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The Cause of Cuba: Cubans

There has been an endeavor to set this down with "malice toward none and charity for all," and it certainly accounts for the frequent risings and constant agitation, that have at last resulted in the war that is overwhelming in ruin Spaniards and Cubans alike. Each effort of the Cubans to free themselves has caused the imposition of burdens until the load is beyond endurance.

The cost of the ten years' war has been charged to Cuba by Spain, and that of itself takes half that the customs amounted to in the best of times. It is not possible for the Island to meet further requisition. Before the present war had been determined upon, as a last resort, the planters were in a state of despondency--taxed until desperate. Those of them who entered into the rebellion say: "We had nothing to lose--all were ruined any how. We had to conquer or die or run away."

It may serve some suggestion of stratagem or impulse of vanity or arise from a vague reasoning that there is occasion for alarm, because Madrid has been telegraphing to Havana that the minister of colonies will put into effect the reforms of March 15th, 1895. We have seen what those adjustments are, and surely they are not acceptable.

Senor Estrado Palma has issued a manifesto regarding the pretended reforms which have been persistently pushed upon the public attention, and that which he has to say is full of striking pertinence. He writes, the "reforms" are unworthy consideration, and "we are firmly resolved to listen to no compromise and to treat with Spain only on the basis of absolute independence for Cuba. If Spain has power to exterminate us, then let her convert the Island into a vast cemetery; if she has not, and wishes to terminate the war before the whole country is reduced to ashes, then let her adopt the only measure that will put an end to it and recognize our independence." Now that this is the spirit and purpose of the great majority of the Cubans, may be accepted as the truth, and that which is and is to come, judged accordingly.

Senor Estrado Palma proceeds: "We have thrown ourselves into the struggle advisedly and deliberately; we knew what we would have to face, and we decided unflinchingly to persevere until we should emancipate ourselves from the Spanish government. And we know that we are able to do it, as we know that we are competent to govern ourselves. Experience has taught us that as a people we have nothing to envy the Spaniards; in fact, we feel ourselves superior to them, and from them we can expect no improvement, no better education. We are Americans; we breathe the pure air of free institutions, and we contemplate with envy the government of the people, by the people, and for the people. We are in as good condition to rule ourselves without any fear of disorder or civil war as were the thirteen American colonies when they emancipated themselves from England, and in a superior condition to the Spanish colonies of this continent when they broke from the Spanish yoke. Slavery is over in Cuba with all its injustice and cruelties. The white man and the colored live in perfect harmony, without prejudices or resentment between them. They fight together to attain political liberty. The colored people in Cuba are superior to those in the United States. They are industrious, intelligent, and lovers of learning. During the last fifteen years they have attained wonderful intellectual development. On the other hand, thousands of white people, with all the facilities offered by their wealth, have completed their education in foreign countries, especially in the United States, where they have accustomed themselves to republican customs, and to the exercise of their rights as freemen, thus preparing themselves and preparing their sons for the exercise of those same rights in their native land when emancipated from Spanish domination."

This is delivered with the emphasis, perhaps the extravagance, of enthusiasm, but it is the truth of the Cubans, and it is of the highest importance that the people of the United States should familiarize themselves with the facts, for they are the essentials to the understanding of the fundamental conditions of the settlements the future must bring forth. Senor Palma tersely states facts, when he says: "Between the present revolution and the government of Spain there is no possible arrangement not based on the recognition of Cuban independence. It is useless to speak about reforms, or even of the more liberal home rule. All that is to nurse illusions and to lose time." The parallel that Senor Palma draws between the grievances of our revolutionary fathers, when they declared their independence, and the cause of Cuba, is a master-piece, and should be familiar to all American citizens. This is it:

We Cubans have a thousandfold more reason in our endeavor to free ourselves from the Spanish yoke than the people of the thirteen colonies when, in 1775, they rose in arms against the British government. The people of these colonies were in full enjoyment of all the rights of man; they had liberty of conscience, freedom of speech, liberty of the press, the right of public meeting, and the right of free locomotion. They elected those who governed them, they made their own laws, and, in fact, enjoyed the blessings of self-government. They were not under the sway of a captain-general with arbitrary powers, who, at his will, could imprison them, deport them to penal colonies, or order their execution even without the semblance of a court-martial. They did not have to pay a permanent army and navy that they might be kept in subjection, nor to feed a swarm of hungry employees yearly sent over from the metropolis to prey upon the country. They were never subjected to a stupid and crushing customs tariff which compelled them to go to the home markets for millions of merchandise annually, which they could buy much cheaper elsewhere; they were never compelled to cover a budget of twenty-six or thirty million dollars a year without the consent of the taxpayers and for the purpose of defraying the expenses of the army and navy of the oppressor, to pay the salaries of thousands of worthless European employees, the whole interest on a debt not incurred by the colony, and other expenditures from which the Island received no benefit whatever, for out of all those millions only the paltry sum of $700,000 was apparently applied for works of internal improvement, and one-half of which invariably went into the pockets of the Spanish employees.

If the right of the thirteen British colonies to rise in arms in order to acquire their independence has never been questioned because of the attempt of the mother country to tax them by a duty on tea or by the Stamp Act, will there be a single citizen in this great republic of the United States, whether he be a public or a private man, who will doubt the justice, and more than the justice, the necessity in which the Cuban people find themselves of fighting to-day and to-morrow and always, until they shall have overthrown Spanish oppression and tyranny in their country, and formed themselves into a free and independent republic?