“The administration of General Buenaventura Baez has just fallen under the weight of a great revolution, in which figure the principal notabilities of the country. A spontaneous cry, which may be called national, because it has risen from the depths of the majority, reveals the proportions of the movement, its character, and its legitimacy.”
Then follows in the same journal a manifesto signed by the principal inhabitants of Dominica, where are set forth with much particularity the grounds of his overthrow, alleging that he became President not by the free and spontaneous choice of the people, but was imposed upon the nation by an armed movement; that he treated the chief magistracy as if it were his own patrimony, and monopolized for himself and his brothers all the lucrative enterprises of the country without regard to the public advantage; that, instead of recognizing the merit of those who had by their sacrifices served their country, he degraded, imprisoned, and banished them; that, in violation of the immunity belonging to members of the Constituent Assembly, he sent them to a most horrible prison,—and here numerous persons are named; that, without any judicial proceedings, contrary to the Constitution, and in the spirit of vengeance, he shut up many deserving men in obscure dungeons,—and here also are many names; that, since his occupation of the Presidency, he has kept the capital in constant alarm, and has established a system of terrorism in the bosom of the national representation. All this and much more will be found in this manifesto. There is also a manifesto of Cabral, assigning at still greater length reasons for the overthrow of Baez, and holding him up as the enemy of peace and union; also a manifesto by the Triumvirate constituting the Provisional Government, declaring his infractions of the Constitution; also a manifesto from the general in command at the City of San Domingo, where, after denouncing the misdeeds of one man, it says, “This man, this monster, this speculator, this tyrant, is the General Buenaventura Baez.”
Soon after the disappearance of Baez, his rival became legitimate President by the direct vote of the people, according to the requirement of the Constitution. Different numbers of the official journal now before me contain the election returns in September, 1866, where the name of General José María Cabral appears at the head of the poll. This is memorable as the first time in the history of Dominica that a question was submitted to the direct vote of the people. By that direct vote Cabral became President, and peace ensued. Since then there has been no election; so that this was last as well as first, leaving Cabral the last legitimate President.
During his enforced exile, Baez found his way to Washington. Mr. Seward declined to see him, but referred him to me. I had several conversations with him at my house. His avowed object was to obtain money and arms to aid him in the overthrow of the existing Government. Be assured, Mr. President, he obtained no encouragement from me,—although I did not hesitate to say, as I always have said, that I hoped my country would never fail to do all possible good to Dominica, extending to it a helping hand. It was at a later day that belligerent intervention began.
Meanwhile Cabral, embarrassed by financial difficulties and a dead weight of paper money, the legacy of the fugitive conspirator, turned to the United States for assistance, offering a lease of the Bay of Samana. Then spoke Baez from his retreat, denouncing what he called “the sale of his country to the United States,” adopting the most inflammatory language. By his far-reaching and unscrupulous activity a hostile force was organized, which, with the help of Salnave, the late ruler of Hayti, compelled the capitulation of Cabral, February 8, 1868. A Convention was appointed, not elected, which proceeded to nominate Baez for the term of four years, not as President, but as Dictator. Declining the latter title, the triumphant conspirator accepted that of Gran Ciudadano, or Grand Citizen, with unlimited powers. At the same time his enemies were driven into exile. The prisons were gorged, and the most respectable citizens were his victims. Naturally such a man would sell his country. Wanting money, he cared little how it was got. Anything for money, even his country.
ORIGIN OF THE SCHEME.
Cabral withdrew to the interior, keeping up a menace of war, while the country was indignant with the unscrupulous usurper, who for the second time obtained power by violence. Power thus obtained was naturally uncertain, and Baez soon found himself obliged to invoke foreign assistance. “Help me, Cassius, or I sink!” cried the Grand Citizen. European powers would not listen. None of them wanted his half-island,—not Spain, not France, not England. None would take it. But still the Grand Citizen cried, when at last he was relieved by an answering voice from our Republic. A young officer, inexperienced in life, ignorant of the world, untaught in the Spanish language, unversed in International Law, knowing absolutely nothing of the intercourse between nations, and unconscious of the Constitution of his country, was selected by the President to answer the cry of the Grand Citizen. I wish that I could say something better of General Babcock; but if I spoke according to the evidence, much from his own lips, the portraiture would be more painful, and his unfitness more manifest. In closest association with Baez, and with profitable concessions not easy to measure, was the American Cazneau, known as disloyal to our country, and so thoroughly suspected that the military missionary, before leaving Washington, was expressly warned against him; but like seeks like, and he at once rushed into the embrace of the selfish speculator, who boasted that “no one American had been more intimately connected with the Samana and annexation negotiations, from their inception to their close, than himself,”—and who did not hesitate to instruct Baez that it was not only his right, but duty, to keep an American citizen in prison “to serve and protect negotiations in which our President was so deeply interested,” which he denominates “the great business in hand.”[20]
By the side of Cazneau was Fabens, also a speculator and life-long intriguer, afterwards Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary of Baez in “the great business.” Sparing details, which would make the picture more sombre, I come at once to the conclusion. A treaty was signed by which the usurper pretended to sell his country to the United States in consideration of $1,500,000; also another treaty leasing the Bay of Samana for an annual rent of $150,000. The latter sum was paid down by the young plenipotentiary, or $100,000 in cash and $50,000 in muskets and a battery. No longer able to pocket the doubloons of Spain, the usurper sought to pocket our eagles, and not content with muskets and a battery to be used against his indignant fellow-countrymen, obtained the Navy of the United States to maintain him in his treason. It was a plot worthy of the hardened conspirator and his well-tried confederates.