<P> In 1937, Trujillo ordered the massacre of up to 38,000 Haitians, the alleged justification being Haiti's support for Dominican exiles plotting to overthrow his regime . This event later became known as the Parsley Massacre . Subsequently, during the first half of 1938, thousands more Haitians were forcibly deported and hundreds killed in the southern frontier region . The massacre was met with international criticism . General Hugh Johnson, a former New Deal official, made a national broadcast describing how Haitian women had been stabbed and mutilated, babies bayoneted, and men tied up and thrown into the sea to drown . The killing was the result of a new policy which Trujillo called the' Dominicanisation of the frontier' . Place names along the border were changed from Creole and French to Spanish, the practice of Voodoo was outlawed, quotas were imposed on the percentage of foreign workers that companies could hire, and a law was passed preventing Haitian workers from remaining after the sugar harvest . </P> <P> Although Trujillo sought to emulate Generalissimo Francisco Franco, he welcomed Spanish Republican refugees following the Spanish Civil War . During the Holocaust in the Second World War, the Dominican Republic took in many Jews fleeing Hitler who had been refused entry by other countries . The Jews settled in Sosua . These decisions arose from a policy of blanquismo, closely connected with anti-Haitian xenophobia, which sought to add more whites to the Dominican population by promoting immigration from Europe . As part of the Good Neighbor policy, in 1940, the U.S. State Department signed a treaty with Trujillo relinquishing control over the nation's customs . When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor Trujillo followed the United States in declaring war on the Axis powers, even though he had openly professed admiration for Hitler and Mussolini . During the Cold War, he maintained close ties to the United States, declaring himself the world's' Number One Anticommunist' and becoming the first Latin American President to sign a Mutual Defense Assistance Agreement with the United States . </P> <P> Trujillo and his family established a near - monopoly over the national economy . By the time of his death, he had accumulated a fortune of around $800 million; he and his family owned 50--60 percent of the arable land, some 700,000 acres (2,800 km), and Trujillo - owned businesses accounted for 80% of the commercial activity in the capital . He exploited nationalist sentiment to purchase most of the nation's sugar plantations and refineries from U.S. corporations; operated monopolies on salt, rice, milk, cement, tobacco, coffee, and insurance; owned two large banks, several hotels, port facilities, an airline and shipping line; deducted 10% of all public employees' salaries (ostensibly for his party); and received a portion of prostitution revenues . World War II brought increased demand for Dominican exports, and the 1940s and early 1950s witnessed economic growth and considerable expansion of the national infrastructure . During this period, the capital city was transformed from merely an administrative center to the national center of shipping and industry, although' it was hardly coincidental that new roads often led to Trujillo's plantations and factories, and new harbors benefited Trujillo's shipping and export enterprises .' </P> <P> Mismanagement and corruption resulted in major economic problems . By the end of the 1950s, the economy was deteriorating because of a combination of overspending on a festival to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the regime, overspending to purchase privately owned sugar mills and electricity plants, and a decision to make a major investment in state sugar production that proved economically unsuccessful . In 1956, Trujillo's agents in New York murdered Jesús María de Galíndez, a Basque exile who had worked for Trujillo but who later denounced the Trujillo regime and caused public opinion in the United States to turn against Trujillo . In August 1960, the Organization of American States (OAS) imposed diplomatic sanctions against the Dominican Republic as a result of Trujillo's complicity in an attempt to assassinate President Rómulo Betancourt of Venezuela . </P>

Dominican immigration to the usa happened mostly during which period