Abstract: In exile in Britain in 1936, Emperor Haile Selassie sent Malaku Bayen and his African-American wife Dorothy to raise money and support in the western hemisphere. There they created a weekly paper, the Voice of Ethiopia, and an organization, the Ethiopian World Federation, both explicitly directed to members of the African Diaspora. Drawing in enthusiastic African-Americans and Afro-Caribbeans, the VOE and EWF developed a new Black nationalism. Previous movements in the Diaspora had had hazy understandings of African cultures and history, believed in their duty to ‘uplift’ an allegedly backward Africa, and had been unable to establish a truly independent Black state. In contrast, the EWF promoted Ethiopia as the cultural-historical center for Black people across the globe; insisted that Ethiopia was an equal rather than junior partner in the process of modernization; and promised that Diasporic aid in liberating Ethiopia would be rewarded with a home in a strong, independent, Black state.