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Of course that a number of them could have emigrated by sheer repugnance of haitian rule, cib. But the fact is that the majority of the people that emigrated belonged to the upper strata of the population of that time (hence Balaguer's lament), and, the only reason that I see for them to have emigrated is if they had their livelihood seized, which I'm certain was the case. Why? because it's not a secret that Boyer saw his fellow officers as potential enemies and rivals to keep appeased at all costs (so as to not run the same fate as Christophe did, which had to commit sucide after a rebellion from his officer corps), so, what better method of keeping them content than to offer them more land than they already posessed (keep in mind that the majority of the haitian presence on the eastern part during Boyer's rule was of the military kind, so it's a given that many of them came to "take posession" of the booty). Treachery was not an unknown vice on the haitian army, as Toussaint, Dessalines and Christophe respective fates can attest, so Boyer wasn't acting out of personal paranoia on this.

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But you are not taking into account something that did indeed happen during that rule, and that is, the disappearance of the terrenos comuneros land regime (an event that is narrated by Bernardo Vega and Frank Moya Pons), in which many families cultivated the land in a communal state (sort of like the israeli kibbutz), would indeed be expropiated by the regime, along with the lands of the Church (this last being a good move, by the way, because all these lands at the hands of the padrecitos were sitting idle, harming the country's economic well being by this lack of use). Also, you're forgetting that Boyer had to integrate into the bulk of the haitian army that part of the soldiery and officer corps which belonged to Christophe's kingdom (he couldn't just dismiss them, because he wasn't fool enough to risk another rebellion at the hands of already discontent troops), and the fact that his government had already depleted the economic surplus that Christophe left on his state's coffers at the time of his suicide (which amounted to 6 million british livres) by the time he took posession of the eastern part. All those factors tend to point that he had no other choice than to seize the lands of some of the spanish families in order to keep his already bankrupt regime afloat (a fact that is sustained by a myriad of authors, including haitian ones like Dantes Bellegarde). As a personal side note, my family from the maternal side (a junior branch of the Sotos of Bani) was part of the families that were expropiated by the regime.

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As an aside of this debate, I have a question for you: Did your family returned to Hinche after Toussaint's imprisonment by the french?

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I take it then that your disdain for the expatriates of that time that didn't come back comes from your experience with those people. Am I mistaken?

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cibaeno75,

While I do not currently know of any source that quotes from a Haitian legal document that states 'no whites of Santo Domingo can own land', it was actively discouraged by Boyer:

From Frank Moya Pons' History of the Caribbean, pages 177-178

'Boyers' first public decision was to abolish slavery and to promise farmland to all the freedmen. Although there were fewer than 4,000 slaves in Santo Domingo at that time.
'Because large amounts of land in Santo Domingo were owned communally, it was difficult for the Haitians to divide the land into smaller plots.
The problem of determining which lands the state could redistribute among the former slaves of Santo Domingo created numerous political difficulties.
In October of 1822, the commission determined that the state could claim as its own all property that had belonged to the Spanish government, the lands and buildings of the convents and religious orders that had been abandoned after 1795, all the property of the Church, French land confiscated since 1809, and the porperty of all collaborators with the French in their recently attempted invasion.
The Haitian authorities immediately began to confiscate these properties and redistribute them among the freedmen or sell them at a reduced rate to the military officials and Haitian functionaries who had also requested land and housing in Santo Domingo. These confiscations created a deep resentment among the Spanish and Creole population of Santo Domingo. Many of these properties had been in the possession of private citizens for over twenty years and their ownership was legalized by prior usage. In February of that year he gave former residents and expatriates of Santo Domingo a 4 month deadline to return to their land, with the penalty of confiscation if they failed to do so. When no one returned, the Haitian authorities tried to claim their land as state property. This greatly irritated the occupants of the land in question, many of whom were relatives of the absentee owners.

On July 8, 1824 he promulgated a new law defining which areas culd be claimed as state property on the eastern part of the island. According to the law, these areas included land that did not belong to private citizens before unification as well as all property of the Church, convents, hospitals, and other ecclesiastic organizations. The property of individuals who were absent when unification occurred and who did not return before the deadline established by the Haitian government was also nationalized, as was the property of those who left without pledging their allegiance to the Republic.

There was racial/ethnic overtones during Boyers occupatioin.

Author Jan Rogozonski's 'A Brief History of the Caribbean wrote: "President Boyer deliberately tried to destroy Santo Domingo's Spanish culture."

Otto Shoenrichs' writes:
http://www.fullbooks.com/Santo-Domingo1.html
Most
of the whites, especially the more prominent families, the principal
representatives of the community's wealth and culture, definitely
abandoned the country, some immediately upon the advent of the
Haitians, others in 1824, when a hopeless conspiracy in favor of a
restoration of Spanish rule was quenched in blood, and others in 1830,
when a quixotic demand of the Spanish king for a return of his domain
was refused by Boyer. The Haitians, anxious to eliminate the whites,
encouraged such emigration and confiscated the property left by the
emigrants. The policy of the Haitian government was to build up a
strong African state in the whole island, and in pursuance of this
policy it emancipated all slaves, colonized Haitian negroes on the
Samana peninsula and in other parts of the Spanish-speaking territory
and brought in colored people from the United States. Some of these
remained in Puerto Plata, others in Santo Domingo City, but the larger
number settled on the Samana peninsula, where their descendants still
form the bulk of the population. Every effort was made to Haitianize
the country by extending the Haitian laws, and imposing Haitian
governors.
The wanton acts of the Haitian authorities, their hostility to whites
and lighter colored mulattoes, their opposition to the Spanish
language and customs, and their neglect of the country's development,
caused much discontent, and the idea of separating from Haiti began to
be entertained.