By Bill Forry

If you're up for a party - and New Year's Eve just didn't cut it this year - you're in luck. This weekend marks the 200th anniversary of the successful 1804 slave rebellion in Haiti, which resulted in the world's first black republic. And from Port-au-Prince to Boston, there will be major celebrations to mark the bicentennial.

Who cares, you may say? Fair enough.

Of course, we celebrate Saint Patrick's Day in this town like it's an American holiday, largely because one out of every four people in this state can lay claim to Irish ancestry. And, lots more who aren't even remotely from the Emerald Isle wear the green on March 17 - and it's not always just so they can quaff stout into the wee hours. (Although that's not the worst reason I've ever heard.)

The Irish rightly point to our legacy in "building this country" - the railroads, the politics, the shipyards. From the Fighting 69th to the Fighting Sullivans, Irish-Americans helped pay for America's freedoms in blood.

Haitians don't get the credit they deserve in the "building of America," mostly because they never came to Massachusetts in the numbers that the Irish have, and they have a rather muted voice in this society. Today, there are about 100,000 Haitians living in Greater Boston by most estimates, making it the world's third largest concentration outside the island itself. South Florida is home to the most Haitian people, with an estimated 500,000 and growing.

Small though the number may be when compared to us Irish, the Haitian people can claim a long and proud, though mostly unappreciated, history that closely parallels that of the Irish.

A divided island nation that was, like Ireland, enslaved for many long years by an imperial power, Haiti is renowned for its poets and artists, a people still captivated by a strange brew of Catholicism and murky, ancient superstitions. Even in independence, both countries flung their people like "wild geese" to far corners of the world, often unwanted and impoverished. The ones left behind, roughly 7-8 million in each case, mirrored each other in their rural lifestyles of subsistence farming that slowly gave way to cramped and sometimes miserable urban existence. Each have lived or are still living in the shadow of a decidedly malevolent empire - for the Irish, Great Britain, and for the Haitians, the U.S.

The bleak comparions between Ireland and Haiti, of course, have been obliterated in the last 40 years or so, as the European Union and Ireland's own Celtic Tiger have lifted the formerly Third World country into a first-rate society and economy. Haiti's misery is perhaps not singular in the world, but among countries in proximity to our own, it is unique for its chronic instability, disease, and hunger. Unlike Ireland's continuing queue of legal and illegal migrants to these shores, Haitian immigrants still crowd desperately aboard modern-day famine ships for risky voyages that too often end in death or, more recently, lengthy incarcarations. By edict of John Ashcroft, Haiti is now officially considered a "security threat" by the U.S., its immigrants all considered potential terrorists unless proven otherwise. Since December 2001, that has meant, for scores of Haitian refugees, months, now years in jail, awaiting amnesty hearings while others, like Cuban refugees, are released within hours of wading ashore on the Florida panhandle.

How has it come to this? Without Haiti, it is quite clear, the America we know today would likely look a lot different - and not just in its mix of people. The Louisiana Purchase, through which Thomas Jefferson just about doubled the size of the young America in 1803, came about as a direct result of the plucky Haitians' war on Napoleon, who had sought to expand his French holdings in North America until the slaves of Santo Domingue drove his generals into the sea after a bloody 12-year struggle.

Even earlier, during the American's own revolt, Haitian slaves fought British Redcoats alongside the colonists, some of them to their deaths. Among the 750 Haitian volunteers who defended Savannah, Georgia in 1779 was a Haitian drummer boy named Henry Christophe, whose exploits leading his own countrymen two decades later helped Haitians follow their American brethren into "liberty."

Sadly, though, America never rewarded its Haitian compatriots and, in fact, refused to recognize the world's first black republic, fearing a similar revolt in our own southern states. It was not until a Massachusetts congressman, Charles Sumner, led the charge that the U.S. opened up diplomatic relations with Haiti in 1862, yet another reason to thank God you live in "Kennedy Country." Even after that, Sumner was forced to wage a political war to keep President Ulysses S. Grant from invading and annexing Haiti in 1870. The United States eventually did invade Haiti in 1915, and did not leave for 12 long years, an occupation that was justified by Washington as essential for "national security." For most Haitians it is still remembered as an unspeakable humiliation.

More recently, American presidents of both parties have taken less overt, but nonetheless hostile, swipes at Haitian sovereignty. In a great irony, the Bush administration - which itself entered power under a cloud of electoral mischief in 2000- judged Haiti's internal elections of the same year to be corrupt and "invalid." Bush and - to his great shame - Colin Powell launched sanctions against Haiti that have blocked humanitarian aide from flowing not just from U.S. coffers, but from international sources, a crime which continues to this day.

In this time of bicentennial celebration, Haiti is hemhorraging. The president, Jean-Bertrand Aristide, is under great pressure to resign and many expect could be compelled to leave before his term expires in 2005. Most Haitians have no work, there is a growing chasm between the rich elite and the vast poor population, South American-styled drug running is becoming more entrenched, and violence political and otherwise is surging.

Haiti has little to celebrate, other than its distinction as the world's first black republic. And the U.S., though not totally to blame, bears a great and growing responsibility for the chaos.

More and more, as Haitian-Americans root themselves into upwardly mobile Americans, it seems likely that Haiti's future, for better or worse, will ferment in places like Boston. Like the Irish of old, who plied their homeland with weapons and greenbacks, Haiti's greatest import is American largesse created by their naturalized cousins, aunts, and brethren. Someday, too, it may be that a Haitian-American finds a way to lead his mother's homeland into a new era of peace and prosperity. It's not lost on many Irish-Americans that Ireland's first freely-elected leader was Eamonn DeValera, born in New York City.

For many of us with ties to Haiti, this weekend's bicentennial is bittersweet. Some Haitians I know are choosing to ignore it altogether, so desperate is their despair over Haiti's plight.

Another friend is more hopeful, or at least, I would say, inspiring. Charlot Lucien, gifted writer and state public health official, writes, "On January 1st regardless of who is in power, God or the Devil, civilian or military regime, around the once forbidden bowl of soup, memories and victories of our Haitian super heroes and heroines will be evoked. Nobody will be expected to praise current leaders on either side of the political fence. As a matter of fact, they may be ignored. And yes, maybe some might even ride the celebrations, but they won't be able to claim mine as theirs.

"Given the choice between letting them ride it and denying my children this opportunity to be proud of their History, I choose the first option. Maybe the very evocation of the exploits of the ancestors will shame those responsible for the country's current plight. Who knows."