Item #68902 Dominican Republic. Report of the Commission of Inquiry to Santo Domingo. Frederick DOUGLASS.
Dominican Republic. Report of the Commission of Inquiry to Santo Domingo

First Edition of the Commission to Annex the Dominican Republic

DOUGLASS, Frederick; GRANT, Ulysses S.

Dominican Republic. Report of the Commission of Inquiry to Santo Domingo. with the Introductory Message of the President; Special Reports made to the Commission, State Papers furnished by the Dominican Government, and the Statements of over seventy witnesses.

Washington: Government Printing Office, 1871.

contributor]. GRANT, Ulysses S., [contributor]. Dominican Republic. Report of the Commission of Inquiry to Santo Domingo. with the Introductory Message of the President; Special Reports made to the Commission, State Papers furnished by the Dominican Government, and the Statements of over seventy witnesses. Washington: Government Printing Office, 1871.

Full Description:

DOUGLASS, Frederick, [contributor]. GRANT, Ulysses S., [contributor]. Dominican Republic. Report of the Commission of Inquiry to Santo Domingo, with the Introductory Message of the President; Special Reports made to the Commission, State Papers furnished by the Dominican Government, and the Statements of over seventy witnesses. Washington: Government Printing Office, 1871.

First edition. Octavo (8 7/8 x 5 3/4 inches; 225 x 145 mm). v, [1, blank], 297, [1, blank] pp. With folding map entitled "Map of the Island of Santo Domingo."

Publisher's full red cloth. Boards double-ruled in blind. Spine lettered in gilt. Some sunning to cloth, mainly spine and back board. Corners slightly bumped. Previous owner's old ink inscription dated 1872 on title-page. Internally very clean. Overall a very good copy.

"In 1869, President Grant put forth an annexation scheme. He proposed paying the Dominican Republic $1.5 million (about $25 million today) for the territory. Many in Congress opposed the idea, citing racist fears Dominicans would emigrate to the United States, plus political upheaval in neighboring Haiti. Grant asked Douglass to travel as an emissary to the Dominican Republic to determine if the population was amenable to becoming part of the United States. Feeling optimistic that the United States’s values of democracy and equality were advancing and believing those ideals would benefit the Dominican people, Douglass agreed. Despite Douglass’s efforts, the annexation treaty failed to pass in Congress. Further, in 1874 in response to a growing wariness of U.S. imperial ambitions, Haiti and the Dominican Republic signed a pact that neither nation would annex itself to a foreign power. The United States had to switch diplomatic tactics from annexation to alliance." (The Diplomatic Career of Frederick Douglass, The National Museum of American Diplomacy).

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HBS 68902.

$1,000.

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Item #68902

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