Black Rules the White, London, 1900. Toussaint L'Overture's Own Memories, SANTO DOMINGO GOVERNMENT Until 1844 Santo Domingo was a part of Haiti. In February of that year the eastern part of the Island proclaimed its independence of the Republic of Haiti. This same year a Constitution was adopted. It has since been remodeled a number of times. The president is elected for four years. The National Congress consists of a Senate of 12 senators and a Chamber of Deputies of 24 members. The term is four years. The President is chosen by an electoral college for a term of six years. AREA AND POPULATION The area of Santo Domingo is estimated at 19,325 square miles and the population at 708,000 inhabitants. The population is mainly composed of Creoles of pure Spanish descent, and a mixed race of Europeans, Africans and Indians. There are also many Turks and Syrians, especially in Santo Domingo City where the dry goods trade is almost exclusively in their hands. The populations of the principal cities are: Santo Domingo, the capital, 22,000; Santiago, 20,000; Puerto Plata, about 15,000. RELIGION AND EDUCATION The religion of the State is Roman Catholic. Other forms of religion are permitted. Primary instruction is free and compulsory. The public schools are primary, superior, technical schools, normal schools and a professional school. In 1911 there were 590 schools in the Republic with 20,453 children. FINANCE The revenue is derived chiefly from customs. There are, also, sugar, liquor, and stamp taxes and considerable receipts from posts, telegraphs, telephones and from civil registration. The total revenues for 1913 were $4,208,400. Under the Convention, signed on the part of the United States and Santo Domingo, an American citizen is General Receiver of Customs with authority to deposit $100,000 each month toward interest (5 per cent) and sinking fund in trust for all national creditors. In addition half of the Custom receipts in excess of $3,000,000 is applied to the same end. REFERENCES TO SANTA DOMINGO.-Bulletin 52, Bureau of American NEGROES AND THE FIRST SPANISH EXPLORERS 1501. A Royal Edict permitted Negro slaves born in slavery among Christians to be transported from Spain to Hispaniola. These, however, were not the first African slaves brought from Spain. The first African slaves were brought over by the Spanish slaveholders, who, as they emigrated, were accompanied by their Negroes. 1505. King Ferdinand sent slaves to Hispaniola. In a letter dated September 15, of that year, he said, "I will send you more Negro slaves as you request. I think there may be a hundred." 1510. King Ferdinand sent from Seville fifty slaves to labor in the mines of Hispaniola. 1510. Direct traffic in slaves was established between Guinea and Hispaniola. 1516. Thirty Negroes are said to have accompanied Balboa. They assisted him in building the first ship constructed on the Pacific coast of America. 1517. Charles V., of Spain, who was also Emperor of Germany and the Netherlands, granted the exclusive monopoly to Flemish noblemen to import annually 4,000 Africans to Hispaniola, Cuba, Jamaica, and Porto Rico. This monopoly sold to some Genoese merchants for 25,000 ducats. 1522. Three hundred Negro slaves are said to have accompanied Cortez in his conquest of Mexico. 1526. Negro slaves were employed by Vasques de Ayllon in an attempt to establish a settlement on the coast of what is now North and South Carolina. This was the first introduction of Negro slavery into the territory of the United States. These slaves are said to have built the first ship constructed on the Atlantic Coast of America. 1527. A number of Negro slaves were in the expedition of Panfilo de Narvaez to conquer Florida; among them was Estevancio. 1528. The expedition, under De Narvaez, landed on the coast of Florida. 1539. was The expedition was unsuccessful. Estevancio, "Little Steve," a Negro, was a member of this expedition. Estevancio was afterwards the discoverer of Arizona and one of the first persons to cross the American continent. The survivors were wrecked on the coast of what is now Texas on November 6, 1528, and were made captives by the Indians. Estevancio, with two other companions, wandered over the plains of Texas and Mexico for eight years, until on the 24th of July, 1536, the city of Mexico reached. In 1538 he led an expedition from Mexico in search of the fabled seven cities and discovered Arizona and New Mexico. He was killed at Cibola, in what is now New Mexico. He was the first member of an alien race to visit the New Mexican Pueblos. After a lapse of three and one-half centuries, the tradition of the killing of Estevancio still lingers in a Zuni Indian legend, which, among other things, says: "It is to be believed that a long time ago, when roofs lay over the walls of Kya-ki-me, when smoke hung over the housetops, and the ladder-rounds were still unbroken in Kay-ki-me, then the Black Mexicans came from their abodes in Everlasting Summerland. Then the Indians of So-no-li set up a great howl, and thus they and our ancients did much ill to one another. Then and thus was killed by our ancients, right where the stone stands down by the arroyo of Kya-ki-me, one of the Black Mexicans, a large man, with chilli lips.*" African slaves accompanied the expedition of De Soto. 1540. The second settler in Alabama was a Negro. He was in the De Soto expedition. He liked the country and settled among the Indians. 1542. Three Negroes who accompanied the Coronado expedition remained behind at Triguex, near where Sante Fe, New Mex⚫ico, now is. 1562. The importation of slaves from Africa to the New World was begun by Englishmen. 1564-1565. The first vessel to make the return voyage across the Pacific from the East Indies to Mexico was steered by a Negro pilot. 1565. Pedro Menendez de Aviles had a company of Negro slaves when he founded St. Augustine, Florida. They were brought from Spain and were trained artisans and agriculturists. Lip swelled from eating chilli pepper. Matthew A. Henson.-Born in Charles County, Maryland, August 8, 1866. Most noted of all the Negro explorers. Accompanied Commander Robert E. Peary on all his expeditions in search of the North Pole except one. Henson was the only civilized person with Peary in his final dash to the pole, April 7, 1909. Henson made eight trips to the Arctic regions. In describing Henson's part in the discovery of the North Pole, Commander Peary said: On that bitter brilliant day in April, 1909, when the stars and stripes floated at the North Pole, Caucasian, Ethiopian, and Mongolian stood side by side at the apex of the earth, in the harmonious companionship resulting from hard work, exposure, danger, and a common object. Matthew A. Henson, my Negro assistant, has been with me in REFERENCE.-A Negro at the North Pole (Autobiography); Henson, M. a. NEGRO SLAVERY IN THE COLONIES 1619, August. First African immigrants landed in Virginia. They were probably not slaves, but servants indentured for a term of years. "About the last of August (1619) came in a Dutch man-of-Warre, that sold us twenty negars." Narrative of Master John Rolfe. It was not uncommon practice in this early period for shipmasters to sell white servants to the planters; hence an inference that this twenty Negroes were slaves, drawn from the fact that they were sold to the colony or planters would be unjustified. Prior to 1619 every inhabitant of the colony was practically "a servant manipulated in the interests of the company held in servitude beyond a stipulated term" . . . . . According to a census made in 1624-5 there were in the colony twenty-three Africans. They were listed as "servants," thus receiving the same class name as white persons enumerated in the lists. According to Thomas Jefferson, "the right to these Negroes was common or, perhaps, they lived on a footing with the whites, who, as well as themselves, were under absolute direction of the president." . . . . In the records of the county courts dating from 1632-1661, Negroes are designated as 1628. "servants," "Negro servants," or simply as "Negroes," but never REFERENCES: Russell, the Free Negro in Virginia, 1619-1865. pp. 22-25; Slavery in New York; abolished 1827. 1628. Slavery in New Jersey; abolished 1746. 1630. Slavery in Massachusetts; abolished 1780. 1631-1636. Slavery in Connecticut. Gradual abolition begins 1784. 1636. Slavery in Delaware; abolished 1865. 1639, January 6. First discrimination in law against Negroes in Virginia. The General Assembly requires all persons "except Negroes" to secure arms and ammunition or be subject to a fine. 1640. First record of a "Negro servant for life," otherwise a slave, in Virginia. His name was John Punch. In that year three servants of Hugh Gwyn, a Dutchman called Victor, a Scotchman named James Gregory, and John Punch ran away. They were captured, given thirty lashes each. The Scotchman and the Dutchman were condemned to serve four years beyond their indenture-one year to their masters and three to the colony. John Punch was condemned to serve for life. Russell, "The Free Negro in Virginia," says: "The most reasonable explanation seems to be that the Dutchman and the Scotchman, being white, were given only four additional years to their terms of indenture, while 'the third, being a Negro,' was reduced from his former condition of servitude for a limited time to a condition of slavery for life." 1641. Statutory recognition of slavery in Massachusetts. Statutory recognition of slavery by other American colonies was as follows: Connecticut 1650, Virginia 1661, Maryland 1663, New York and New Jersey 1664, South Carolina 1682, Pennsylvania and Rhode Island 1700, North Carolina 1715, and Georgia 1755. 1642. Governor Calvert of Maryland bargains with a certain shipmaster for the delivery of thirteen slaves. 1646. Massachusetts and Rhode Island make slave raiding a capital offense. 1647. Slavery in Rhode Island; gradual abolition begins 1784. 1649. Estimated there were three hundred Negroes in Virginia. REFERENCE: Virginia Magazine of History. Vol. XVII. p. 232. 1650. Connecticut passes an act making man-stealing a capital offense. 1651. First Negro landowners in Virginia. In that year patents were granted to Negroes as follows: Anthony Johnson 250 acres of land, John Johnson 550 acres, and John |