Colonial institutional rivalries escalated dangerously amid slave reform and war

Evidence

The conflict between the governor and the commissioners was a replay of the competition between governors and intendants that had long been a feature of the administration of Saint-Domingue. But now, in the midst of war and revolution, with the commissioners involved in a reform of slavery, the stakes of the conflict were higher than ever. — Dubois, Laurent, Avengers of the New World_ The Story of…, 537