Dominicans celebrate Restoration of Independence

Santo Domingo.- Most writers agree that the war whichrestored Dominican Republic’s Independence is the most important epic in history.

Journalist Nelson Rodriguez of Diaario Libre writes that GregorioLuperon, the revolt’s first sword, called it, “a struggle with the disadvantageof weapons, but with indomitable courage and immense joy of giving our livesfor the motherland."

He says another aspect of the feat’s greatness, whichbecame "a page of continental importance," in the opinion of the intellectualEugenio Maria de Hostos, was its character of national liberation, from whichemerged in the words of historian Juan Daniel Balcácer, "a peoples withimmense faith in the future, convinced that it is able to cope with any poweron earth to defend its autonomy."

To be sure, the liberation from Haiti in Feb. 27, 1844, isconsidered Independence Day in the Dominican Republic, but the fact that a ragtag Dominican militia was able to defeat a powerful Spanish army in Capotilloin mid-August 1864, leaves the debate open for posterity