreign Service Officers, as far back as the mid-nineteenth century, but none as ambassadors. Some historians claim the first black American diplomat was Ebenezer Don Carlos Bassett, who was appointed minister to Haiti by President Ulysses S. Grant in 1869, but others have suggested it was William Alexander Leidesdorff, who was appointed vice consul in Yerba Buena, Mexico, (today’s San Francisco) on October 29, 1845. Basset was appointed by a U.S. president whereas Leidesdorff was appointed by the Tomas O. Larkin, the U.S. consul in Monterey, Mexico. Regardless of whose argument one accepts, or what interpretation of a diplomat these instances utilize, it is clear that black Americans’ official involvement and leadership as representatives of the country in its relations with foreign nations began well before the twentieth century.

No account of black American history in U.S. foreign and diplomatic affairs would be complete without reference to certain trailblazers like Frederick Douglass, Dr. Ralph Bunch, General Collin Powell, or Dr. Condoleezza Rice. Dr. Bunche is perhaps the most prominent twentieth-century example of this elite class of black diplomatic leaders. He won the 1950 Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts in mediating a series of armistice agreements between four Arab states (Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, and Syria) and Israel. During his career at the United Nations, Dr. Bunche also played a significant role in mediating several other international conflicts and developing international peacekeeping techniques and policies. Although he never held the official title or rank of U.S. ambassador, he certainly positively impacted the road that later black ambassadors would follow.

Since 1893 when the title of ambassador was first officially used in U.S. diplomatic history, there have been more than three thousand, five hundreds individual Americans who have held this title and rank. Only 166 of those have been black Americans (less than 5%). The first American ambassador of African descent was Edward Dudley who at age thirty-eight was first appointed by President Harry Truman as minister to Liberia. Upon elevation of that mission to full embassy status, Dudley was elevated to the rank of U.S. ambassador to Liberia in 1949. Every U.S. president since then has appointed at least one black American as a U.S. ambassador.

These ambassadors come from all walks of life. Their higher education backgrounds range from small community colleges to large public research institutions, Ivy League universities to historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs), U.S.-based universities to universities abroad, as well as women’s universities and the military academies. This educational diversity is also matched by their professional diversity since these ambassadors have been drawn from the academy, from corporate America, from public office, from entertainment, and even from the pulpit.

As ambassadors, black Americans have been appointed to lead U.S. diplomatic delegations in ninety-five nations. They have also represented U.S. interests before the United Nations and other international or regional organizations, and have led the strategic initiatives to combat terrorism, prosecute war crimes, promote trade, and promote religious freedom. At least forty-six have been appointed on two or more different occasions to multiple postings, bringing the total amount of times a black American has successfully been appointed to two hundred and thirty-two occasions. Click here for a full listing of all 166 black American ambassadors. Included among their ranks are fifty-nine women and one hundred and seven men, with their ages at the time of their appointments ranging from thirty-eight to seventy-two years old. These included the eldest, George Haley, age seventy-two (The Gambia, 1998) and youngest at age thirty-eight, which included Edward Dudley (Liberia, 1949), Anne Forrester Holloway (Mali, 1963), and J. Steven Rhodes (Zimbabwe, 1989).

Black American ambassadors have hailed from virtually every region of the United States, the islands of the Caribbean, Europe, and the African continent. For example, the first ten were from ten different states representing the South, the Midwest, and the Northeast. This includes: Edward Dudley: South Boston, Virginia; Jessie Locker: College Hill, Ohio; Richard Jones: Albany, Georgia; John Morrow: Hackensack, New Jersey; Clifton Wharton, Sr.: Baltimore, Maryland; Mercer Cook: Washington, DC; Carl Rowan: Ravenscroft, Tennessee; Clinton Knox: New Bedford, Massachusetts; Hugh Smythe: Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; and Franklin Williams: Queens, New York.

The Caribbean gave birth to several black Americans who would become U.S. ambassadors. Elliott Skinner was born in Trinidad & Tobago; Terrence Todman in St. Thomas; Melvin Evans in St. Croix; Betty King and Roy Austin were both born in St. Vincent and the Grenadines; and Roland Bullen was born in Grenada. Two future Black Ambassadors, Larry Alexander and Brian Nichols, were born on the European continent, both in Germany with the former being born in Frankfurt where his was stationed as an American soldier and the latter in Berlin, where his father was serving as a professor at the time.

Finally, four future Black Ambassadors were born on the African continent. This included Daniel Yohannes who was born in Ethiopia; John Nkengasong who was born in Cameroon; and Tulinabo Mushingi and Patrick Gaspard who were both born in Zaire, now the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Politically, Democratic presidents have appointed ninety-four black Americans to their first ambassadorial appointments, while Republicans have appointed seventy-two. Together, both parties have appointed a black American to the ambassadorship on 232 successful occasions. As Table 1 illustrates, President G.W. Bush and President Obama prioritized Black ambassadorial appointments, evidenced by the fact that they did so successfully, the most, on 45 and 46 occasions respectively. Of the fifty-nine black women who have served as U.S. ambassador, President Obama appointed one of them on twenty-five separate occasions, the most among any U.S. President.

Terrence Todman holds the distinction of being the black American who served as U.S. ambassador on the most occasions, six. In fact, among all U.S. ambassadors only Ambassador Thomas Pickering, who was U.S. ambassador to seven different postings, has been appointed more times than Ambassador Todman. He also holds the distinction of being the black American with the largest number of different presidents appointing him as U.S. ambassador, including Nixon, Ford, Carter, and Reagan. Eight others were appointed by at least three different presidents across partisan lines:

• William Beverly Carter: Nixon (Tanzania, 1972), Ford (Liberia, 1976), and Carter (At-Large, Liaison with State and Local Governments, 1979)
• Edward Perkins: Reagan (Liberia, 1985 and South Africa, 1986), G. H. Bush U.S./U.N. New York,1992), and Clinton (Australia, 1993)
• Johnny Young: G. H. Bush (Sierra Leone, 1989), Clinton (Togo, 1994 and Bahrain, 1997), and G. W. Bush (Slovenia, 2001)
• Arlene Render: G. H. Bush (The Gambia, 1990), Clinton (Zambia, 1996), and G. W. Bush (Cote d’Ivoire, 2001)
• Pamela Bridgewater: Clinton (Benin, 2000), G. W. Bush (Ghana, 2005), and Obama (Jamaica, 2010)
• Aurelia Brazeal: G. H. Bush (Micronesia, 1990) Bill Clinton (Kenya, 1993), G. W. Bush (Ethiopia, 2002)
• Irving Hicks, Sr.: Reagan (Seychelles, 1985), G. H. Bush (Deputy Representative of the U.S. to the Security Council in the United Nations, 1992), and Clinton (Ethiopia, 1994)
• Tulinabo Mushingi: Obama (Burkina Faso, 2013), Trump (Senegal and concurrently Guinea-Bissau, 2017), and Biden (Angola and São Tomé & Principe, 2021).

As Table 2 below illustrates, the 2000’s decade (between 2000 and 2009) was the ten-year period where the most black Americans were appointed as ambassadors and accredited to specific countries or international organizations.

The table shows that on 155 occasions, a black American has been accredited to a country in Sub-Saharan Africa. Black Americans have served as ambassadors to all but three – Mauritania, Somalia, and Sudan – of the nations of sub-Saharan Africa.

No other region comes close in representation to Sub-Saharan Africa. Black ambassadors have served on twenty-three occasions in East Asia and the Pacific, fourteen occasions at various posts in the United Nations system, sixteen occasions in Europe and Eurasian countries, sixteen in Caribbean countries, eight in countries of Central, North and South America, eight in countries in the Near East/North Africa region, and sixteen at-large or other ambassadorial appointments. With only four black Americans serving as ambassadors, South and Central Asia is the world region that has seen the least number of black Americans in this role: Harry Thomas Jr. (Bangladesh, 2003), Pamela Spratlen (Kyrgyzstan, 2011 and Uzbekistan, 2014), and Marcia Bernicat (Bangladesh, 2014).

Several of the black American ambassadors had broad range in terms of the geographic space they covered as ambassadors. For instance, three were appointed to countries in three different regions:

• Terrence Todman: Europe and Eurasia (Spain, 1978, and Denmark, 1983), Central and South America (Costa Rica, 1974, and Argentina, 1989), and Africa south of the Sahara (Chad, 1969, and Guinea, 1972)
• Edward Perkins: East Asia and The Pacific (Australia, 1993), Africa south of the Sahara (Liberia, 1985, and South Africa, 1986), U.N. and Other International Organizations (U.S./U.N. New York, 1992)
• Johnny Young: Europe and Eurasia (Slovenia, 2001), Near East (Bahrain, 1997), and Africa south of the Sahara (Sierra Leone, 1989, and Togo, 1994)

All of the black American ambassadors were trailblazers in their own rites, but there are certain milestone moments that can easily be highlighted. Clifton R. Wharton Sr., for example, was the first black American to be appointed ambassador to a non-black nation when he was assigned to Norway in 1961. Patricia Roberts Harris, who was appointed ambassador to Luxembourg in 1965, was the first black woman to hold an ambassadorship. Hugh Smyth (Syria, 1965, Malta, 1967) and Mabel Smyth (Cameroon and Equatorial Guinea, 1977) are the only black husband and wife to have served as ambassadors. Ulric Haynes Jr., while serving as U.S. ambassador to Algeria (1977-1981), was instrumental in the negotiations that ultimately led to the 1981 release of American hostages in Iran during the well-documented Iranian hostage crisis. James Joseph was the only U.S. ambassador to South Africa (appointed 1995) who had the honor of presenting his diplomatic credentials to President Nelson Mandela, South Africa’s first democratically elected president. George Haley, who was appointed ambassador to Gambia in 1998, was assigned to the nation his older brother, Alex Haley, claimed as the family’s African ancestral home in his 1977 autobiography Roots.

Prior to his ambassadorial appointment, Pierre-Richard Prosper (ambassador-at-large, Office of War Crime, 2001) served as one of two prosecutors on the United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda from 1996-1998 where they were responsible for getting sexual violence and rape, in particular, classified as war crimes for the first time in history. Betty King, while serving as U.S. representative to the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations (USUN/ECOSOC) was the principal U.S. negotiator on the Millennium Development Goals (MDG), a global agreement to reduce poverty, and the benchmark against which all subsequent international development activities are now measured. Cleveland’s first black mayor, Carl Stokes, served as U.S. ambassador to Seychelles beginning in 1994, nearly three decades after his historical mayoral election. Diane Edith Watson served as ambassador to Micronesia before being elected to the U.S. Congress from South Central Los Angeles. Ruth V. Washington was appointed U.S. ambassador to Gambia in November 1989 but, tragically died in an automobile accident in January 1990 before she arrived in the nation.

This essay is far too short to be able to cover all of the trailblazing moments of these black leaders. However, the few examples outlined in this essay do illustrate the wide-ranging backgrounds of the 166 black Americans who have represented the United States as ambassadors. The rarity of their appointments (less than 5% of all ambassadorial appointments in American diplomatic history), their professional diversity, common capacity for leadership, and varying personal characteristics suggest that their stories may be valuable to those interested in leadership studies, inspirational stories of achievement and success, or overcoming life’s challenges. A recognition of these black American ambassadors can also help ensure that their contributions are not overlooked in historical narratives. By learning about their lives, careers, and achievements, we promote a more inclusive and accurate account of American history, celebrating the black voices that have helped shape the nation’s diplomatic legacy.

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