1992, fall – November 3: (Nobody Willing to Touch the Third Rail of Foreign Military Intervention, Diaspora Remittances at $250 Million a Year the Largest So…

1992, fall – November 3: (Nobody Willing to Touch the Third Rail of Foreign Military Intervention, Diaspora Remittances at $250 Million a Year the Largest Source of Foreign Exchange, Clinton Declares Himself Appalled by Bush’s Repatriation Policy, and November 3 — the First Democratic Administration Since Jimmy Carter, a Lot More in Harmony with the Lavalasiens, and the Black Caucus in Congress): In the U.S. Aristide sought to bolster his position with key constituencies, addressing rallies in Central Park and working with the Congressional Black Caucus. Sensing opportunity, Arkansas Governor Clinton declared himself appalled by the Bush policy of repatriation of refugees. What the alternatives to negotiation were, no one was willing to publicly say, least of all the Delphic president-in-exile — brave talk of popular resistance played well in slick New York leftist journals, but those advocating it were well clear of any line of fire. Nobody, at least not yet, was willing to touch the third rail of Haitian politics — to call for foreign military intervention, though UN debates were certainly headed in that direction. Nor had any calls gone out for a cutoff of overseas remittances from the Diaspora — at $250 million a year the largest source of foreign exchange. Rather, as fall progressed, increased hopes were put on a change of administration in Washington rather than one in Port-au-Prince. On November 3, 1992, those hopes bore fruit as the first Democratic administration since that of the ill-omened Jimmy Carter was voted into office. A Democratic administration looked hopeful for several reasons: first, Governor Clinton had campaigned on a promise to change the Bush administration’s refugee policy; second, the incoming administration on the face of it seemed a lot more in harmony with the ideological bent of the Lavalasiens; finally, the Black Caucus in Congress, whose support was critical to Aristide’s cause, wielded far more influence in a Democratic administration than it had in a Republican one. The Clinton election — greeted in the Haitian exile community with the same fervent hope that had attended every change of administration in Washington since Geffrard’s agents had lobbied Lincoln — demonstrated that the internationalization of Haiti which Papa Doc’s policies had inadvertently created had permanently altered the dynamics of Haitian politics: with a million Haitians in the United States, many now citizens and voters, the question of who ruled in Port-au-Prince had become a question that could be posed in American electoral terms, the Diaspora’s political weight converting what had been for a century a matter of diplomatic maneuvering between unequal sovereigns into a domestic policy issue for the United States itself.