Page "History of Haiti" Paragraph 74

Haiti elected its National Assembly in May 1946.

The Assembly set August 16, 1946, as the date on which it would select a president.

The leading candidates for the office — all of whom were black — were Dumarsais Estimé, a former school teacher, assembly member, and cabinet minister under Vincent ; Félix d ' Orléans Juste Constant, leader of the Haitian Communist Party ( Parti Communiste d ' Haïti — PCH ); and former Garde commander Démosthènes Pétrus Calixte, who stood as the candidate of a progressive coalition that included the Worker Peasant Movement ( Mouvement Ouvrier Paysan — MOP ).

MOP chose to endorse Calixte, instead of a candidate from its own ranks, because the party's leader, Daniel Fignolé, was only twenty-six years old — too young to stand for the nation's highest office.

Estimé, politically the most moderate of the three, drew support from the black population in the north, as well as from the emerging black middle class.

The leaders of the military, who would not countenance the election of Juste Constant and who reacted warily to the populist Fignolé, also considered Estimé the safest candidate.

After two rounds of polling, legislators gave Estimé the presidency.