Istwa Nou

Terrifying the elite took very little after the summer of 1958. The press was already half bought and half frightened: opposition papers had been shut, awkward journalists jailed or beaten quiet, and the Catholic La Phalange was the only critical voice left until the government seized it in 1960. The survivors were managed through subsidies, control of newsprint and electricity, macoutes installed in editorial chairs, and editorials supplied ready made. Foreign correspondents were expelled, their cables censored, and offending articles cut out of imported magazines with scissors. Labour went next. After arresting the head of the national workers union, Duvalier told a delegation that any popular movement would be put down with total and inflexible rigour. Unions were broken, driven underground or handed to macoute officers until by 1963 only the drivers union survived, the one he had cultivated himself and which had become the recruiting ground for his militia. No business could declare bankruptcy or close its doors without palace approval. Spontaneous contributions were collected through the Chamber of Commerce. O. J. Brandt bought the entire million dollar bond issue for repaving the Grand'Rue, and the sugar company paid four hundred thousand dollars of tax in advance.