Ja­maican-born civ­il rights leader, and pro­po­nent of the Black Na­tion­al­ism and Pan-African­ism move­ments, Mar­cus Gar­vey has been grant­ed a posthu­mous clemen­cy by US Pres­i­dent Joseph Biden on his last day in of­fice. 

Gar­vey was one of five grant­ed clemen­cy.

Be­low is the state­ment by the White House on Gar­vey:

Mar­cus  Gar­vey (1887-1940) was a renowned civ­il rights and hu­man rights leader who was con­vict­ed of mail fraud in 1923, and sen­tenced to five years’ im­pris­on­ment. Pres­i­dent Calvin Coolidge com­mut­ed his sen­tence in 1927. No­tably, Mr. Gar­vey cre­at­ed the Black Star Line, the first Black-owned ship­ping line and method of in­ter­na­tion­al trav­el, and found­ed the Uni­ver­sal Ne­gro Im­prove­ment As­so­ci­a­tion, which cel­e­brat­ed African his­to­ry and cul­ture.

Dr. Mar­tin Luther King, Jr. de­scribed Mr. Gar­vey as “the first man of col­or in the his­to­ry of the Unit­ed States to lead and de­vel­op a mass move­ment.” Ad­vo­cates and law­mak­ers praise his glob­al ad­vo­ca­cy and im­pact, and high­light the in­jus­tice un­der­ly­ing his crim­i­nal con­vic­tion.

Ac­cord­ing to a state­ment from the White House at­trib­uted to Biden, "

To­day, I am ex­er­cis­ing my clemen­cy pow­er to par­don 5 in­di­vid­u­als and com­mute the sen­tences of 2 in­di­vid­u­als who have demon­strat­ed re­morse, re­ha­bil­i­ta­tion, and re­demp­tion. These clemen­cy re­cip­i­ents have each made sig­nif­i­cant con­tri­bu­tions to im­prov­ing their com­mu­ni­ties.

In 1922, Mar­cus Gar­vey and three Uni­ver­sal Ne­gro Im­prove­ment As­so­ci­a­tion (U.N.I.A.) of­fi­cials were charged with mail fraud re­lat­ed to the Black Star Line. Con­vict­ed in 1923 and sen­tenced to five years in prison, Gar­vey ap­pealed but was de­nied. He was re­leased in 1927 and de­port­ed to Ja­maica. Gar­vey died in Lon­don in 1940.