He became world-renowned, as well as controversial, because of his actions and statements about black empowerment at a time when the concept was virtually unknown. Now, Marcus Garvey, the organizational leader who ended up being convicted of mail fraud a century ago,

President Joe Biden has posthumously pardoned Black nationalist Marcus Garvey, who influenced Malcolm X and other Black civil rights leaders and was convicted of mail fraud in the 1920s.

This historic pardon culminates a decades-long fight by Marcus Garvey’s descendants and supporters to right the wrongs of a what many regarded as a politically motivated conviction.