the large sums which were required for the establishment of reform and the creation of the institutions which are the essential conditions of modern life.

"The Spanish Commission can not but protest against the assertion made in the American memorandum that the ten years' insurrection was the outcome of just grievances, and it regrets that such an assertion should have been made without a necessity which would have required it unavoidably, in the same way as the American Commission would surely, and with good reason, regret that the Spanish Commission should say anything here without an imperative necessity of the justice of the rebellions of the natives of the immense American territory which the United States had so often to suppress with an iron hand, and if it should also say anything of the right by which the Southern States attempted to break the federal bond by the force of

arms.

"It is usless, for reasons that will hereafter be stated, for the Spanish Commissioners to take up the concrete discussion of the divisions of the Cuban debt to which reference is made in the American memorandum. They understand the errors that may have found their way into that document, because it is very natural that the American Commissioners should not have such accurate knowledge as is requisite for precise judgment of the acts of the Spanish administration in the Peninsula, or in its colonies.

"And we find a confirmation of this in the facts.

"In regard to the argument against the recognition of a certain part of the Cuban debt, on the ground that the rebellion of a minority of the Cuban people to obtain their independence was just, we have only to make the following remark:

"The insurgent minority, it is true, rose up in arms to secure the independence of the island. The United States erroneously believed that their cause was just, and by force of arms caused it to prevail against Spain. But now the facts have shown that Spain was right, as the United States themselves have had to recognize that the Cuban people are not as yet in such conditions as are necessary to entitle them to the enjoyment of full liberty and sovereignty. It is upon this ground that the United States have decided to withhold from that people the said privileges and to hold them under American control, until they become able to enjoy that liberty prematurely demanded by them.

"The Spanish Commission feels bound, furthermore, to call the attention of the American Commission to the obligations of Porto Rico.

"The American memorandum' which is now answered refers exclusively to the obligations of Cuba. Is this omission due to the belief

that as the sovereignty over Porto Rico was not relinquished but ceded by Spain to the United States, it must be conveyed to the latter free from burdens of all kinds? Is the principle maintained that cessions of territory, for whatever causes, whether conquest, or a mere agreement, do not carry with them ipso facto all the burdens which encumber the ceded territory?

In the oral discussion the American Commissioners stated that the Spanish Government had declared that no debt rested on the smaller Antille. The Spanish Commissioners have carefully gone over all the written communications that have passed between the two High Parties, from the ultimatum of the President of the Union of April 20 of this year to the signing of the protocol in Washington on August 12 of the same. In none of them have they found a suggestion or trace of such a declaration. And, be it said in passing, that among other obligations, the smaller Antille has been burdened for very many years with a part, which though small is no less sacred, of the perpetual and truly just charge through which Spain, in the name of America rather than her own, has been showing her gratitude to the immortal Columbus, who discovered it, and his legitimate descendants, and, should the conclusions of the American Commissioners prevail and Spain continue paying it, logic would place the United States in the position of repudiating it.

"But the fact is that the discussion upon the so-called Cuban debt seems to lack opportuneness at the present.

"The American Commissioners, when referring to the principal items of the said debt, doubtless believed that the Spanish Commission had suggested in its draft the said items to be at once admitted as colonial debt to be transferred together with the sovereignty either to Cuba or to the United States; and this is the capital error upon which the American memorandum is based. The Spanish Commissioners only wish that the principle, up to this time always admitted, to wit, that a debt being exclusively the debt of a colony and affecting its territory goes with the colony itself, be also recognized in this treaty. The American memorandum says nothing in contradiction of this principle, nor do the Spanish Commissioners expect that anything be now said against it, least of all by the United States, whose territory was acquired by them not only with their blood, but also with the money of their treasury. There are publicists who maintain that the thirteen original States paid over to their mother country fifteen million pounds sterling (£15,000,000); and the facts are official that the United States paid to France, Spain, the Indian nations, and Russia respectively cousiderable sums of money for Louisiana, Florida, the Indian States, Texas, California, and Alaska. This instance would be the first one in the history of the United States, in which they, acting

at variance with their own traditions, should have gratuitously acquired a territory which sooner or later will be annexed to the Union.

"The case of the acquisition of Texas, identical as to its origin, its process and its end with that of the Island of Cuba, eloquently shows that the policy then pursued with Mexico by the United States is different from the one now pursued with Spain. In the case of Mexico the American armies, also in support of insurgents, the Texan insurgents, spread themselves over the territory of the whole Mexican Republic, and went as far (a fact which has not taken place in Cuba) as to capture the national capital. The United States demanded then from Mexico the independence of Texas as they now demand from Spain the independence of Cuba, and furthermore they caused Mexico to cede to them New Mexico and California, as now they cause Spain to cede to them Porto Rico and other Spanish islands in the West Indies. But in the case of Mexico they did not ask from her Government any war indemnity, and consented not only to pay her the value of the territories ceded and annexed to the American Empire, but also to assume the payment of the American claims then standing against Mexico.

"In the case of Spain, however, they have demanded from her, in the way of war indemnity, the cession of the islands above mentioned, and ask now, additionally, that the burdens which encumber those islands as well as their sister Cuba be thrown on the mother country, who with her own hands introduced them into the life of the civilized world.

"The only wish of the Spanish Commissioners is that the principle above referred to be admitted and recognized. Its practical application may, according to their understanding of the subject, be afterwards entrusted to a Commission of righteous and impartial persons. If this Commission, upon examination of the bill of items to be filed by Spain, showing what obligations ought in her opinion to be paid by either Cuba, or Porto Rico, should decide that those obligations must fall on the mother country, Spain shall submit to its decision. But if the Commission decides that the whole or a part of the said debts ought to be paid by the colony, there is no reason why the United States in their turn should not also submit to the award. If the United States feel so sure, as they seem, in their position, they can not see any danger in assenting to the proposition herein made by the Spanish Commission. But if they are not so sure, their high sense of justice and the duty of respect which they owe to themselves impose upon them the obligation of causing a matter of mere pecuniary interest to be made subordinate to the sacred cause of justice.

"And in order to show to the American Commission that the Spanish Commissioners have no other wish than the one stated, and that their

purpose is not by any means to have a fixed sum adjudged at this time, as a colonial debt to be paid by the Spanish Antilles, they have decided to withdraw Articles II., IV. and V., as drawn up by them in their former draft, and offer as a substitute for the three a single article, reading as follows:

666

"Article II.

'The relinquishment and transfer made by her Catholic Majesty and accepted by the United States of America embrace:

“‘1. All the prerogatives, powers and rights belonging to her Catholic Majesty as a part of her sovereignty over the Island of Cuba and its inhabitants.

“‘2. All the charges and pecuniary obligations, outstanding at the date of the ratification of this treaty, which upon careful examination of their origin, their purposes and the conditions of their creation, should be adjudged according to strict law and undeniable equity to be different from the charges and obligations which properly and specifically belong to the Peninsular treasury, owing to their having been at all times properly and specifically belonging to Cuba.

"To secure the careful examination provided for in the foregoing paragraph, a Commission consisting of competent and impartial persons shall be appointed by the two High Contracting Parties. The manner of this appointment shall be determined in this treaty by a separate article.'”

Memorandum of Spanish Peace Commission, Paris, Oct. 26, 1898, S. Doc. 62, 55 Cong. 3 sess., part. 2, pp. 85-90.

"In the Spanish memorandum an effort is made to answer that part of the argument submitted by the American CommisAmerican response. sioners on the 14th instant in which it is maintained that the so-called Cuban debt is not in any sense a debt of Cuba, but that it is in reality a part of the national debt of Spain. The American Commissioners were able to show that the debt was contracted by Spain for national purposes, which in some cases were alien and in others actually adverse to the interests of Cuba; that in reality the greater part of it was contracted for the purpose of supporting a Spanish army in Cuba; and that, while the interest on it has been collected by a Spanish bank from the revenues of Cuba, the bonds bear upon their face, even where those revenues are pledged for their payment, the guarantee of the Spanish nation. As a national debt of Spain, the American Commissioners have never questioned its validity. "The American Commissioners, therefore, are not required to maintain, in order that they may be consistent, the position that the power of a nation to contract debts or the obligation of a nation to pay its debts depends upon the more or less popular form of its government. They would not question the validity of the national debt of Russia,

because, as the Spanish memorandum states, an autocratic system pre-. vails in that country. Much less do the American Commissioners maintain that a nation can not cede or relinquish sovereignty over a part of its territory without the consent of the inhabitants thereof, or that it impairs the national obligation of its debt by such cession or relinquishment.

"Into these questions they do not think it neccessary to enter.

"As to the rights, expectations, or calculations of creditors, to which the Spanish memorandum adverts, the American Commissioners have only to say that as regards the so-called Cuban debt, as explained in their memorandum of the 14th instant, the creditors, from the beginning, took the chances of the investment. The very pledge of the national credit, while it demonstrates on the one hand the national character of the debt, on the other hand proclaims the notorious risk that attended the debt in its origin, and has attended it ever since.

"The Spanish memorandum observes that in the last twenty years the Antilles have been represented in the Spanish Cortes and declares that their representatives have participated in all legislative acts bearing upon colonial obligations without ever protesting against their lawfulness or binding force. The information in the possession of the American Commissioners leads to a different conclusion.

The American Commissioners have in their hands the Diario de las Sesiones de Cortes, for Thursday, the 29th of July, 1886, when the Cuban budget for 1886-1887 was introduced and discussed. By this record it appears that on the day named Señor Fernandez de Castro, a Senator from Cuba, referring to the budgets of 1880, 1882, 1883, 1884, and 1886, declared that he had objected to all of them, and that no Cuban debt ought to be created, since the obligations embraced in it were national and not local. He entered into a brief examination of the items which constituted the debt, and created something of a sensation by pointing out that quinine had been consumed in Cuba, during the war of 1868-1878, at the rate of $5,000 a week.

**Another Cuban Senator, Señor Morelos, supported the views of Señor Fernandez de Castro.

Senator Carbonell, representing the University of Havana, in a speech of great power, continued the argument, saying: Have the people involved in this matter ever been consulted? The country has not been heard, and now for the first time has become acquainted with the fact that it has to pay such debts.'

"The Cuban and Porto Rican Senators, Señores Portuondo, Ortiz, Labia, Montoro, Fernandez de Castro, Figueras, and Vizcarrondo, went further, and introduced a bill to provide for the payment by Spain of the so-called Cuban debt in proportion to the productive capacity of the various provinces.

"The protests of the colonial Senators were not heeded, but their