CHAPTER II

AMERICAN NEUTRALITY, 1895-1897

The abolition of slavery by a process of gradual emancipation constituted the only important reform of the period following the Ten Years' War. The great colonial abuses remained unabated, and this at a time when the larger political relations of SpanishAmerican peoples and the increased commercial activities of Cuba in particular stimulated the natural political instincts of the people. Cuba, with a captaingeneral enjoying full and arbitrary power, without a legislative assembly and without true representation in the Spanish Cortes at a time when its neighbors were enjoying the form at least of a free and independent government, with an antiquated, restrictive colonial policy made doubly bad by abuses in the management of the insular revenues, with life, liberty and property at the mercy of an office-holding aristocracy-Cuba so placed had every reason for political discontent.1 The

1A. Mérignhac, "L'Autonomie cubaine et le conflit hispanoaméricain," in the Revue du droit public, Vol. IX, p. 237, shows that the constitutional liberties fell short of the aspirations of the Cuban people, that irregularities in administration annulled the considerable degree of nominal liberty granted in the decree of April 2, 1881, that arbitrary governors-general imposed vexatious limits on individual liberty, and finally that no true right of freedom of speech, thought or writing, nor the enjoyment of religious liberty or of freedom of assembly or association existed. The fundamental liberties were entirely subject to the caprice of the governing aristocracy. Another writer estimates that in a population of 13,000 not more than 500 were Spaniards, but

British colonies in America in 1776 had much less justification for rebellion. However, Cuba's main grievances were economic rather than political. It has been estimated that Spanish office-holders took from forty to fifty per cent. of the annual insular revenues. The census taken by the War Department of the United States in 1899 showed an average revenue for the five years, 1893-8, of $25,000,000. Of this $10,500,ooo was absorbed in paying interest on the Cuban debt, which in 1897 amounted to $400,000,000 or $283.54 per capita. Twelve million dollars was necessary for the support of the Spanish army and navy in Cuba, and the Government-state and church-in the island. Two million five hundred thousand dollars was devoted to public works, education and general improvement. Business was hampered by an unfortunate commercial system. The termination in 1894 of the reciprocal commercial agreement with the United States closed the natural market of the island, and set up again the old system of differential, special and discriminating duties against foreign trade, and forced back on the Cubans compulsory trade with Spain. High duties on sugar, coffee and tobacco imported into Spain closed the only remaining markets.2 Wheat from the United States to Cuba was obliged to pass through the home ports of Spain, pay the duty, and then pass to Cuba. A letter written by Tomas Estrada Palma to Richard Olney, December in the same community the electoral lists contained 32 Cubans and 400 Spaniards. There was not a single Cuban among the members of the Municipal Council of Havana. Lebrand, La guerre hispano-américaine, p. 24.

2 Ibid., pp. 12-14; Report of the Cuban Census for 1899, War Department, Washington, 1900, p. 38.

7, 1895, while an ex parte statement of the causes of the insurrection, gives, there is every reason to believe, in the main a true indictment. Palma writes: "The causes of the insurrection of 1895 are substantially the same as those of the former revolution lasting from 1868 to 1878, and terminating only in the representation of the Spanish Government that Cuba would be granted such reforms as would remove the grounds of complaint on the part of the Cuban people. Unfortunately the hopes thus held out have never been realized. The representation which was to be given to the Cubans has proven absolutely without character; taxes have been levied anew on every thing conceivable; the offices in the island have increased, but the officers are all Spaniards; the native Cubans have been left with no public duties whatsoever to perform except the payment of taxes to the government and blackmail to the officials, without privilege even to move from place to place in the Island except on the permission of governmental authority.

Spain has framed the laws so that natives have substantially been deprived of the rights of suffrage. The taxes levied have been almost entirely devoted to the support of the army and navy in Cuba, to pay interest on the debt that Spain has saddled on the Island, and to pay salaries of the vast number of Spanish office-holders, devoting only $746,000 for internal improvements out of the $26,000,000 collected by tax. No public schools are within the reach of the masses for their education. All the principal industries of the Island are hampered by excessive imposts. Her commerce with every country but Spain has been crippled in every possible manner, as can be

seen by the frequent protests of ship owners and merchants.

The Cubans have no security of person or property. The judiciary are instruments of the military authorities. Trial by military tribunals can be ordered at any time at the will of the Captain-general. There is, besides, no freedom of speech, press or religion.

The direct cause of the insurrection was associated by the Cubans with the failure of the Cortes to pass the bill reforming the Government of Cuba, introduced in 1894 by Señor Maura, minister for the colonies. In fact, Spain had given Cuba many reform acts, such as the extension of the Spanish constitutional guarantees in 1881, the Spanish law of civil procedure in 1885, and the new Spanish civil code in 1889, but colonial politicians had perverted such concessions. For several years before the outbreak in 1895 Cuban leaders had been actively organizing revolutionary clubs and associating them into a revolutionary party. The soul of the movement was José Marti, a native of Cuba, who had had a varied career. He was educated in the law and had been for a number of years Professor of Literature and Philosophy in the University of Guatemala, for a time consul of the Argentine Republic, Uruguay and Paraguay in

Senate Document 231, 56 Cong., 2 Sess., part 7, p. 96. These charges were denied by the former mayor of Havana, M. Alvarez, in an article in the North American Review, Vol. 161, p. 362, but his contention fails to convince the reader. Compare views of Le Fur,. La guerre hispano-américaine, p. 8; Latané, pp. 137–38; Callahan, p. 367; Benoist, Rev. des deux mondes, Vol. 139, p. 553; Contemporary Review, Vol. 74, p. 1; North American Review, Vol. I, pp. 165, 610; Forum, September, 1895.

New York City, and in the same place publisher of a journal devoted to Cuban interests, La Patria. His associates were many of them veterans of other wars in Cuba and other parts of Spanish America. The supreme command in the rebel forces was assigned to Maximo Gomez, a Santo Domingan who had found service in the armies of Spain in his native island and Cuba and who had ably served the insurgents in the Ten Years' War. Before the outbreak of the revolt, the revolutionists had formed about one hundred and forty clubs or juntas in various states of North, South and Central America, Cuba and the other West Indies. Every member was a contributor to a fund to the amount of one tenth or more of his earnings. The greater sum was collected in the United States, but the aid from friends of Cuba, largely Cuban in blood, residents in other countries, was not inconsiderable. The agitators were supposed to have ready at the beginning of 1895 one million dollars. The insurrection, it is acknowledged, was conceived on neutral soil by Cubans in exile, was prosecuted from the first through arms and ammunition supplied by Cubans in foreign lands, who had in many cases become citizens of the lands of their adoption, and was financially supported, in part at least, by funds raised abroad. By virtue of this dependence of the insurrection on aid from Cuban naturalized subjects of neutral states and other neutral sympathizers the war was destined to involve serious questions of neutral rights and obligations.

* See North American Review, Vol. 166, p. 560, for account of financial sources by H. S. Rubens, counsel of the American Delegation of the Cuban Revolutionary Party; also Senate Document 885, 55 Cong., 2 Sess., testimony of Mr. Guerra, Treasurer of the Cuban Delegation.