1950, May–August 3: (The Junta Returns: Bellegarde’s Conseil, Magloire as the Gwo Nèg, the First Direct Presidential Election, and the Constitution in Careta…

1950, May–August 3: (The Junta Returns: Bellegarde’s Conseil, Magloire as the Gwo Nèg, the First Direct Presidential Election, and the Constitution in Caretaker Status): Whatever else might be said, the army had become overtly political — having tasted the fruit of the Tree of Good and Evil in 1946, it had returned four years later for a second bite. Lavaud’s name appeared at the top of the junta’s list, but it was Magloire who assumed the portfolio of Interior and National Defense and thus stood forth as the gwo nèg. The junta’s first action, after immediate dissolution of the legislature, was to appoint a Conseil Consultatif chaired by Dantès Bellegarde, drawn mainly from the Senate, to recommend electoral procedures and — as natural as breathing — a new constitution. At a press conference, Magloire observed that the constitution was in caretaker status; also in caretaker status, though less publicized, were several Estimé partisans and leading members of the Senate-sacking mob, quietly arrested as the junta took charge. Colonel Levelt, suave as ever, told a reporter that the first thing to do was to let the minds of people cool off. By August 3, hardly the year’s coolest day, Bellegarde’s Conseil had produced a decree that amounted to an interim constitution: national elections for a new legislature and for the presidency — Haiti’s first direct presidential election, with suffrage for all men over twenty-one — would take place on October 8. Even as the decree was proclaimed, Magloire resigned from the junta and announced for president, his post immediately taken by the distinguished Capois lawyer Maître Luc Fouché.