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Haiti INDEPENDENT HAITI
On January 1, 1804, Haiti proclaimed its independence.
Through this action, it became the second independent
state in
the Western Hemisphere and the first free black republic
in the
world. Haiti's uniqueness attracted much attention and
symbolized
the aspirations of enslaved and exploited peoples around
the
globe. Nonetheless, Haitians made no overt effort to
inspire, to
support, or to aid slave rebellions similar to their own
because
they feared that the great powers would take renewed
action
against them. For the sake of national survival,
nonintervention
became a Haitian credo.
Dessalines, who had commanded the black and the mulatto
forces during the final phase of the revolution, became
the new
country's leader; he ruled under the dictatorial 1801
constitution. The land he governed had been devastated by
years
of warfare. The agricultural base was all but destroyed,
and the
population was uneducated and largely unskilled. Commerce
was
virtually nonexistent. Contemplating this bleak situation,
Dessalines determined, as Toussaint had done, that a firm
hand
was needed.
White residents felt the sting most sharply. While
Toussaint,
a former privileged slave of a tolerant white master, had
felt a
certain magnanimity toward whites, Dessalines, a former
field
slave, despised them with a maniacal intensity. He
reportedly
agreed wholeheartedly with his aide, Boisrond-Tonnerre,
who
stated, "For our declaration of independence, we should
have the
skin of a white man for parchment, his skull for an
inkwell, his
blood for ink, and a bayonet for a pen!" Accordingly,
whites were
slaughtered wholesale under the rule of Dessalines.
Although blacks were not massacred under Dessalines,
they
witnessed little improvement in the quality of their
lives. To
restore some measure of agricultural productivity,
Dessalines
reestablished the plantation system. Harsh measures bound
laborers to their assigned work places, and penalties were
imposed on runaways and on those who harbored them.
Because
Dessalines drew his only organizational experience from
war, it
was natural for him to use the military as a tool for
governing
the new nation. The rule of Dessalines set a pattern for
direct
involvement of the army in politics that continued
unchallenged
for more than 150 years.
In 1805 Dessalines crowned himself Emperor of Haiti. By
this
point, his autocratic rule had disenchanted important
sectors of
Haitian society, particularly mulattoes such as Pétion.
The
mulattoes resented Dessalines mostly for racial reasons,
but the
more educated and cultured gens de couleur also
derided
the emperor (and most of his aides and officers) for his
ignorance and illiteracy. Efforts by Dessalines to bring
mulatto
families into the ruling group through marriage met with
resistance. Pétion himself declined the offer of the hand
of the
emperor's daughter. Many mulattoes were appalled by the
rampant
corruption and licentiousness of the emperor's court.
Dessalines's absorption of a considerable amount of land
into the
hands of the state through the exploitation of
irregularities in
titling procedures also aroused the ire of landowners.
The disaffection that sealed the emperor's fate arose
within
the ranks of the army, where Dessalines had lost support
at all
levels. The voracious appetites of his ruling clique
apparently
left little or nothing in the treasury for military
salaries and
provisions. Although reportedly aware of discontent among
the
ranks, Dessalines made no effort to redress these
shortcomings.
Instead, he relied on the same iron-fisted control with
which he
kept rural laborers in line. That his judgement in this
matter
had been in error became apparent on the road to
Port-au-Prince
as he rode with a column of troops on its way to crush a
mulattoled rebellion. A group of people, probably hired by Pétion
or
Etienne-Elie Gérin (another mulatto officer), shot the
emperor
and hacked his body to pieces.
Under Dessalines the Haitian economy had made little
progress
despite the restoration of forced labor. Conflict between
blacks
and mulattoes ended the cooperation that the revolution
had
produced, and the brutality toward whites shocked foreign
governments and isolated Haiti internationally. A lasting
enmity
against Haiti arose among Dominicans as a result of the
emperor's
unsuccessful invasion of Santo Domingo in 1805.
Dessalines's
failure to consolidate Haiti and to unite Haitians had
ramifications in the years that followed, as the nation
split
into two rival enclaves.
Data as of December 1989
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