Pedro Francisco Bonó (1828-1906) was one of the most respected men in the history of the Dominican Republic. A businessman, lawyer, and planter, he moved in and out of polities as duty, rather than ambition dictated. In moments of greatest danger to the nation Bonó tended to emerge as a leader—for example, in a revolt against the “usurpations” of Buenaventura Báez in 1857, then in the “restoration” following the Spanish occupation in 1863, and again to defend the administration of his friend, President Ulises Espaillat, in 1876. Yet few Caribbean politicians have refused the honor of being president as often as Bonó and meant it.
While a young man Bonó fought against the Haitians, published some fiction, served briefly as deputy and as senator in the national government, and helped to draft the Constitution of 1858. The dictator, Pedro Santanta, drove Bonó and a handful of intellectuals into exile in 1854 but permitted him to return in time to witness the Republic’s annexation to Spain. In spite of poor health, Bonó became War Minister in the government of the Restoration and by 1867 was a justice of the Supreme Court and Minister of Foreign Affairs. At this stage of his life he frequently was suggested for the presidency.
Bonó is remembered primarily as a statesman, and it is his own writings and correspondence that make up the bulk of this book; biographical material is sketchy. Emilio Rodríguez Demorizi, whose busy typewriter has recently given us valuable collections about the Spanish occupation, the Restoration, and Ulises Espaillat, treats Bonó as Santo Domingo’s first sociologist. Bonó’s wide interests are reflected in his essays, speeches, and instructions to his administrative subordinates. His opinions are clear; his own reading is broad and surprisingly reflective of the Enlightenment. He was concerned with the relationship of low living standards and crime; he prescribed programs of broad educational and agricultural reform. He opposed the Samaná cession and any attack on his nation’s sovereignty. He looked to the municipality for the protection of political rights. Always he defended the individual.
Superficially Papeles de Bonó resemble the program of scores of nineteenth-century Latin American liberals. Still, as he studied his tormented little homeland from within and without, Bonó looked behind constitutional solutions and argued for the dignified treatment of man as the solution to the world’s racial, economic, and political ills.
