Our War with Spain for Cuba's Freedom

by Trumbull White

CHAPTER XXXI.

McKINLEY SUCCEEDS CLEVELAND.

The Cuban Question Not a New One—The Efforts of Former
Administrations to Bring About a Settlement—President Cleveland's
Message—Recommendations of President McKinley—The Spanish
Minister's Insulting Letter—His Resignation Accepted—The Apology
of the Spanish Government.

For more than ninety years the United States government has been confronted with a Cuban question. At times it has disappeared from our politics, but it has always reappeared. Once we thought it wise to prevent the island from winning its independence from Spain, and thereby, perhaps, we entered into moral bonds to make sure that Spain governed it decently. Whether we definitely contracted such an obligation or not, the Cuban question has never ceased to annoy us. The controversies about it make a long series of chapters in one continuous story of diplomatic trouble. Many of our ablest statesmen have had to deal with it as Secretaries of State and as Ministers to Spain, and not one of them has been able to settle it. One President after another has taken it up, and every one has transmitted it to his successor. It has at various times been a "plank" in the platforms of all our political parties—as it was in both the party platforms of 1896—and it has been the subject of messages of nearly all our Presidents, as it was of President Cleveland's message in December, 1896, in which he distinctly expressed the opinion that the United States might feel forced to recognize "higher obligations" than neutrality to Spain. In spite of periods of apparent quiet, the old trouble has always reappeared in an acute form, and it has never been settled; nor has there recently been any strong reason for hope that it could be settled merely by diplomatic negotiation with Spain. Our diplomats have long had an experience with Spanish character and methods such as the public can better understand since war has been in progress. The pathetic inefficiency and the continual indirection of the Spanish character are now apparent to the world; they were long ago apparent to those who have had our diplomatic duties to do.

Thus the negotiations dragged on. We were put to trouble and expense to prevent filibustering, and filibustering continued in spite of us. More than once heretofore has there been danger of international conflict, as for instance when American sailors on the Virginius were executed in Cuba in 1873. Propositions have been made to buy the island, and plans have been formed to annex it. All the while there have been great American interests in Cuba. Our citizens have owned much property and made investments there, and done much to develop its fertility. They have paid tribute unlawful as well as lawful, both to insurgents and to Spanish officials. They have lost property, for which no indemnity has been paid. All the while we have had a trade with the island, important during periods of quiet, irritating during periods of unrest.

TROUBLE NOT A NEW ONE.

The Cuban trouble is, therefore, not a new trouble, even in an acute form. It had been moving forward toward a crisis for a long time. Still, while our government suffered these diplomatic vexations, and our citizens these losses, and our merchants these annoyances, the mass of the American people gave little serious thought to it. The newspapers kept us reminded of an opera bouffe war that was going on, and now and then there came information of delicate and troublesome diplomatic duties for our Minister to Spain. If Cuba were within a hundred miles of the coast of one of our populous States, and near one of our great ports, periods of acute interest in its condition would doubtless have come earlier and oftener, and we should long ago have had to deal with a crisis by warlike measures. Or if the insurgents had commanded respect instead of mere pity, we should have paid heed to their struggle sooner; for it is almost an American maxim that a people cannot govern itself till it can win its own independence.

When it began to be known that Weyler's method of extermination was producing want in the island, and when appeals were made to American charity, we became more interested. President Cleveland found increasing difficulty with the problem. Our Department of State was again obliged to give it increasingly serious attention, and a resolute determination was reached by the administration that this scandal to civilization should cease—we yet supposed peacefully—and Spain was informed of our resolution. When Mr. McKinley came to the Presidency, the people, conscious of a Cuban problem, were yet not greatly aroused about it. Indeed, a prediction of war made at the time of the inauguration would have seemed wild and foolish. Most persons still gave little thought to Cuba, and there seemed a likelihood that they would go on indefinitely without giving serious thought to it; for neither the insurgents, nor the Cuban junta, nor the Cuban party in the United States, if there was such a party, commanded respect.

PRESIDENT McKINLEY'S MESSAGE.

President McKinley sent a message to Congress a few weeks after his inauguration, in which he recommended the appropriation of $50,000 for the relief of American citizens in Cuba. It read as follows:

"Official information from our Consuls in Cuba establishes the fact that a large number of American citizens in the island are in a state of destitution, suffering for want of food and medicines. This applies particularly to the rural districts of the central and eastern parts. The agricultural classes have been forced from their farms into the nearest towns where they are without work or money. The local authorities of the several towns, however kindly disposed, are unable to relieve the needs of their own people, and are altogether powerless to help our citizens. The latest report of Consul-General Lee estimates that 600 to 800 are without means of support. I have assured him that provision would be made at once to relieve them. To that end I recommend that Congress make an appropriation of not less than $50,000, to be immediately available for use under the direction of the Secretary of State.

"It is desirable that a part of the sum which may be appropriated by Congress should, in the discretion of the Secretary of State, also be used for the transportation of American citizens who, desiring to return to the United States, are without means to do so."

The joint resolution offered by Senator Gallinger, which embodied the recommendations of President McKinley, passed both Houses without a dissenting vote.

An influential journal printed the following editorial concerning this measure:

"It is an essentially new departure in international affairs, and it is in order for the sticklers for precedent to enter fussy protestation, as they did in connection with the Venezuelan question, against the Monroe doctrine, declaring it was not to be found in the code of international law. It is certainly very unusual, if not unprecedented, for the government to make a relief appropriation for its own people in some foreign land. The truth is, this Cuban situation is wholly exceptional. Here is a little island in a state of civil war. It is largely a sectional war, one part of the island being in possession of one of the belligerents, and the other section in possession of the other belligerent.

"Several hundreds of our American citizens are in that section of the island occupied by Spanish armies, and are suffering, in common with the Cubans themselves, from a deliberate policy of starvation. Weyler is trying to conquer by famine. That is his fixed purpose, and, from the nature of the case, no discrimination is made between Spanish subjects in rebellion and American citizens sojourning in the island. If the policy of starvation cannot be maintained without this indiscrimination then so much the worse for Weyler and his policy. Congress has only to make the appropriation asked for, and the relief will go forward, without regard to any collateral consequences."

DE LOME'S INSULTING LETTER.

One of the most sensational incidents in connection with Spanish affairs prior to the destruction of the Maine was the publication of a letter, which fell into the hands of the Cuban Junta, written by Senor Dupuy De Lome, the representative of the Spanish government in Washington, to the editor of a newspaper at Madrid. A translation of the letter is given:

My Distinguished and Dear Friend:

You need not apologize for not having written to me. I ought to have written to you, but have not done so on account of being weighed down with work.

The situation here continues unchanged. Everything depends on the political and military success in Cuba. The prologue of this second method of warfare will end the day that the Colonial Cabinet will be appointed, and it relieves us in the eyes of this country of a part of the responsibility of what may happen there, and they must cast the responsibility upon the Cubans, whom they believe to be so immaculate.

Until then we will not be able to see clearly, and I consider it to be a loss of time and an advance by the wrong road, the sending of emissaries to the rebel field, the negotiating with the autonomists, not yet declared to be legally constituted, and the discovery of the intentions and purposes of this government. The exiles will return one by one, and when they return will come walking into the sheepfold, and the chiefs will gradually return.

Neither of these had the courage to leave en masse, and they will not have the courage to thus return. The President's message has undeceived the insurgents, who expected something else, and has paralyzed the action of Congress, but I consider it bad.

Besides the natural and inevitable coarseness with which he repeats all that the press and public opinion of Spain has said of Weyler, it shows once more what McKinley is—weak and catering to the rabble, and, besides, a low politician, who desires to leave a door open to me and to stand well with the jingoes of his party. Nevertheless, as a matter of fact, it will only depend on ourselves whether he will prove bad and adverse to us.

I agree entirely with you that without military success nothing will be accomplished there, and without military and political success there is here always danger that the insurgents will be encouraged, if not by the government, at least by part of the public opinion. I do not believe you pay enough attention to the role of England. Nearly all that newspaper canaille, which swarm in your hotel, are English, and while they are correspondents of American journals, they are also correspondents of the best newspapers and reviews of London.

Thus it has been since the beginning. To my mind, the only object of England is that the Americans should occupy themselves with us and leave her in peace, and if there is a war, so much the better. That would further remove what is threatening her, although that will never happen. It would be most important that you should agitate the question of commercial relations, even though it would be only for effect, and that you should send here a man of importance, in order that I might use him to make a propaganda among the senators and others, in opposition to the Junta and to win over exiles. There goes Amblarad. I believe he comes too deeply taken up with political matters, and there must be something great or we shall lose. Adela returns your salutation, and we wish you in the new year to be a messenger of peace and take this new year's present to poor Spain. Always your attentive friend and servant, who kisses your hand,

ENRIQUE DUPUY DE LOME.

As soon as this letter was made public, De Lome cabled his resignation to the Spanish government, and withdrew his passports from the State Department in Washington, thus saving himself the mortification of a dismissal. The Spanish government at Madrid sent the following communication to Minister Woodford regarding the affair:

The Spanish Government, on learning of the incident in which Minister Dupuy De Lome was concerned, and being advised of his objectionable communication, with entire sincerity laments the incident, states that Minister De Lome had presented his resignation, and it had been accepted before the presentation of the matter by Minister Woodford. That the Spanish Ministry, in accepting the resignation of a functionary whose services they have been utilizing and valuing up to that time, leaves it perfectly well established that they do not share, and rather, on the contrary, disauthorize the criticisms tending to offend or censure the chief of a friendly State, although such criticisms had been written within the field of friendship and had reached publicity by artful and criminal means.

That this meaning had taken shape in a resolution by the Council of Ministers before General Woodford presented the matter, and at a time when the Spanish Government had only vague telegraphic reports concerning the sentiments alluded to. That the Spanish nation, with equal and greater reason, affirms its view and decision after reading the words contained in the letter reflecting upon the President of the United States.

As to the paragraph concerning the desirability of negotiations of commercial relations, if even for effect and importance of using a representative for the purpose stated in Senor Dupuy De Lome's letter, the government expresses concern that in the light of its conduct, long after the writing of the letter, and in view of the unanswerable testimony of simultaneous and subsequent facts, any doubt should exist that the Spanish Government has given proof of its real desire and of its innermost convictions with respect to the new commercial system and the projected treaty of commerce.

That the Spanish Government does not now consider it necessary to lay stress upon, or to demonstrate anew the truth and sincerity of its purpose and the unstained good faith of its intentions. That publicly and solemnly, the Government of Spain contracted before the mother country and its colonies a responsibility for the political and tariff charges which it has inaugurated in both Antilles, the natural ends of which, in domestic and international spheres, it pursues with firmness, which will ever inspire its conduct.