RECENTLY I was reminded of how intensely the flame of anti-colonialism once burned, consuming the empires of the past ? specifically those which existed in the pre-World War Two era.

Often it is stated by historians that World War Two was all about preserving the freedom of the world from the tyrannies that would have been imposed if Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan had prevailed.

But it is less often stated until the end of World War Two millions of people in Africa, Asia (including what was then called the Indian sub-continent), the Caribbean and elsewhere were subjected to brutal colonial rule by the non-Axis European powers. They had their labour and their natural resources exploited for centuries in some instances ? by outside interests.

I was reminded of the collective post-World War Two disintegration of the globe-spanning European empires while watching a recent documentary, a feature-length interview with the renowned African-American intellectual and historian the late John Hope Franklin.

This must have been one of the last interviews conducted with Dr. Franklin for it took him through the whole scope of his long life, including the struggle for racial equality in America and the struggle for decolonisation in the wider world.

Indeed, this documentary underscored how brightly the flame of decolonisation burned in the 1950s and '60s, casting the light of liberty and self-determination in former colonial possessions around the world and igniting the passion of subjugated people for self-rule. As Dr. Franklin commented, this world-wide movement for democracy and justice even influenced the thinking of Civil Rights leaders in the United States in their peaceful war against segregation and second-class citizenship.

But a historical question remains to be answered as regards Bermuda. Why didn't the appeal of national self-determination ? Independence from the colonial power ? grip this country with the same fervour that was in evidence elsewhere?

While some may cling to the quaint notion that Bermuda is indeed "another world", I believe an answer to this question may lie in a closer examination of the nature of Bermuda's own racial and Civil Rights struggle and what influences may have pushed Bermuda in the more conservative direction with which it addressed these pressing issues.

Certainly efforts got under way to dismantle barricades of segregation and discrimination in the 1950s and '60s but the pursuit of these important objectives was never yoked to the pursuit of Independence ? as was the case in so many other colonies.

And it's not as if Bermuda did not share some important commonalities with other colonial societies.

Before the universal application of Civil Rights was an accepted norm in Bermudian society, this island was a perfect example of a colonial society ? the black majority was denied fundamental civic and political rights, denied full access and opportunity to participate in Bermuda's economic system.

Civil service positions were closed to black Bermudians and even when such jobs began to be opened up to all people in Bermuda, many of the top positions remained the exclusive preserve of foreigners, usually people from Britain.

So in theory you had the classic situation in which a full-blooded Independence campaign should have emerged at the same time as the struggle for Civil Rights got under way ? there was a disenfranchised black majority, a privileged white minority, British dominance of the island's political and administrative apparatus and an immigration policy that was race based (although this reality would probably be denied today).

Interestingly, given all of these conditions, Bermuda's black majority did not react like other colonial peoples facing the self-same situations in the 1950s.

Edgar Fitzgerald Gordon, founding father of Bermuda's organised labour movement and an icon of the Civil Rights movement, first came to prominence during this period. But, curiously enough, there is absolutely no historical evidence to suggest that Dr. Gordon supported the concept of Bermudian Independence.

This fact is all the more curious, from my perspective, given the world-wide anti-colonial movement was beginning to gather strength at precisely the same time Dr. Gordon launched his campaign against Bermuda's bastions of discrimination.

Even the famous "White Paper" that Dr. Gordon prepared and took over to England on November 2, 1946 ? a petition signed by the executive committee of the Bermuda Workers Association, forerunner of the Bermuda Industrial Union ? was an appeal to the United Kingdom to intervene in Bermuda's antiquated colonial society rather than anything even approximating a challenge to ongoing British colonial rule here.

The "White Paper" listed any number of grievances about the civic, political and economic arrangements in Bermudian society as they impacted on what the petition called "the great majority of the underprivileged and suffering in Bermuda" (meaning the island's black majority).

Rather than demanding the British leave Bermuda, the "White Paper" asked the Foreign & Commonwealth Office of the so-called Mother Country to play a more active role in improving the living conditions of black Bermudians in its colony.

The "White Paper" could in no way be interpreted as a call for Bermudian Independence. It never touched on the issue of national self-determination, the subject that became the rallying point for oppressed peoples in most of Britain's other colonial territories.

Why didn't Dr. Gordon and the black Bermudian leadership which backed him link their desire for Civil Rights with the global movement for decolonisation and sovereignty?

I can only speculate at this point but it could be that Dr. Gordon was so consumed with establishing the framework of a viable trade union organisation in Bermuda and the pursuit of Civil Rights for the black majority that he might have seen Independence as something of a distraction from the important work at hand.

He was already working around the clock to pursue his agenda for creating a more just civic society in Bermuda ? involving himself in establishing an anti-colonial movement would not necessarily have helped him to fulfil these fundamental objectives at that particular time.

Ironically, one of the last conversations I had with my late friend and fellow trade unionist Carlton Askia (Burchall) concerned Dr. Gordon and his efforts to refashion Bermudian society. My friend stunned me when he revealed that Dr. Gordon may well have been a monarchist.

Indeed, there are even photographs of Dr. Gordon in top hat and tails greeting the Queen when she visited Bermuda in the early 1950s. Dr. Gordon did his medical training in Scotland where, I understand, he was treated very well. He only encountered the ugly face of racism when he came to Bermuda.

So he may not have had a particular dislike for the British or their institutions ? indeed, he seems to have believed that the British offered the ultimate solution to the problems that were largely created by white Bermudians.

In other words, the Foreign & Commonwealth Office represented a court of appeal of sorts that could pressure the white Bermudian Establishment to take the remedial steps necessary to reform Bermudian society in the post-World War Two era.

among the Bermudian ruling class for intelligent, articulate black people was well entrenched in this period. When Dr. Gordon was a Member of Colonial Parliament, the members of the Government of the day ? virtually all white ? never referred to him as "the Honourable Member".

It was always "Gordon" this and "Gordon" that. Even the newspapers treated him in the same discourteous way in the coverage of Parliamentary meetings. Finally, Dr. Gordon got fed up with the petty disdain shown to him by his fellow MCPs and announced that henceforth he should be referred to as "Mazumbo", an African name.

This move probably unsettled the racists in Bermuda's Parliament but it also marked the beginnings of something else in Bermuda's political and social evolution ? the emergence of a man who could have been a true nationalist leader in Bermuda, one who could have emerged as the father of an Independent Bermuda.

Some of us like to think this may have happened. But Dr. Gordon died at the age of 60 on April 20, 1955, still a relatively young man. And the truth is that we don't know whether or not he would have gone on to embrace a nationalist agenda and pursue the issue of Bermudian Independence.

Still, Dr. Gordon's caution as regards Independence should not be viewed in historical isolation. The fact is that none of the rest of the black leadership at that time seemed to be inclined to pursue Independence in tandem with the local Civil Rights struggle.