Santo Domingo: A Country with a Future

by Otto Schoenrich

Congress meets each year in regular session on the anniversary of Dominican independence, February 27, and its session is limited to ninety days, which may, however, be extended sixty days more. Since there are no provincial legislatures the powers of the Congress, set forth in the Constitution, are sweeping. They include the right to legislate in general for every part of the Republic, to approve or reject treaties and to try the president, cabinet members and supreme court judges on impeachment charges.

In practice the elections for deputies have been as perfunctory as those for president, though there were occasional contests. The character and attitude of Congress has varied with the character and condition of the presidents. During the incumbency of strong leaders, such as Santana, Baez and Heureaux, the Congress was little more than the tool of the executive, but when the personality of the president was not so overwhelming or when many of the deputies were followers of a rival chieftain, as in the administrations of Jimenez and Morales, an independent and sometimes a nagging spirit has been manifested.

Under the American occupation the Congress was by decree of January 2, 1917, declared in abeyance and all executive and legislative powers are temporarily exercised by the commander of the American forces. The heads of executive departments are officers of the American navy or marine corps. Otherwise the general structure of the government remains as before. The theory that Santo Domingo is an independent, sovereign country is carefully followed, though at times it leads to anomalous situations, as when the American military governor issues exequaturs to American consuls in Santo Domingo "by virtue of the powers vested in me by the Constitution of the Dominican Republic," or when the American minister, Hon. W. W. Russell, representing the United States and receiving his instructions from the United States State Department, calls on Admiral H. S. Knapp, chief executive of Santo Domingo, who takes his orders from the United States Navy Department.

For administrative purposes the Republic is divided into twelve provinces; Azua, Barahona, Espaillat, La Vega, Macoris, Monte Cristi, Pacificador, Puerto Plata, Samana, Santiago, Santo Domingo and Seibo. Formerly six were known as provinces and six as maritime districts, though there was in practice no distinction between them. The provinces are subdivided into communes and cantons—a canton being a commune in embryo—and these in turn are subdivided into sections. Congress is empowered to create new provinces, communes and cantons.

In the twelve provinces there are now sixty-five communes, several comprising cantons. The provinces bear the names of their capital towns, except Espaillat and Pacificador, the former of which is called after Ulises F. Espaillat who took a prominent part in the War of Restoration and was president in 1876, and the latter in honor of President Heureaux, on whom a fawning Congress conferred the title of Pacificador de la Patria, but these also are sometimes known by the names of their capitals, Moca and San Francisco de Macoris. The communes bear the names of their urban centers. Towns with long names are usually referred to by part of the name only, thus Santa Cruz del Seibo is known simply as El Seibo, Santa Barbara de Samaná either as Santa Barbara or as Samana, etc.

At the head of each province is an official who bears the title of governor. He acts as the direct agent of the president and is chief of the government police and commander of the military forces of the district. In civil matter he is dependent upon the department of the interior and police, in military affairs he is under the department of war and the navy. The governors are appointed by the president of the Republic and their salaries are paid from the national treasury. Under the present American occupation the various provinces still have their governors, but the real governors are the American officers locally in command of the occupation forces.

In each commune and canton there is a communal or cantonal chief who represents the governor of the province. He is paid by the national government and is charged with the preservation of the peace in his jurisdiction. Again in each section there is a sectional chief, a local police officer who depends on the communal chief.

The system of local chieftains of gradually diminishing category has brought Santo Domingo to resemble in some administrations a feudal monarchy rather than a constitutional republic. As governor the president usually chose prominent men of the locality, either friends whom he wished to reward or opponents or rivals whom he was obliged to placate. The communal chiefs were also appointed by the president, though the governor's wishes were respected to a large extent, and here too men of influence were selected, such influence usually being reckoned by the possession of a devoted following. The section chiefs were chosen under similar considerations.

Though the law prescribes the duties of the governors, their local prestige, their authority as commanders of the military, and their activities in revolutionary times, have so exalted their position as to convert them into something like satraps and make them powerful supporters or dangerous rivals of the president. Many insurrections have been inaugurated by disaffected governors. At times provinces have remained practically independent for many months, ruled merely by the governor and a coterie of his friends, while the president, in the impossibility of imposing his authority, was obliged to acquiesce. A conspicuous example of such a peculiar state of affairs was furnished by the district of Monte Cristi, during the presidency of Morales. In December, 1903, the formidable insurrection of Jimenez against Provisional President Morales originated in Monte Cristi and though the government gradually regained the remainder of the country it was unable to subjugate this district, where the entire population was Jimenista and the character of the country rendered campaigning very difficult. Finally in the spring of 1904 a formal treaty was signed by which the insurgents agreed to lay down their arms upon the government's promise not to interfere in their district, where all executive appointments were thereafter to be made as recommended by the local authorities. Though constitutional forms were still observed a few military chiefs thus assumed the direction of affairs. Whenever any executive appointment was to be made, the name of the nominee was certified to the capital to be ratified as a matter of course; when orders came from Santo Domingo City, whether in civil or military affairs, they were obeyed or ignored as convenience dictated; the entire amount of the revenues collected in the Monte Cristi custom-house was retained in the district. In order to stimulate imports and increase the customs collections the local authorities even conceded a secret discount from the general tariff. With the enforcement of the San Domingo Improvement Company's arbitral award and the inauguration of the receivership for Santo Domingo the control of the custom-house passed out of the hands of the local chieftains, who sullenly protested as against an invasion of their treaty rights. In other matters the autonomy of the district remained unimpaired until the beginning of 1906 when upon the fall of Morales the government troops, in suppressing the revolution in the north, overran Monte Cristi province and restored its dependency upon the central government.

The healthiest and most important political subdivisions in Santo Domingo are the communal governments, and whatever progress has been made in the Republic has been due largely to their initiative. They correspond to the Spanish "municipios" and the French "communes." In Santo Domingo the French name was introduced during Haitian occupation. The various towns constitute the centers of government, their jurisdiction extends over the surrounding rural districts, and the affairs of the whole are administered by a municipal council. The powers of such councils are manifold and far-reaching and their importance has been accentuated by the chronic impotency of the central government to foster public improvements. The councils exercise all the faculties commonly pertaining to city councils elsewhere and have control of education, sanitation, streets and roads in their respective districts. They also act as election boards.