FRENCH EXPERIENCE WITH REPRESENTATIVE GOVERNMENT IN THE WliST INDIES' The problem of representative government in tropical colonics is beset with extraordinary difficulties, which are crying for solution just at present, when so many important colonial establishments have been founded in those regions. The simplest method of solv- ing the question, that of entrusting the administration to the discre- tion of tried officials, as is done in the English crown colonies, does not satisfy the political aspirations of the residents in the colonies and also runs counter to the ideal of government by consent, and of the political and moral amelioration of the natives. In case a repre- sentative council is established, in order to give opportunity for the expression of the political will of the inhabitants, it may be based either upon a restricted election or upon manhood suffrage. The latter solution has been tried only in the French tropical colonies. There the councils-general have been given real legislative power and are not merely advisory as in the English crown colonies. More- over, the governor, while not legally responsible to the council, is nevertheless forced ultimately to yield to its will, on account of its power to refuse certain important appropriations. The French West Indies are the best imaginable field for politi- cal assimilation ; the conditions which may be regarded as rendering that policy difficult or impossible are absent in the Antilles. There are two such contingencies : either, the population is so abjectly bar- barous or decadent that even the rudimentary facts of a higher civili- zation cannot be understood by it ; or it has a long-established social order, and its traditional religion, customs and political institutions lead it to resist assimilation to an alien society, as is the case in countries like Siam, Burma, and Cambodia. Neither contingency applies to the West Indies. The black and colored population of Martinique, originally re- cruited from various parts of Africa, has through the long era of slavery lost most of the connection with its older life. When the patriarchal organization of slavery was abolished in 1848, it became to a certain extent an atomistic society upon which assimilation could work with full force. Moreover, the colored population is ' Paper read before the American Historical Association, December 28, 1900. ( 475 )
