Places and Persons
Williams, Michael
Places and Persons THE HEALING OF HAITI By MICHAEL WILLIAMS WHAT will come of that one of the many commissions appointed by President Hoover which is to investigate conditions in Haiti cannot, of...
...However, one thing was certain, where so many others were confused or doubtful, namely, the good work of the Church...
...Whether or not the various commissions really discover the facts...
...It was at the time when the United States marines were being accused, and also abused, particularly by the more radical or liberal organs of our press on account of monstrous cruelties alleged against them...
...It may indeed be necessary to maintain a semi-protectorate, or some form of patronage of that romantic island for some time to come...
...Only a few weeks before our arrival in Haiti, a priest had been poisoned, presumably by a devotee of Voodoo...
...The late Senator Medill McCormick was the chairman of ex-President Harding's commission...
...At any rate, it seems an interesting and highly debatable one...
...the other members of it being the late Senator Jones of New Mexico, and former Senator Pomerene of Ohio, and Senator Oddie of Nevada...
...As all the American officials on the island told the correspondents over and over again, one chief trouble in dealing with the problems in both republics was the seesaw, inconstant, apparently even fickle methods prevailing in Washington...
...more important still, whether or not they dig down below the facts and reveal the principles and forces of which the visible facts are often merely the obscure expressions, are questions intensely debatable...
...One could not help but recall that the chief object of his voyage was not to discover new lands, but to find his way eventually to Jerusalem the Holy, as leader of a new crusade, and that to spread the Faith rather than commerce was his driving desire...
...Nevertheless, there were elements of financial and commercial imperialism mixed up with the worthier motives for the occupation which were not so acceptable...
...This threw a decidedly interesting light upon the nature of a large part of the publicity reaching readers in the United States...
...I raise the question...
...I bore letters of introduction to members of the hierarchy and to lesser yet important members of the clergy both in Haiti and in Santo Domingo...
...Never, except from professional bigots, does there arise a suggestion, in England, that British interests are not justly and properly served by these Catholic servants of the state...
...On a night drive with marine officers from Port au Prince to Cap Haitian in the north, I heard the Voodoo drums booming in the hills and saw the red blossoms of fire in the jungle which signalized the gathering of groups of the worshipers of Voodoo...
...The cannon-ball shot by Freebooter Drake when he sailed into the Spanish Main, and then around the south end of America and up the western coast, looting towns and burning churches, was visible in the roof of the old cathedral...
...but certainly we should not do it merely for business reasons, good as business reasons are in their proper place...
...Here was a really beautiful problem in the ethics of journalism (if there really is such a thing...
...Perhaps the fault in the United States, in this regard, as so often happens in other matters, is chiefly to be attributed to Catholics themselves...
...Perhaps the new Foreign Service School at Georgetown will help to redress this badly balanced situation...
...That is good news...
...That ancient quarrel has died down, like so many others...
...There was a Committee of Freedom for Haiti, with many active members in this country...
...but these had been the acts of isolated commanders of small units, touched by sun fever, and perhaps by the potency of alcohol, and certainly not directed or approved by the higher command...
...There is something solidly scientific in the conception of fact-finding commissions...
...Places and Persons THE HEALING OF HAITI By MICHAEL WILLIAMS WHAT will come of that one of the many commissions appointed by President Hoover which is to investigate conditions in Haiti cannot, of course, be safely predicted...
...Perhaps we have not yet developed that sense of service to the state, in diplomacy and foreign relations, and prefer rather to seek the more immediate and perhaps more financially profitable political positions open to energetic or lucky practical politicians at home...
...So did the further interesting fact that the representative of one of the largest of our press agencies was an employee of the senatorial commission...
...a circumstance which it shares with all the others...
...It is extraordinary that this point does not seem to be recognized...
...several of whom had also obtained assignments from newspapers or press associations in the United States...
...I had witnessed the same grim, sordid, horrible tragicomedy in Mexico...
...The thing can be worked out...
...It is amazing that more of our ministers and consuls in Latin America are not Catholics or at any rate educated gentlemen able and willing to learn about the Catholic Church, and the place it bears in the life of our southern neighbors...
...What becomes of objective truth when part of the publicity attendant upon a great public enquiry is gathered and written by a paid employee of the official, government side of the case, and another part is industriously, and even more fervidly, gathered and presented by avowed opponents of the governmental case...
...The version in Haiti was merely a cruder model of a fairly general type of political hypocrisy, subtly blended with humanitarian fanaticism...
...While the idea of commissions is in the air, it might be proper to propose still another, namely, one to consider whether the formation of a body of permanent secretaries at Washington, to keep our relations with foreign countries, and particularly those over which we have assumed some measure of responsibility, from fluctuating so badly as they have done in the past...
...My place was with the latter, representing the News Service of the National Catholic Welfare Conference...
...These latter gentry, wrote and spoke the most eloquent republican and libertarian sentiments imaginable, but for generations had kept the common people in ignorance, almost in savagery, while giving their own children high education in Paris, Berlin and Madrid, while sharing the taxes and customs income among themselves in a routine varied by numerous and bloody revolutions, each one of which, however, sooner or later simply resulted in reestablishing the rule of some despot or clique among the minority of powerful leaders, black or yellow, leaving the poor peasants and workers in the same condition, or a worse one, as that from which the revolutions were to rescue them...
...Yet whenever and wherever the Church found footing and some support, the Faith made way...
...It is well known that a large number in the foreign office which so ably serves the interests of the British empire are Catholics...
...but not without some continuity of policy at Washington...
...The case for the United States government intervening in Haiti and Santo Domingo when it did-considering all the circumstances: the menace of an occupancy of the island by Germany or some other European power during the world war, and the frightful condition of disorder in Haiti-seemed to me a compelling one...
...There were also secretaries, and interpreters, and attaches from the marine headquarters of High Commissioner General Russell in Port au Prince, and, of course, a number of newspaper correspondents...
...It was my good fortune to accompany a former Haitian commission appointed by President Harding in its tour of investigation in the black republic, and also in the neighboring republic of Santo Domingo, and perhaps some of my memories and impressions of that occasion may incidentally be useful to those readers who later on will follow and try to understand the reports that will come from the new commission...
...the official stenographer...
...For the sake of trade, and for the sake of culture, to say nothing about religion simply as religion, it should be taken into consideration...
...Perhaps, however, a little light may be thrown upon the complex of confusing facts and circumstances which will face the Haitian commission by approaching that subject a little more indirectly and suggestively than it is possible to do merely through abstract discussion...
...Back still further in the hills, so the missionaries told me-and they were the truly well informed of all on the island-the people were lapsing back into a condition closely resembling the primitive savagery of their African forefathers...
...not that Catholics expect them to do subtle propaganda or indeed any kind of propaganda for their religion, but unless or until our government realizes that in such countries as Haiti, Santo Domingo and Mexico, not to know the truth concerning the Church and the conditions amid which it works, is to ignore or at least not to know about one of the most vital elements for the future stability of our relations either with dependencies or semi-dependencies or protectorates, or with the Catholic nations to the south with which we have to deal...
...Modern life is so enormously complicated in all its operations and phases that any reasonable effort to get at rock-bottom facts is to be commended...
...The latter country has its own native Church, with Archbishop Nouel, of Santo Domingo, eminent not only as a churchman but also as a historian and as a statesman (he served one brief and troubled term as President of his country...
...I stood beside the shrine which contains the bones of the great discoverer...
...and still less because of any imperialistic lust...
...Moreover, what had been accomplished by the marine government in improving sanitation, in building roads, and, generally speaking, in accomplishing that exterior, material improvement of conditions which higher civilizations unquestionably bring in the wake of their military or their commercial imperialism, had been admirable and would endure: unless, of course, the island lapsed back too suddenly, or without some central, civilized control, into the hands of the small oligarchy of Negroid aristocrats...
...The state there seems to recognize that the special qualifications of a Catholic in dealing on behalf of his country with nations of Catholic culture, or where the Church plays a vital part in the life of the people, is a very practical qualification...
...Vocations were appearing among the blacks as well as among the more developed natives of Santo Domingo, where, indeed, nearly all the clergy were of native stock, some of them of pure Spanish blood, others of mixed origin...
...The French missionaries in Haiti, both men and women, were self-sacrificing, patient, untiring workers for the good of the poor, the victimized black and mixed-blood population...
...As for the conduct of the marines, undoubtedly there had been abuses and several instances of even outrageous tyranny...
...In Haiti the Church was organized under Propaganda Fide, as a mission country, the bishops and clergy being French, the sisters in the hospitals and schools also being from that great missionary land...
...When the commission reached Haiti it was met with a rousing street demonstration, bearing many signs composed in fluent and stirring English by American members of the patriotic Committee...
...It is not my present intention to debate them...
...The newspapers tell us that two of the new commission to Haiti are Catholic laymen, a gentleman from Rhode Island, Elie Vezina, who is presumably of French racial origin, and James Kerney of Trenton, New Jersey, the celebrated publisher of the Trenton Times...
...I do not say so...
...Why then should we start a new one with the people of Haiti and Santo Domingo...
...In Santo Domingo I saw the house of Columbus and his nephews...
Vol. 11 • March 1930 • No. 18
