François Duvalier[a] (14 April 1907 – 21 April 1971), also known asPapa Doc, was a Haitian politician and physician who served aspresident of Haiti from 1957 until his death in 1971.
Duvalier completed a degree in medicine from theUniversity of Haiti in 1934 and spent a year at theUniversity of Michigan studying public health. In 1943 he became active in a campaign to control the spread of contagioustropical diseases in Haiti. His patients affectionately called him "Papa Doc," a moniker that he used throughout his life. Duvalier served as Minister for Public Health and Labor under the administration ofDumarsais Estimé.[3]
An undercover governmentdeath squad, theTonton Macoute (Haitian Creole:Tonton Makout), indiscriminately tortured or killed Duvalier's opponents; the Tonton Macoute was thought to be so pervasive that Haitians became highly fearful of expressing any form ofdissent, even in private. The Tonton Macoute eventually came to number 300,000 and more than half of the government budget was allocated to the group as well as the Presidential Guard.[3] Duvalier further sought to solidify his rule by incorporating elements ofHaitian mythology, most prominentlyVodou, into apersonality cult.
Duvalier remained in power until his death in 1971 and was succeeded by his son,Jean‑Claude, who was nicknamed "Baby Doc."
Duvalier was born inPort-au-Prince in 1907, the son of Duval Duvalier,justice of the peace, teacher and journalist,[4] whose family came fromMartinique, andUlyssia Abraham, a baker.[4][8] His aunt, Madame Florestal, raised him as a child.[6]: 51 He completed a degree in medicine from theUniversity of Haiti in 1934,[9] and served as staff physician at several local hospitals. He spent a year at theUniversity of Michigan studying public health[6]: 53 and in 1943, became active in aUnited States–sponsored campaign to control the spread of contagious tropical diseases, helping the poor to fighttyphus,yaws,malaria and other tropical diseases that had ravaged Haiti for years.[9] His patients affectionately called him "Papa Doc", a moniker that he used throughout his life.[10]
The racism and violence that occurred during theUnited States occupation of Haiti, which began in 1915, inspiredblack nationalism among Haitians and left a powerful impression on the young Duvalier.[11] He was also aware of the latent political power of the poor black majority and their resentment against the smallmulatto elite.[12] Duvalier supportedPan-African ideals,[13] and became involved in thenégritude movement of Haitian authorJean Price-Mars, both of which led to his advocacy ofHaitian Vodou,[14] an ethnological study of which later paid enormous political dividends for him.[12][15] In 1938, Duvalier co-founded the journalLes Griots. On 27 December 1939, he marriedSimone Ovide, a mulatto nurse's aide. They had four children: Marie‑Denise, Nicole, Simone, andJean‑Claude.[16]
In 1946, Duvalier aligned himself with PresidentDumarsais Estimé and was appointed Director General of the National Public Health Service. In 1949, he served as Minister of Health and Labor, but when Duvalier opposedPaul Magloire's 1950 coup d'état, he left the government and resumed practicing medicine. His practice included taking part in campaigns to preventyaws and other diseases. In 1954, Duvalier abandoned medicine, hiding out in Haiti's countryside from the Magloire regime. In 1956, the Magloire government was failing, and although still in hiding, Duvalier announced his candidacy to replace him as president.[6]: 57 By December 1956, an amnesty was issued and Duvalier emerged from hiding,[17] and on 12 December 1956, Magloire conceded defeat.[6]: 58
The two frontrunners in the1957 campaign for the presidency were Duvalier andLouis Déjoie, amulatto landowner and industrialist from the north. During their campaigning, Haiti was ruled by five temporary administrations, none lasting longer than a few months. Duvalier promised to rebuild and renew the country and rural Haiti solidly supported him as did the military. He resorted tonoiristepopulism, stoking the majorityAfro-Haitians' irritation at being governed by the few mulatto elite, which is how he described his opponent, Déjoie.[5]
François Duvalier was elected president on 22 September 1957.[18] Duvalier received 679,884 votes to Déjoie's 266,992.[19] Even in this election, however, there are multiple first-hand accounts of voter fraud and voterintimidation.[6]: 64
After being elected president in 1957, Duvalier exiled most of the major supporters of Déjoie.[20] He had a new constitution adopted that year.[10]
Duvalier promoted and installed members of the black majority in the civil service and the army.[13] In July 1958, three exiled Haitian army officers and five American mercenarieslanded in Haiti and tried to overthrow Duvalier; all were killed.[21] Although the army and its leaders had quashed the coup attempt, the incident deepened Duvalier's distrust of the army, an important Haitian institution over which he did not have firm control. He replaced the chief-of-staff with a more reliable officer and then proceeded to create his own power base within the army by turning the Presidential Guard into an elite corps aimed at maintaining his power. After this, Duvalier dismissed the entire general staff and replaced it with officers who owed their positions, and their loyalty, to him.[citation needed]
In 1959, Duvalier created a rural militia, theMilice de Volontaires de la Sécurité Nationale (MVSN, English:Militia of National Security Volunteers)—commonly referred to as theTonton Macoute after aHaitian Creolebogeyman—to extend and bolster support for the regime in the countryside. TheMacoute, which by 1961 was twice as big as the army, never developed into a real military force but was more than just asecret police.[22]
In the early years of his rule, Duvalier was able to take advantage of the strategic weaknesses of his powerful opponents, mostly from the mulatto elite. These weaknesses included their inability to coordinate their actions against the regime, whose power had grown increasingly strong.[23]In the name ofnationalism, Duvalier expelled almost all of Haiti's foreign-born bishops, an act that earned himexcommunication from the Catholic Church.[12] In 1966, he persuaded theHoly See to allow him permission to nominate the Catholic hierarchy for Haiti.[24] Duvalier now exercised more power in Haiti than ever.
On 24 May 1959, Duvalier suffered a massiveheart attack, possibly due to aninsulin overdose; he had been adiabetic since early adulthood and also suffered fromheart disease and associated circulatory problems. During the heart attack, he was comatose fornine hours.[6]: 81–82 His physician believed that he had sufferedneurological damage during these events, harming his mental health and perhaps explaining his subsequent actions.[6]: 82
While recovering, Duvalier left power in the hands ofClément Barbot, leader of theTonton Macoute. Upon his return to work, Duvalier accused Barbot of trying to supplant him as president and had him imprisoned. In April 1963, Barbot was released and began plotting to remove Duvalier from office by kidnapping his children. The plot failed and Duvalier then ordered a nationwide search for Barbot and his fellow conspirators. During the search, Duvalier was told that Barbot had transformed himself into a black dog, which prompted Duvalier to order that all black dogs in Haiti be put to death.[25] TheTonton Macoute captured and killed Barbot in July 1963. In other incidents, Duvalier ordered the head of an executed rebel packed in ice and brought to him so he could commune with the dead man's spirit.[26] Peepholes were carved into the walls of the interrogation chambers, through which Duvalier watched Haitian detainees being tortured and submerged in baths ofsulfuric acid; sometimes, he was in the room during the torture.[27]
Duvalier and Joel Barromi, Israeli ambassador to Haiti, surrounded by Haitian generals in 1963
In 1961, Duvalier began violating the provisions of the 1957 constitution. First, he replaced the bicameral legislature with a unicameral body. Then he calleda new presidential election in which he was the sole candidate. His term was to expire in 1963 and the constitution prohibited re-election, but the referendum sought to extend his term until 1967. The election was flagrantly rigged; the official tally showed a total of 1,320,748 "yes" votes for allowing Duvalier to stay in office, with none opposed.[10] Upon hearing the results, he proclaimed, "I accept the people's will. ... As a revolutionary, I have no right to disregard the will of thepeople".[6]: 85 [17]The New York Times commented, "Latin America has witnessed many fraudulent elections throughout its history but none has been more outrageous than the one which has just taken place in Haiti".[6]: 85 On 14 June 1964, anotherconstitutional referendum made Duvalier "President for Life", a title previously held by seven Haitian presidents; it also changed the flag and coat of arms from blue and red to black and red, with the black symbolising the country's ties to Africa. This referendum was also blatantly rigged; an implausible 99.9% voted in favor, which should have come as no surprise since all the ballots were premarked "yes".[6]: 96–97 [10] The new document granted Duvalier—orLe Souverain, as he was called—absolute powers as well as the right to name his successor.
His relationship with the United States proved difficult. In his early years, Duvalier rebuked the United States for its friendly relations withDominican dictatorRafael Trujillo (assassinated in 1961) while ignoring Haiti. TheKennedy administration (1961–1963) was particularly disturbed by Duvalier's repressive and totalitarian rule and allegations that he misappropriated aid money, at the time a substantial part of the Haitian budget, and aU.S. Marine Corps mission to train theTonton Macoute. The U.S. thus halted most of its economic assistance in mid-1962, pending stricter accounting procedures, with which Duvalier refused to comply. Duvalier publicly renounced all aid from Washington on nationalist grounds, portraying himself as a "principled and lonely opponent of domination by agreat power".[10]: 234
Duvalier misappropriated millions of dollars of international aid, including US$15 million annually from the United States.[28]: 50–51 He transferred this money to personal accounts. Another of Duvalier's methods of obtaining foreign money was to gain foreign loans, including US$4 million fromCuban dictatorFulgencio Batista.[28]: 47–48
After theassassination of John F. Kennedy in November 1963, which Duvalier later claimed resulted from a curse that he had placed on Kennedy,[29] the U.S. eased its pressure on Duvalier, grudgingly accepting him as a bulwark againstcommunism.[10][30] Duvalier attempted to exploit tensions between the U.S. andCuba, emphasizing hisanti-communist credentials and Haiti's strategic location as a means of winning U.S. support:
Communism has established centres of infection ... No area in the world is as vital to American security as the Caribbean ... We need a massive injection of money to reset the country on its feet, and this injection can come only from our great, capable friend and neighbor the United States.[20]: 101
Duvalier enraged Castro by voting against the country in anOrganization of American States (OAS) meeting and subsequently at theUnited Nations, where a trade embargo was imposed on Cuba. Cuba answered by breaking off diplomatic relations and Duvalier subsequently instituted a campaign to rid Haiti of communists.[31] This move severedHaitian relations with Cuba for 38 years until the two countries re-established relations in 1997.
Duvalier's relationship with the neighboringDominican Republic was always tense: in his early years, Duvalier emphasized the differences between the two countries. In April 1963, relations were brought to the edge of war by the political enmity between Duvalier and Dominican presidentJuan Bosch. Bosch, a leftist, provided asylum and support to Haitian exiles who had plotted against the Duvalier regime. Duvalier ordered his Presidential Guard to occupy the Dominican Embassy inPétion-Ville, with the goal of arresting a Haitian army officer believed to have been involved in Barbot's plot to kidnap Duvalier's children. The Dominican president reacted with outrage, publicly threatened to invade Haiti, and ordered army units to the border. However, as Dominican military commanders expressed little support for an invasion of Haiti, Bosch refrained from the invasion and sought mediation throughtheOAS.[32]: 289
In 1966, Duvalier hosted theEmperor of Ethiopia,Haile Selassie I, in what would be the only visit of a foreign head of state to Haiti under Duvalier.[20]: 139 During the visit, the two discussed bilateral agreements between their two nations and the economic shortcomings brought about by international pressure. Duvalier awarded Haile Selassie the Necklace of the Order of Jean-Jacques Dessalines the Great, and the emperor, in turn, bestowed upon Duvalier the Great Necklace of theOrder of the Queen of Sheba.[20]: 139
Duvalier had a contentious relationship with theHoly See. The Vatican only recognized Haiti in 1860, and thereafter staffed its Church hierarchy with European clerics, mostly FrenchBretons. Even as the Haitian clergy slowly became "indigenized" in the early 20th century (the first Haitian-born bishop, Rémy Augustin, was consecrated in 1953), the church remained firmly aligned with the mulatto elite, conducting its business only in French and being a indefatigable opponent of Vodou practice. Duvalier's populist instincts andnoirist sponsorship of peasant ways made him intensely suspicious of the Church in Haiti, which he viewed as a semi-colonial force. He began actively persecuting the church in 1959, unleashing Tontons Macoutes onPort-au-Prince Cathedral, and began expelling foreign priests. In November 1960, he deported the FrenchArchbishop of Port-au-Prince,François Poirier, followed by his auxiliary, Bishop Augustin, and six French priests in January 1961 (resulting in his excommunication), and the Bishop of Gonaives and three French priests in November 1962.[33][34] The entireJesuit Order was expelled in 1964.[35]
The Vatican sought to strike a deal with Duvalier in order to end his persecution of the church, culminating in a concordat signed on August 15, 1966. This concordat lifted Duvalier's excommunication, and gave him the ability to nominate indigenous Haitians to the country's hierarchy. Within days after the signing of the concordat, the country's six bishops and archbishop were replaced by indigenous Haitian clerics loyal to Duvalier. Duvalier's promotion of Vodou also waned after he assumed control of the Haitian Church. This state of affairs lasted until 1984, when the concordat was amended by the Vatican.[35][36] However, the bishops nominated by Duvalier remained in office, with the Archbishop of Port-au-Prince,François-Wolff Ligondé, being particularly well-known as an ally of the Duvaliers until his toppling in 1991.[37]
During theNigerian Civil War, Duvalier granted diplomatic recognition toBiafra during its war againstNigeria, making Haiti one of few countries that recognized Biafra. Duvalier's decision to recognize Biafra was influenced by his anti-communist foreign policy and by Haiti's historical connection to theIgbo people, the predominant ethnic group of Biafra.[38][39]
Duvalier's government was one of the most repressive in the Western Hemisphere.[40] During his 14-year rule, his regime murdered and exiled many political opponents; estimates of those killed, not only political oponents, range from 30,000 to 60,000.[32] Attacks on Duvalier from within the military were treated as especially serious. When bombs were detonated near the Presidential Palace in 1967, Duvalier had nineteen officers of the Presidential Guard executed inFort Dimanche.[10]: 357 A few days later, Duvalier gave a public speech during which he read the attendance sheet with the names of all 19 officers killed. After each name, he said "absent". After reading the whole list, Duvalier remarked that "all were shot".[28]: 10–11 Many of those killed in the government's repression were communists and even suspected communists.[20]: 148 One of the reasons Duvalier targeted communism was to reassure the U.S. that he was not communist: Duvalier was exposed to communist and leftist ideas early in his life and rejected them.[20]: 147–148 On 28 April 1969, Duvalier instituted a campaign to rid Haiti of all communists. A new law declared that "Communist activities, no matter what their form, are hereby declared crimes against the security of the State." Those convicted under the law would receive the death penalty and have their property confiscated.[41]
Duvalier employed intimidation, repression, and patronage to supplant the old mulatto elites with a new elite of his own making. Corruption—in the form of government rake-offs of industries, bribery, extortion of domestic businesses, and stolen government funds—enriched the dictator's closest supporters. Most of them held sufficient power to intimidate the members of the old elite, who were gradually co-opted or eliminated.[10]
The government confiscated peasant landholdings and allotted them to members of the militia,[12] who had no official salary and made their living throughcrime andextortion.[10]: 464 The dispossessed fled to the slums of the capital where they would find only meager incomes to feed themselves.Malnutrition and famine became endemic.[12]
Nonetheless, Duvalier enjoyed significant support among Haiti's majority black rural population, who saw in him a champion of their claims against the historically dominant mulatto elite. During his 14 years in power, he created a substantial black middle class, chiefly through government patronage.[10]: 330 Duvalier also initiated the development ofFrançois Duvalier Airport with the help of US grant money. The airport is now known asToussaint Louverture International Airport after theleader of theHaitian Revolution.
Duvalier fostered an intensecult of personality, portraying himself as the physical embodiment of the island nation. He also revived the traditions ofVodou, later using them to consolidate his power with his claim of being aVodou priest himself. In an effort to make himself even more imposing, Duvalier deliberately modeled his image on that ofBaron Samedi, one of thelwa, or spirits, of Haitian Vodou. He often donned sunglasses in order to hide his eyes and talked with the strong nasal tone associated with thelwa.[42] The regime's propaganda stated that "Papa Doc was one with thelwa,Jesus Christ andGod himself".[12] The most celebrated image from the time shows a standing Jesus Christ with a hand on the shoulder of a seated Papa Doc, captioned, "I have chosen him".[43] Duvalier declared himself an "immaterial being" as well as "the Haitian flag" soon after his first election.[44] In 1964, he published acatechism in which theLord's Prayer was heavily reworded to praise Duvalier instead of God.[44][45]
Duvalier also held in his closet the head of former opponent Blucher Philogenes, who tried to overthrow him in 1963.[28]: 132 He believed another political enemy, Clément Barbot, was able tochange at will into a black dog and had the militia begin killing black dogs on sight in the capital.[46]
François Duvalier died ofheart disease anddiabetes on 21 April 1971 aged 64. His 19-year-old sonJean-Claude Duvalier, nicknamed "Baby Doc", succeeded him as president.[47][48][49] His Catholic funeral was held inside of the Hall of Statues in the National Palace on April 25, presided over by ArchbishopLigondé and the other bishops of Haiti and attended by a multitude of dignitaries, including American ambassadorClinton Knox. Initially placed in a fluorescent-lit glass box, his body was moved to a bronze glass-roofed coffin for internment. The large cortege processing to Port-au-Prince's Grand Cimetière was interrupted twice by minorcrowd crushes. He was laid to rest in a small tiled mausoleum which he had earlier built for his father.[50]
On 8 February 1986, when the Duvalier regime fell, a crowd attacked Duvalier's mausoleum, throwing boulders at it, chipping off pieces from it, and breaking open the crypt. Duvalier's coffin was not inside, however. A prevailing rumor in the capital, according toThe New York Times, was that his son had removed the remains when he fled to Paris in aU.S. Air Force transport plane the day before.[51][52][53] As of 2015, only the desecrated foundation of his mausoleum remains.[54]
Many books have been written about the Duvalier era in Haiti, the best known of which isGraham Greene's novelThe Comedians.[55] Duvalier, however, dismissed the piece and referred to its author as "a cretin, a stool pigeon, sadistic, unbalanced, perverted, a perfect ignoramous [sic], lying to his heart's content, the shame of proud and noble England, a spy, a drug addict, and a torturer".[56] The book was later made into afilm. Greene himself was declaredpersona non grata and barred from entering Haiti.[57]
Alan Whicker featured Duvalier in a 1969 episode ofWhicker's World, which included an interview with the president.[58] Made byYorkshire Television, the documentary is deeply revealing of Duvalier's character and of the state of Haiti in 1969.[59]
The first authoritative book on the subject wasPapa Doc: Haiti and its Dictator byAl Burt andBernard Diederich, published in 1969,[60] though several others by Haitian scholars and historians have appeared since Duvalier's death in 1971. One of the most informative, Patrick Lemoine'sFort‑Dimanche: Dungeon of Death, dealt specifically with victims ofFort Dimanche, the prison which Duvalier used for the torture and murder of his political opponents.[61]
In 2007, John Marquis wrotePapa Doc: Portrait of a Haitian Tyrant,[62] which relied in part on records from a 1968 espionage trial in Haiti to detail numerous attempts on Duvalier's life. The trial's defendant, David Knox, was a Bahamian director of information. Knox lost and was sentenced to death, but he was later granted amnesty.[63]
^Fatton, Robert Jr. (2013). "Michel-Rolph Trouillot'sState Against Nation: A Critique of the Totalitarian Paradigm".Small Axe.17 (3–42): 208.doi:10.1215/07990537-2379009.ISSN1534-6714.S2CID144548346.In 1963, Duvalier created theParti de l'unité nationale—PUN (National Unity Party)—to constitute a single-party system. ... the existence of a single party as one of the defining characteristics of the totalitarian nature of Duvalierism ... the party had a thoroughly inconsequential role in the Duvalierist system.
^Péan, Leslie (24 July 2014)."Métaspora de Joël Des Rosiers ou l'art comme dépassement de la vie quotidienne".Le Nouvelliste (in French). Port‑au‑Prince.Archived from the original on 9 November 2015.Dans un mélange de subtilité allusive et de rigueur architecturale,Joël Des Rosiers décrit ainsi la détresse psychique du dictateur: « François Duvalier chasseJoseph Dunès Olivier de la magistrature. Il fut ostracisé pour avoir notarié l'acte de candidature à l'élection présidentielle du sénateurLouis Déjoie, opposant politique et véritable vainqueur des élections. Ce fut le premier acte illégal du dictateur. Oh ! Il en fut d'autres. Oh ! Par bassesse, le dictateur vengeait la mémoire de son vrai père Florestal Duvalier, citoyen français duMorne des Esses, commune de la Martinique, tailleur de son métier à la rue de l'Enterrement, dont le fils aîné Duval Duvalier fut fait officiellement le père adoptif de François Duvalier alors qu'il en était le demi‑frère. Pour maquiller sa paternité tardive, Florestal Duvalier, vieillard cacochyme, poussa son fils adulte Duval à reconnaître l'enfant, né de ses amours ancillaires avec une jeune domestique, Irutia Abraham, originaire deManiche,commune des Cayes. La mère de Duvalier en devint folle. Son fils lui fut retiré si bien que l'enfant ne la connut jamais et fut élevé par une tante, madame Florestal .»
^Her name is recorded variously as "Ulyssia",[5] "Uritia",[6]: 51 and "Irutia".[7]
^Hall, Michael R. (2012).Woronoff, Jon (ed.).Historical Dictionary of Haiti. Historical Dictionaries of the Americas. Lanham, Maryland: Scarecrow Press. p. 92.ISBN978-0-8108-7549-4.LCCN2011035933.OCLC751922123.OL25025684M.While working in a hospital during the 1930s, [Simone Duvalier] met [François] Duvalier, and the couple married on 27 December 1939. They had four children: Marie‑Denise, Nicole, Simone, and Jean‑Claude Duvalier.
^Tartter, Jean (2001)."Haiti: National Security § The Duvalier Era, 1957–86". In Metz, Helen Chapin (ed.).Dominican Republic and Haiti. Country Studies. Research completed December 1999 (3rd ed.). Washington, D.C.: Federal Research Division, Library of Congress. p. 464.ISBN978-0-8444-1044-9.ISSN1057-5294.LCCN2001023524.OCLC46321054.Although referred to as a militia, the VSN in fact became the Duvaliers' front-line security force. As of early 1986, the organization included more than 9,000 members and an informal circle of thousands more. The VSN acted as a political cadre, secret police and instrument of terror. It played a crucial political role for the regime, countering the influence of the armed forces, historically the government's primary source of power. The VSN gained its deadly reputation in part because members received no salary, although they took orders from the Presidential Palace. They made their living, instead, through extortion and petty crime. Rural members of the VSN, who wore blue denim uniforms, had received some training from the army, while the plainclothes members, identified by their trademark dark glasses, served as Haiti's criminal investigation force.
^Peschanski, João Alexandre (2013). "Papa Doc's Feint: the misled opposition and the consolidation of Duvalier's rule in Haiti".Teoria e Pesquisa.22 (2):1–10.doi:10.4322/tp.2013.016.ISSN0104-0103.
^"Haiti: Papa Doc's concordat (1966)".Concordat Watch.Archived from the original on 16 January 2015.This concordat let Dr. François Duvalier ('Papa Doc') nominate seven key clerics, thus ensuring their personal loyalty to him. It also stipulates that future appointments should be 'preferentially to members of the indigenous clergy'. Both these measures helped bring the Haitian church under Papa Doc's control.
^Diederich, Bernard; Burt, Al (1969).Papa Doc: The Truth about Haiti Today. McGraw-Hill.A group of Tonton Macoute chiefs and militia sped to Martissant to relieve another unit being attacked by Barbot, and stumbled upon the Barbot stronghold. They believed they had him trapped in the house and they showered the house with gunfire until it seemed nothing inside could live. When they kicked down the front door, only a black dog ran out. No one was inside; but Barbot had left behind his stock of weapons and grenades. Some Haitians decided that the shadowy Barbot had the power to change himself into a black dog. They said Duvalier ordered all black dogs shot on sight.
^Lentz, Harris M. (2014) [1st pub. 1994]."Haiti".Heads of States and Governments. Abingdon, England: Routledge. p. 357.ISBN978-1-884964-44-2.OCLC870226851.OL14865945W.He once ordered the head of an executed rebel packed in ice and brought to the presidential palace so he could commune with his spirit.
^Murray, Rolland (2008). "Black Crisis Shuffle: Fiction, Race, and Simulation".African American Review.42 (2):215–233.JSTOR40301207.Haitian president François 'Papa Doc' Duvalier infamously claimed that his [Vodou] curse on John F. Kennedy brought about the President's 1963 assassination.
^abGreene, Anne (2001)."Haiti: Historical Setting § François Duvalier, 1957–71". InMetz, Helen Chapin (ed.).Dominican Republic and Haiti. Country Studies. Research completed December 1999 (3rd ed.). Washington, D.C.: Federal Research Division, Library of Congress. pp. 288–289.ISBN978-0-8444-1044-9.ISSN1057-5294.LCCN2001023524.OCLC46321054.President Duvalier reigned supreme for fourteen years. Even in Haiti, where dictators had been the norm, François Duvalier gave new meaning to the term. Duvalier and his henchmen killed between 30,000 and 60,000 Haitians. The victims were not only political opponents, but women, whole families, whole towns. In April 1963, when an army officer suspected of trying to kidnap two of Duvalier's children took refuge in the Dominican chancery, Duvalier ordered the Presidential Guard to occupy the building. The Dominicans were incensed; PresidentJuan Bosch Gaviño ordered troops to the border and threatened to invade. However, the Dominican commanders were reluctant to enter Haiti, and Bosch was obliged to turn to theOrganization of American States to settle the matter.
^Anderson, Jeffrey E. (2015).The Voodoo Encyclopedia: Magic, Ritual, and Religion. Santa Barbara, California: ABC-CLIO.ISBN9781610692083.
^Inskeep, Steve;Green, Nadege (6 October 2014)."Duvalier's Death Causes Mixed Reactions In Miami's Little Haiti".Morning Edition. Washington, D.C.: NPR.Archived from the original on 30 November 2014.People with ties to Haiti are remembering one of that country's former dictators. Jean‑Claude 'Baby Doc' Duvalier died over the weekend. The old saying goes, speak nothing but good of the dead, but that is hard forPatrick Gaspard to do. He's a U.S. diplomat and a Haitian‑American. And after Duvalier's death, he tweeted, I'm thinking of the look in my mother's eyes when she talks about her brother Joel, who was disappeared by that dictator. Duvalier and his father before him ran one of the most repressive regimes in the western hemisphere.
^"Report on the situation of human rights in Haiti".Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. Washington, D.C.: Organization of American States. 1979.ISBN978-0-8270-1094-9.OCLC8344995.Archived from the original on 21 March 2012.Current Haitian legislation contains a number of legal provisions that place considerable restrictions on the freedom of speech. The most important of these is the law of 28 April 1969: Article 1. Communist activities, no matter what their form, are hereby declared crimes against the security of the State ... The authors of an accomplices in crimes listed above shall receive the death penalty, and their goods and chattels shall be confiscated and sold for the benefit of the State{{citation}}: CS1 maint: work parameter with ISBN (link)
^abKofele-Kale, Ndiva (2006)."The Cult of State Sovereignty".The International Law of Responsibility for Economic Crimes (2nd ed.). Aldershot, England: Ashgate Publishing. p. 261.ISBN978-1-4094-9609-0.LCCN2006006433.OCLC64289359.OL7991049M.Not satisfied with being the Haitian flag, ... Duvalier also declared himself 'an immaterial being' shortly after he became 'President-for-Life', and issued aCatechisme de la Révolution to the faithful containing the following version of the Lord's Prayer: 'Our Doc, who art in the National Palace for Life, hallowed be Thy name by present and future generations. Thy will be done inPort-au-Prince as it is in the provinces. Give us this day our new Haiti and forgive not the trespasses of those antipatriots who daily spit on our country; lead them into temptation, and, poisoned by their own venom, deliver them from no evil ...'
^Fourcand, Jean M. (1964).Catechisme de la révolution [Catechism of the Revolution](PDF) (in French). Port‑au‑Prince:Edition imprimerie de l'état. p. 37.Archived(PDF) from the original on 27 September 2015.Notre Doc qui êtes au Palais National pour la Vie, que Votre nom soit béni par les générations présentes et futures, que Votre Volonté soit faite à Port‑au‑Prince et en Province. Donnez‑nous aujourd'hui notre nouvelle Haïti, ne pardonnez jamais les offenses des apatrides qui bavent chaque jour sur notre Patrie, laissez‑les succomber à la tentation et sous le poids de leurs baves malfaisantes: ne les délivrez d'aucun mal. Amen.
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