Publisher's Synopsis
The select committee of the Senate to investigate the occupation and administration of territories of the Republic of Haiti and of the Dominican Republic by American naval forces presents herewith a report upon the occupation of Haitian territory and the relation of the United States to the Government of Haiti. The Island of Haiti, midway between Cuba and Porto Rico supports a population as numerous as that of Cuba (about three and a quarter million souls) upon a territory about three-quarters as large as that of Cuba. It is therefore noteworthy in considering the economic and social condition of the inhabitants of the Island of Haiti that during recent years the export and import trade of the island has averaged perhaps one-tenth of the volume of Cuban foreign trade. Porto Rico, with a territory equal to one-fifth of that of the Island of Haiti and with a population of about a million and a quarter, has exported and imported about twice as much as has the neighboring island. While the Cuban interior may be reached from all ports by connecting railways, and while Porto Rico is covered with a network of splendid highways, and while its ports are united by a coastwise railway system, the whole island of Haiti prior to the coming of the Americans in 1915 had absolutely no through and thorough highways and no railways other than half a dozen unremunerative, unsuccessful, and incomplete spurs of track running inland from different points of the coast. In a country without highways and without railways, and in which even the few trails were impassable during unseasonable weather, it is not surprising that agriculture, industry, and trade all languished and that the overwhelming majority of the population has been utterly poor and illiterate.
