The Present State of Hayti (Saint Domingo) with Remarks on its Agriculture, Commerce, Laws, Religion, Finances, and Population

Another most extraordinary, and I call it a most unexampled power over the courts, is vested in the hands of an officer denominated the grand judge. He can stay execution after the judgment is confirmed as long as he may deem it adviseable; and although at the time the party is in possession of means to liquidate the debt, he frequently gives him one, two, or three years to pay it. In the mean time, the debtor may dispose of his property in a clandestine manner, the creditor being left to lament not only the loss of his debt, but the heavy charges to which he had been put through the whole of the delays and chicanery of the law, and the weakness and unfairness of the judges.

The British merchants in Hayti have been subjected to the most intolerable impositions, through the unjust proceedings of the courts of justice; but it is probable that some check will now be put to these iniquitous and nefarious proceedings. The consul-general is too wary, and too sensible of the evil, not to be on the alert; and although he may not have the power to remedy the past, I am confident he will prevent a recurrence of it in future. His known perseverance and determination have shaken the courts already, and his presence there will, I think, insure to his countrymen that justice for which they have so long sought in vain.

The judges form perhaps the most extraordinary selection of personages that could ever have been found in any country; and their avocations previously to their elevation to the judicial seat, have never been professional. The grand judge, Mons. Freshnell, is an infirm man of colour, nearly eighty years of age. Until he arrived at middle age, he had been actively and successfully employed in the marauding career of a pirate. His legal knowledge is just what might have been expected from his previous avocations. He is a modest old man, it is true; for when his present appointment was offered to him he declined it, as he said himself, from his incompetency to fill it, and to perform the duties which it required. Boyer however insisted on his accepting it, and remarked “that it did not require talent or legal knowledge to execute the duties of it, that he had only to do as he was directed by such orders as he might receive from the bureau of government”; so that, in fact, the first law officer of the republic is a mere tool of the government, possessed neither of capacity nor power. He is a mere instrument of the president, to move and act as he may be directed.

The chief judge of the court of cassation is a black, and, like that race in general, exceedingly vain both of his talents and high station. He is a small shopkeeper, but generally called a merchant (negociant), and in that way he is more respectable than in his judicial capacity. The other judges of this court are all engaged in some mercantile or similar calling, and exhibit neither the dignity of expounders of the law, nor the grave nor placid exterior demeanour of men on whom devolves the important duty of distributing justice with an equal hand.

Monsieur Dieu Donney, chief judge of the lower courts, is a man of colour, and may be considered as possessing some little knowledge in the laws of the republic, and would, in all probability, do justice were he permitted to do so. He is said to be a great opponent to the practice of suspending judgments when ready for execution, and has declared it, in the presence of the president, to be unjust and unconstitutional, and that before long it would inevitably be the means of driving all foreigners from the country, for it gave countenance to the fraudulent designs of those who were in the habit of obtaining a large amount in goods on credit, disposing of them immediately for less than they actually cost, for the purpose of realizing the money and investing it in lands, when they knew that in the first place they could, by the delays of the court, prevent judgment being taken for two years, and after judgment, might obtain three years for its liquidation; and in fact, perhaps in the end, never pay at all, because in the interim they might dispose of, or make over their property to another, in trust, and laugh at their creditor with impunity.

He is, I think, an upright man, and although his talents are not of the first order amongst his Haytian brethren, yet he makes up for this by his integrity, and gives great satisfaction by the justice of his decisions; but he is often controlled by the majority of his brother judges, who are as corrupt as they are ignorant.

The idea which some of the judges have of conscience is somewhat singular, and may not be unworthy of notice. They are all very ill paid it is true, and consequently they are open to bribery, as I have before mentioned; and whenever a good bribe is offered, they never consult their consciences about the justice of the case, but give a verdict as a quid pro quo for the douceur.

With regard to that respectable officer, a justice of the peace in Hayti, he is almost indescribable, being a compound of bad qualities. Speaking of them generally, they are what may be not incorrectly denominated retailers of justice, and dispose of it to that person who can give the most. They are persons certainly not very judiciously selected, and in the different districts where they reside, they exercise their power very arbitrarily, unless the parties who may unfortunately be brought before them, for offences committed within their jurisdiction, can afford to pay well for a little lenity. An attempt was made by the justice of peace at Port au Prince, who is the uncle of Boyer’s mistress, to impose on a British sailor, who had been illegally discharged from an American vessel, in which he had sailed, without payment of his wages, acting, it was said, under the influence of the agents of the vessel. But the British consul-general not only remonstrated strongly with this personage, but threatened to make it a subject of representation to the president; the fellow however having afterwards made some submission, and apologized for his conduct, the matter was permitted to drop.

Having touched upon the administration of the laws of Hayti, I shall now offer a few observations on the church establishment and the moral and religious condition of the people.

The established religion of Hayti is the Roman Catholic, the constitution, however, tolerates other forms according to the letter of the law; but although it does tolerate other forms of worship, the municipal authorities take great care that the Protestant sectarians shall encounter every possible obstacle when they wish to meet for the purpose of divine worship. They will not permit their meetings to be held in a public manner, and the inhabitants are cautioned against receiving them into their houses unless they desist from preaching. What is therefore called toleration in Hayti it would be difficult to define. It is not many years since, that a missionary from one of the societies of England (I think he was a Wesleyan) was obliged to leave the country, although that individual bore a most exemplary character, and had very studiously avoided exciting the envy of the Catholic priests, or giving the least umbrage to any person of that persuasion. He set about the duties of his mission with all the ardour of his sect, and gained many followers, but the rancour of the Catholic clergy was roused by his success, and their malice soon became conspicuous. This very worthy man, therefore, was subjected to great insult. His removal was suggested to the president, and the anathemas of the church were threatened unless he complied with their request. He was represented by them to have aimed at subverting the doctrines of the church of Rome, and of introducing heresy among the people, to have preached disobedience to the established authorities, and to have ridiculed the supremacy of the Pope. The weakness and submission of the president forced him to expel this individual from the island. It is said, however, that Boyer secretly enabled him to do so, by presenting him with a sum of money, and expressing the regret he felt that any causes of a religious character should have called upon him to exercise the power with which the constitution had armed him, as he individually was sensible of the unreasonableness of that jealousy which is too predominant in the followers of the Church of Rome, and which he could not but silently deprecate.

The Catholic church in Hayti appears to be in a very disorganized state. The schism in the church which happened a few years ago has not been healed, and Boyer, by expelling the bishop of Port au Prince and Pere Jérémie, (Jeremiah O’Flinns, an Irish priest,) has incurred severe papal censures, which, it is said, he has taken no steps to remove. Formerly the church establishment in Hayti was numerous, there being no less than an archbishop, three bishops, and about sixty priests and monks. But at this time there remain only about thirty or forty of the latter class distributed in the different parts of the country, and it is the determination of the government not to increase their number; the others will in future be excluded, as the poverty of the state requires the revenue of the church in aid of its exigences.

Some of the priests who officiate, are the most abject and miserable wretches I think I ever saw. They are poor, and in some of the interior parts they derive their sole support from the voluntary contributions of the inhabitants, but those in the principal towns have a tolerable income, and seem to enjoy the good things of this world in common with their flock. Those who attend at the shrine of Alta Gracia at Higuey are said to be rich, but their emoluments arise principally from the offerings of the poor deluded bigots who go there on their pilgrimage.

The people in general seem to care but little about religion, and the conduct of the leading men of the state sets religion and morality at defiance. The female Haytians who attend divine worship, and go regularly to mass, are not actuated by any religious feeling. Going to church is a mere matter of parade with them, the sabbath being a day of festivities, and not set aside for religious devotion. The female congregations which frequent the churches in Hayti appear better prepared for an opera, or some other public amusement, than for the sacred duties of offering up their prayers in adoration of the Deity.

The men seldom or never go to mass, except on the days particularly set apart by the government as public fêtes. On these occasions the president and all the officers of Hayti go in procession, but the idea of devotion, I believe, never enters their contemplation. Such days are merely set aside for celebrating some particular event, which it is wished should be handed down to posterity. These occasions present only the external symbol of religion, the whole people being either ignorant or careless of its real character. Their manner and appearance during the celebration of mass shew that they have no inward feelings of piety or devotion.

The moral state of the people is at the lowest possible ebb. In the towns there is perhaps the appearance of morality, and persons are apt to conclude that they have made some progress in general, from what they have observed in such places where opportunities are afforded of seeing those of the inhabitants who have had the benefits of education; but in the interior there is an infinite difference, and the people are in the lowest state of moral degradation – every thing shews it, their habits and manner of living. In secluded places they congregate, and follow all the propensities of nature, and indulge in all the vices of lust and sensuality without limits and without control. It is not possible, I think, for any one to visit their habitations, without returning from them with a conviction that their present state is much below any thing that can be imagined to have existed in the worst state of society in any part of the world. In the new republics of South America, in which society is very backward also, the prevailing habits present some appearance of improvement; but in the country districts of Hayti there are no demonstrations of advancement from that deplorable ignorance in which they seem to have existed from the period of the revolution; no change in their loose and dissolute manners and customs, but a fixed and determined perseverance in all the primitive vices of the African race.

If the interior of the houses of the highest class of people even in the towns display nothing indicative of that peculiar regard for propriety and cleanliness which we have heard of as being so characteristic of the people of colour, in the tropics, what will be said of the habitations of the cultivators in the interior of Hayti, where they resemble more the huts of the most savage tribes of the eastern and the western world? The former are far from being in such a condition as to make them desirable residences; for in fact they exhibit nothing approaching to that state which is so common with people of colour in other colonies, the sluggish occupiers caring little about cleanliness except in the exterior ornaments of their persons. The huts of the interior are merely mud edifices with two rooms for the accommodation of the whole family, and in which the slaves of the British colonies, and particularly in Jamaica, would disdain to reside; nor would their proprietors offer them such miserable abodes. In these houses filth and every species of uncleanliness prevail, for the people give themselves entirely up to their indolent and lazy habits. It is common to see the pigs and poultry herding with the family, and whilst the latter are at their repast, the former are in attendance, “picking the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.” One bed often suffices for all the inmates. The furniture consists of a very few articles, a table, a stool, two chairs, a side board, or rather a tray on four legs, and some bowls made from the calabash as substitutes for earthenware, with an iron pot or two for culinary purposes. Every thing seems useful, there is nothing ornamental, except now and then a small pier glass in a gilt frame decorated mostly with the labours of Arachne, and a wood-cut of the cap of liberty, considered to be an emblematical representation of Haytian heroism.

It may not be improper to offer a few remarks on the subject of education in the republic, and which seems to me to have been represented in colours far too glowing. Most people, I apprehend, have formed an opinion of the progress of education from what they have perceived in Port au Prince, Cape Haytien, and one or two others of the principal places, as though those places contained the largest proportion of the population. This is an erroneous impression, as the youth in the country parts, not having the means of education placed within their reach, are brought up in the darkest ignorance. This is immediately seen at any of the little villages through which the traveller has to pass, for making an inquiry at many of them if there were any schools, the answer was generally “there were none, except at Port au Prince.” In the north, the public schools established by Christophe, who really made efforts to disseminate knowledge and to improve the morals of the people, have all been suspended and the houses turned into barracks for the military, to the utter disgrace of the government.

In Port au Prince there is one school supported by the republic upon the Lancasterian principle, and a military school for young men who are intended for the scientific departments of the army, and there is a similar establishment at the cape; but the few schools which are to be met with in the large towns are merely private institutions to which youth are sent whose parents have the means of supporting them. The ignorant cultivators give themselves no concern about procuring moral education for their children; and on the score of religion they seldom feel the least anxiety, for three-fourths of them are at this moment as rank idolaters as their forefathers were in Africa.

In the towns also it should be understood the people are mostly engaged in some mercantile avocations, or else they are handicraftsmen, or persons holding some civil or military appointments. They therefore have not only an opportunity of educating their children, being contiguous to the schools, but they have the pecuniary means for doing so. The cultivators in the country have neither; money in particular they never have, except just as much as the sale of their vegetables on a Sunday brings them, but which is generally disposed of in payment for the salt provisions, and the supply of taffia required for their weekly consumption. They have no reserve for purposes of improvement, nor are they taught to improve; but the government seems to consider that to keep them in ignorance is the most secure way to insure tranquillity and repose to the country. That such is the feeling of the government I think is quite evident from the one hundred and seventy-eighth article of the Code Rural, which I have given before, and which orders that children shall be sent to their fathers “to follow their condition of life.” As long therefore as their parents continue in ignorance and immorality, it is clear that the children have no means of profiting by a good example. It is the prevailing sentiment of the people of colour, that the blacks should be kept in their present state of ignorance, and so long as the government be composed of people of the former class, the latter will remain in their present abject condition. As the negro is now situated, he is in a worse state of degradation than the slave; for although he is free, he is almost excluded from the general mass of the population; he is marked with the name of freedom, whilst he actually groans under despotism and oppression. In this state he is likely to remain, until some general change be effected in Hayti which shall place him in a state of unresisted intercourse with the more enlightened portion of the people, by which he may be taught properly to estimate the value of liberty, and made to participate in those blessings which it is wont to diffuse.

I do not know a circumstance that shews more clearly the backward state of knowledge and education in Hayti than the little progress made by the representatives of the people in the senate and in the chamber of communes, for there are many of them who can neither read nor write. In the senate, out of twenty-four members I could mention four or five who, at the time I left the island, could not write their names, nay, not even their initials. It may appear strange that the president, who has the selection of the members who occupy seats in the senate, should appoint men thus incapable and uneducated to become his council and advisers. However strange this may seem to others, it excites no surprise in my mind, because I am convinced, and it is a matter of general notoriety, that Boyer wants only mere passive instruments to obey, and not canvass or oppose any measures emanating from the government. Out of about seventy-two members composing the chamber of communes, there are twenty-six equally ignorant, and their only qualification seems to be a sufficient degree of pliancy to yield a ready assent to any proposition which has been submitted by the government for their consideration.

All that government wants of the members of either house is to keep up the appearance of legislative deliberation, to give a colour to their own proceedings, and form a cloak to cover their plans of oppression and rapacity. The persons selected in the different communes as representatives, are those who have been recommended by the government, for the people have no voice, or, what is nearly the same, they dare not raise it against those whom the president has recommended to their choice. These abject representatives are mere tools in the hands of government, and as they are well paid, they care little or nothing for the duties of the station to which they are elevated.

The senator with his one thousand two hundred dollars per annum, and the commune with his eight hundred dollars received from the treasury, would not hesitate to accede to any proposition, however monstrous and unconstitutional, in order to secure his seat, and preserve the favour of the government.

CHAPTER XIV

Population. – Census 1824, opinion on it. – Further statement. – Manner of taking the census. – Checks to increase. – Decrease is evident. – Nature of those checks. – Increase in United States according to Raymond. – Conclusion

It is a very difficult task to ascertain the exact number of the population in Hayti, and I may in all probability not be correct in the statement which was given to me, although I am convinced that the individual from whom I received it would not knowingly have offered me a document containing an erroneous calculation. Indeed I place great reliance on this statement, because the official station of its author affords him information which is not easily to be obtained from any other source. It appears that the census said to have been taken in the year 1824, and the particulars of which I have in my possession as presented to me personally by Boyer, is a fabrication of government, promulgated intentionally to astonish the nations of Europe with the rapid increase of the population since the expulsion of the French in the time of Dessalines. This census when taken into consideration will appear almost incredible, and, from the irregular manner in which, even on the confession of its advocates, it is acknowledged to have been taken, it will be found unworthy of being received as an authentic return. It states the number as follows: —

The incredibility attached to such a statement as the preceding will be manifested, when it is remembered that in 1802, in the time of Toussaint, the population

Now it must I think be admitted that such an increase as appears from a comparison of these two statements cannot be probable. That the population of any country should double in twenty-two years, cannot for a moment be believed. Here it is represented to have more than doubled, for there is a decrease in the Spanish part of nearly thirty-four thousand, and the subsequent war with Le Clerc and the massacres of Dessalines, as well as the long internal contests between Christophe and Petion, are not taken in the scale of decrease. The census of 1824, therefore, will, I should think, appear erroneous. That it is prima facie a fabrication, cannot be denied; and the advantage expected to result from this falsification I cannot comprehend. By the statement to which I have alluded as given to me, and on which I can rely as containing a more correct return of the population of 1824, Hayti appears to contain: —

And about three hundred white inhabitants, consisting of foreign merchants, tradesmen, handicraftsmen, &c.

Of the above number, the divisions are stated in this manner: —

This account of the population carries on the face of it much more probability than the statement of Boyer. Indeed I took no little pains to inquire of individuals conversant with the subject, and they spoke decidedly against the census of 1824, giving it as their opinion that it could not have exceeded seven hundred thousand, at all events seven hundred and twenty thousand of all degrees. It was their further opinion that the population had not lately increased, but on the contrary, from what they could observe in the different parts through which they had occasion to travel on their mercantile concerns, there appeared a great check, and that there was unquestionably an annual decrease.

The manner in which the government proceeds in taking a census must inevitably lead to inaccuracy and error, even where there is no design to deceive. A census is taken in each arrondissement by the general commanding, aided by the justices of the peace in the several parishes composing it, and as there are no registers kept in those parishes of births or deaths, every thing is left to estimation, occasional visits being made to several parts of them to ascertain the number of settlers. Now many of these proprietors have possessions in two or three parishes within the arrondissement; and the returns of persons composing their family are made in each of them, and thereby swell the aggregate of the population much beyond the actual number. And further, the census is not taken simultaneously in the several arrondissements, but at different periods, and it is said, that the cultivators who move from one to the other, are returned in two places.