1902-12-17: (Pierre Nord Alexis Proclaims Himself President With U.S.

1902-12-17: (Pierre Nord Alexis Proclaims Himself President With U.S. Naval Support, the Great-Grandson of Henri Christophe Continuing the Dynasty of Black Aristocratic Military Strongmen): On December 17, 1902, Pierre Nord Alexis proclaimed himself president of Haiti with the support of the U.S. Navy off the Haitian coast. Born on August 2, 1820, into the Black aristocracy of Cap-Haïtien, Alexis was the grandson of Henri Christophe through his mother Blézine Georges, one of Christophe’s illegitimate daughters. He was also the son-in-law of Jean-Louis Pierrot, whose daughter Marie Louise he had married in 1845. The bloodlines of the Revolution ran through him: Christophe’s ambition, Pierrot’s revolutionary credentials, and the sense of entitlement that came with belonging to the Black elite that Christophe had created a century earlier. Alexis championed closer ties with the United States and supported public works programs, especially railroad construction. But his regime was plagued by almost constant rebellion, fiscal irregularities, and growing tension with Lebanese Christian immigrants whose economic influence he attempted to suppress through discriminatory legislation. In January 1908, at the age of eighty-eight, he proclaimed himself president for life, a gesture of authoritarian vanity that triggered the revolt that overthrew him in December 1908.