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RESEARCH PRODUCT

À l’ombre des épées. Les seigneurs de la guerre, gardiens de la Constitution et pouvoirs régulateurs dans l’imaginaire constitutionnel haïtien

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Due to a militarised society between 1804 and 1915, the weight of the warlords was heavy in the foundation and maintenance of the Haitian constitutional order. Their mission as guardians is apparent since the Constitution of 1801, and the military was not content to monopolise the supreme magistracy until the US occupation in 1915. Institutional practice, however, leaves much to be desired. The military Senate was defined by President Jean-Pierre Boyer as the moderating power of the institutions between 1839 and 1842, a short-lived attempt to normalise the institutions in the hands of generals at rest. Unfortunately, the political and social climate accompanying the disintegration of the state from 1859 onwards, against a background of the patrimonialization of power, resurrected (if it had ever disappeared) the brute force of the warlords. They engaged in pre-emptive coups, giving way to provisional military governments that flourished until the end of the 20th century. Despite the evidence, officers and future presidents, no doubt sincere, such as François-Denys Légitime, sketched out a theory that made the armed forces a kind of conservative power capable of reconciling a fractured society and restoring a bloodless state. In this way, they contributed to the Haitian constitutional imaginary, making us imagine a democracy in the shadow of swords that would always be a mirage.