Self-Determining Haiti Part 4

On July 13 the Department of Finance replied to the Financial Adviser as follows:

"I beg to acknowledge your letter of July 12, in which you say, 'I find myself obliged, etc....'

"In taking note of this declaration, the importance and gravity of which certainly cannot escape you, I can only regret in the name of the Government:

"1. That you omitted to tell me with the precision which such an emergency demands what are the affairs of an importance so considerable for the welfare of the country and the settlement of which, according to the recommendations made by you, is of such great moment that you can subordinate to that settlement the continuation of the work on the budget?

"2. That you have taken such a serious step without considering that in so doing you have divested yourself of one of the essential functions which devolves upon you as Financial Adviser attached to the Department of Finance.

"The preparation of the budget of the state const.i.tutes one of the princ.i.p.al obligations of those intrusted with it by law, because the very life of the nation depends upon its elaboration. The Legislature has been in session since April 5 last. By the Const.i.tution the draft budgets and the general accounts should be submitted to the legislative body within eight days after the opening of the session, that is to say by April 13. The draft budgets were sent to your office on March 22.

"By reason of your absence from the country, the examination of these drafts was postponed, the acting Financial Adviser not being willing to shoulder the responsibility; we refer you to his letters of March 29 and of April 17 and 24. Finally ... you came back to Port-au-Prince, and after some two weeks, you began with the secretaries to study the draft budgets.

"The Government therefore experiences a very disagreeable surprise on reading your letter of July 12. It becomes my duty to inform you of that disagreeable surprise, to formulate the legal reservations in the case, and to inform you finally that you bear the sole responsibility for the failure to present the budget in due time.

"FLEURY FEQUIERE, Secretary of Finance"

On July 19, Mr. Bailly-Blanchard, the American Minister, placed in the hands of the President of the Republic a memorandum emanating from Mr. McIlhenny, in which the latter formulates against the Government complaints sufficient, according to him, to explain and justify the discontinuance of the preparation of the budget, announced in his letter of July 12.

_Memorandum of Mr. McIlhenny_

I had instructions from the Department of State of the United States just before my departure for Haiti, in a pa.s.sage of a letter of May 20, to declare to the Haitian Government that it was necessary to give its immediate and formal approval:

1. To a modification of the Bank Contract agreed upon by the Department of State and the National City Bank of New York.

2. To the transfer of the National Bank of the Republic of Haiti to a new bank registered under the laws of Haiti to be known as the National Bank of the Republic of Haiti.

3. To the execution of Article 15 of the Contract of Withdrawal, prohibiting the importation and exportation of non-Haitian money, except that which might be necessary for the needs of commerce in the opinion of the Financial Adviser.

4. To the immediate vote of a territorial law which has been submitted to the Department of State of the United States and which has its approval.

On my arrival in Haiti I visited the President with the American Minister and learned that the modifications of the bank contract and the transfer of the bank had been agreed to and the only reason why the measure had not been made official was because the National City Bank and the National Bank of Haiti had not yet presented to the Government their full powers. He declared that the Government did not agree to the publication of a decree executing the Contract of Withdrawal because it did not consider that the economic condition of the country justified it at that time. To which I replied that the Government of the United States expected the execution of Article 15 of the Contract of Withdrawal as a direct and solemn engagement of the Haitian Government, to which it was a party, and I had instructions to insist upon its being put into execution at once....

_The Counter Memoir_

To this memorandum the Executive Authority replied by a counter memoir which read in part as follows:

"The modifications proposed by the Department of State [of the United States] to the bank contract, studied by the Haitian Government, gave rise to counter propositions on the part of the latter, which the Department of State would not accept. The Haitian Government then accepted these modifications in nine articles in the form in which they had been concluded and signed at Washington, on Friday, February 6, 1920, by the Financial Adviser, the Haitian Minister, and the [Haitian]

Secretary of Finance. But when Messrs. Scarpa and Williams, representing respectively and officially the National Bank of Haiti and the National City Bank of New York, came before the Secretary of Finance for his signature to the papers relative to the transfer of the National Bank of Haiti to the National City Bank of New York, the Secretary of Finance experienced a disagreeable surprise in finding out that to Article 9 of the doc.u.ment signed at Washington, February 6, 1920, and closed as stated above, there had been added an amendment bearing on the prohibition of non-Haitian money. The Secretary could only decline the responsibility of this added paragraph of which he had not the slightest knowledge and which consequently had not been submitted to the Government for its agreement. It is for this reason alone that the agreement is not signed up to this time. The Government does not even yet know who was the author of this addition to the doc.u.ment to which its consent had never been asked."

Today, gentlemen, you have come to the end of the regular session for this year. Four months have run by without the Government being able to present to you the budget for 1920-1921.... Such are the facts, in brief, that have marked our relations recently with Mr. McIlhenny....

FLEURY FEQUIERE, Secretary of Finance

The Businessmen's Protest

The protest printed below, against Article 15 of the Contract of Withdrawal, was sent to the Haitian Secretary of Finance on July 30.

The undersigned bankers, merchants, and representatives of the various branches of the financial and commercial activities in Haiti have the honor to submit to the high appreciation of the Secretary of State for Finance the following consideration:

They have been advised from certain sources that pressing recommendations have been made to the Government of Haiti.

1. That a law be immediately voted by which would be prohibited the importation or exportation of all money not Haitian, except that quant.i.ty of foreign money which, in the opinion of the Financial Adviser, would be sufficient for the needs of commerce.

2. That in the charter of the Banque Nationale de la Republique d'Haiti there be inserted an article giving power to the Financial Adviser together with the Banque Nationale de la Republique d'Haiti to take all measures concerning the importation or exportation of non-Haitian monies.

The undersigned declare that the adoption of such a measure, under whatever form it may be, would be of a nature generally contrary to the collective interests of the Haitian people and the industry of Haiti. It would be dangerous to subst.i.tute the will of a single man, however eminent he might be, however honorable, however infallible, for a natural law which regulates the movements of the monetary circulation in a country.

It would be more dangerous yet to introduce in the contract of the Banque Nationale de la Republique d'Haiti a clause which would a.s.sure this establishment a sort of monopoly in the foreign money market, which const.i.tutes the princ.i.p.al base of the operations of high commerce, when it has already the exclusive privilege of emission of bank notes. Such a clause would make of all other bankers and merchants its humble tributaries, obeying its law and its caprices....

(Signed) THE ROYAL BANK OF CANADA; AMERICAN FOREIGN BANKING CORPORATION; HAITIAN AMERICAN SUGAR CO.; RAPOREL S.S. LINE; P. C. S.; ELECTRIC LIGHT CO.; PANAMA LINE; ED. ESTEVE & CO.; CLYDE LINE; COMPTOIR COMMERCIAL; GEBARA & CO.; ALFRED VIEUX; V. G. MAKHLOUF; N. SILVERA; SIMMONDS FRERES; ROBERTS, DUTTON & CO.; WEST INDIES TRADING CO.; J. FADOUL & CO.; R. BROUARD; A. DE MATTEIS & CO.; J. M. RICHARDSON & CO.; COMPTOIR FRANCAIS; H.

DEREIX; E. ROBELIN; F. CHERIEZ; I. J. BIGIO, AND GEO. H.

MACFADDEN.

"By Order of the American Minister"

Correspondence regarding the refusal of the Financial Adviser of Haiti, an American, but an official of the Haitian Department of Finance, to pay the salaries for the month of July, 1920, of the President and certain other officials of the Haitian Republic, revealing that the action was taken by order of the American Minister to Haiti, without explanation and without authority in the Haitian Const.i.tution or in the Haiti-American Convention, was printed in the _Moniteur_ for August 14.

I.

PORT-AU-PRINCE, August 2, 1920.

MR. A. J. MAUMUS, Receiver General of Customs

In accordance with the suggestion made to the Financial Adviser on July 24, your office began on the morning of July 30 to pay the salaries for that month to the officials and public employees at Port-au-Prince.

Nevertheless up to this morning, August 2, no checks have been delivered to His Excellency the President of the Republic, the secretaries of the various departments, the state councilors, and the palace interpreter.

In calling your attention to this fact I ask that you will please inform me of the reasons for it.

FLEURY FEQUIERE, Secretary of Finance.

II.

PORT-AU-PRINCE, August 2, 1920.

TO THE SECRETARY OF FINANCE AND COMMERCE