[28][29][30] Following the death of Ethiopian civil rights activist Hachalu Hundessa in 2020, his bust in the United Kingdom was destroyed by Oromo protesters, and an equestrian monument depicting his father was removed from Harar.

[43][44] In 1928, Empress Zewditu planned on granting him the throne of Shewa; however, at the last moment opposition from certain provincial rulers caused a change and his title Negus or "King" was conferred without geographical qualification or definition.

[49][39][42][50][51][nb 2] This title reflects Ethiopian dynastic traditions, which hold that all monarchs must trace their lineage to Menelik I, who is described by the Kebra Nagast (a 14th-century CE national epic) as the son of the tenth-century BCE King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba.

[60] Ras Makonnen arranged for Tafari as well as his first cousin, Imru Haile Selassie, to receive instruction in Harar from Abba Samuel Wolde Kahin, an Ethiopian Capuchin friar, and from Dr. Vitalien, a surgeon from Guadeloupe.

[40][68] In his place, the daughter of Menelik II (the aunt of Iyasu) was named Empress Zewditu, while Tafari was elevated to the rank of Ras and was made heir apparent and Crown Prince.

In the power arrangement that followed, Tafari accepted the role of Regent Plenipotentiary (Balemulu 'Inderase)[nb 3] and became the de facto ruler of the Ethiopian Empire (Mangista Ityop'p'ya).

While Tafari was the more visible of the two, Zewditu was not simply an honorary ruler, but she did have some political restraints due to the complicated nature of her position compared to other Ethiopian monarchs, one was that it required that she arbitrate the claims of competing factions.

[79][80] In 1924, Ras Tafari toured Europe and the Middle East visiting Jerusalem, Alexandria, Paris, Luxembourg, Brussels, Amsterdam, Stockholm, London, Geneva, Gibraltar and Athens.

On 19 October 1935, he gave more precise orders for his army to his Commander-in-Chief, Ras Kassa, instructing the men to choose hidden positions, to conserve ammunition, and to avoid wearing conspicuous clothing for fear of air attack.

The decision was not unanimous and several participants, including the nobleman Blatta Tekle Wolde Hawariat, strenuously objected to the idea of an Ethiopian monarch fleeing before an invading force.

[140] A bust of Haile Selassie by Hilda Seligman stood in nearby Cannizaro Park to commemorate his stay, and was a popular place of pilgrimage for London's Rastafari community, until it was destroyed by protestors on 30 June 2020.

[149] In 1937, Haile Selassie was to give a Christmas Day radio address to the American people to thank his supporters when his taxi was involved in a traffic accident, leaving him with a fractured knee.

[156] On 27 August 1942, Selassie confirmed the legal basis for the abolition of slavery that had been illegally enacted by Italian occupying forces throughout the empire and imposed severe penalties, including death, for slave trading.

[161] Ethiopia was still "semi-feudal",[162] and the Emperor's attempts to alter its social and economic form by reforming its modes of taxation met with resistance from the nobility and clergy, which were eager to resume their privileges in the post-war era.

[161] In addition to these efforts, Selassie changed the Ethiopian church-state relationship by introducing taxation of church lands, and by restricting the legal privileges of the clergy, who had formerly been tried in their own courts for civil offenses.

[171][172] In keeping with the principle of collective security, for which he was an outspoken proponent, Selassie sent a contingent, under General Mulugueta Bulli, known as the Kagnew Battalion, to take part in the Korean War by supporting the United Nations Command.

[174][175] During the celebrations of his Silver Jubilee in November 1955, Selassie introduced a revised constitution,[176] whereby he retained effective power, while extending political participation to the people by allowing the lower house of parliament to become an elected body.

His letter to Lord Meork, National Distress Fund, London said, "even though We are busy of helping our people who didn't recover from the crises of the war, We heard that your fertile and beautiful country is devastated by the unusually heavy rain, and your request for aid.

[200][202][203] On 4 October 1963, Selassie addressed the General Assembly of the United Nations[204][205][206] On 25 November 1963, the Emperor traveled to Washington, D.C., and attended the state funeral of assassinated U.S. president John F. Kennedy.

[213] While he had assured Ethiopia's participation in UN-approved collective security operations, including Korea and Congo, Selassie drew a distinction between it and the intervention in Indochina, deploring it as needless suffering and calling for the Vietnam War to end.

[242] In addition to the exposure of attempts by corrupt local officials to cover up the famine from the imperial government, the Kremlin's depiction of Selassie's Ethiopia as backwards and inept (relative to the purported utopia of Marxism–Leninism) contributed to the popular uprising that led to its downfall and the rise of Mengistu Haile Mariam.

[248] General Aman Mikael Andom, a Protestant of Eritrean origin,[244] served briefly as provisional head of state pending the return of Crown Prince Asfa Wossen, who was then receiving medical treatment abroad.

On 23 November 60 former high officials of the imperial government were executed by firing squad without trial,[250] which included Selassie's grandson Iskinder Desta, a rear admiral, as well as General Aman and two former prime ministers.

[249][251] These killings, known to Ethiopians as "Black Saturday", were condemned by the Crown Prince; the Derg responded to his rebuke by revoking its acknowledgment of his imperial legitimacy, and announcing the end of the Solomonic dynasty.

[288][289] During PNP leader (later Jamaican prime minister) Michael Manley's visit to Ethiopia in October 1969, the Emperor recalled his 1966 reception with amazement, and stated that he felt that he had to be respectful of their beliefs.

[303] In 1948, Selassie donated 500 hectares of land at Shashamane, 250 kilometres (160 mi) south of Addis Ababa, to the Ethiopian World Federation Incorporated for the use of people of African descent who supported Ethiopia during the war.

He contrasted with the Solomonic dynasty and gave more political powers, dukedoms, and government offices to members of his immediate family, including his grandson Rear Admiral Iskinder Desta.

An individual source according to Paulos Milkias, a professor at Montreal, Canada, claimed that Desta threatened his grandfather with death at gunpoint unless he changed the successional line (although this was never definitively confirmed).

"[344] During one of his interviews with Meet the Press during a 1963 state visit to the U.S., a time when the Civil Rights movement was in full swing, Selassie condemned race-based oppression and advocated for Pan-African unity.

[370] Selassie has been depicted by photographers, artists, and sculptors such as Edward Copnall, Beulah Woodard, Jacob Epstein, William H. Johnson, Yevonde Middleton and Alvin Gittins.