Istwa Nou

Charles MacKenzie took up his post as British Consul General to Haiti, sent by the Canning cabinet, which had decided that British commercial interests in the Caribbean were better served by an officer on the ground than by pretending the country did not exist. Many later accounts treat the appointment as British recognition of Haitian sovereignty. MacKenzie's own records say plainly that he was never accredited as a diplomatic agent. London wanted a reliable channel for trade and a set of eyes in a black republic twenty two years old, while stopping short of admitting it to the company of states. The comparison Logan draws is with the United States, which kept no post of any kind in Haiti and would keep none for decades, because any American gesture toward the place ran straight into the domestic quarrel over slavery. Britain bought itself commerce and information at low cost. Washington paid for its silence with both.