UNIA at Peak Then Collapses After Garvey's Imprisonment

The Universal Negro Improvement Association under Marcus Garvey reached peak membership of 4–6 million by 1921, with chapters in 40 countries, operating the Black Star Line shipping company, Negro Factories Corporation, and Black Cross Nurses. After Garvey's 1925 imprisonment for mail fraud — a prosecution orchestrated largely by J. Edgar Hoover's FBI using informants — the UNIA rapidly declined. Garvey was deported to Jamaica in 1927. While the UNIA's business ventures failed, Garvey's philosophy of Pan-African consciousness, Black pride, and self-determination profoundly influenced subsequent generations of Black nationalists including Malcolm X's father Earl Little, a UNIA organizer.