Social Problems in Porto Rico

by Fred K. Fleagle

"The second problem is to provide protection against the frequent tropical rains. This is especially important in tropical countries that have a protracted rainy season, as it is often difficult to shut out the rain without also shutting out the fresh air.

"The third problem is the provision of adequate sanitary facilities. Due to the heat in southern countries and to the humidity that prevails during certain seasons of the year, this problem is more difficult of solution and likewise more important than in countries farther north.

"The fourth problem is that of securing cheap and durable building materials. In a land like Porto Rico where tropical shrubs and the palm are practically the only woods that the laborers are able to obtain, we must not expect the same solid, commodious habitations which are found in northern countries where the pine and hemlock abound.

"The fifth problem, perhaps as important as any of the preceding and certainly as difficult to remedy, arises partly from the generosity of nature herself. People can live in tropical countries in almost any form of habitation. Cold winters have not obliged the poorer classes to be adepts in house construction. Poverty has forced them to live as cheaply as possible. Naturally, the laboring classes engaged in tilling the soil still make their homes in the cheapest forms of huts. This problem has, therefore, three aspects—an over-indulgent climate, poverty, and a lack of opportunity by the poorer classes to learn better methods of house construction.

"In Porto Rico we have, in addition to the problems mentioned above, two special conditions which have influenced the form and quality of our laborers' houses. The first is that the seasonal character of many of our agricultural industries forces the laborers to migrate from one section to another in order to find work and, naturally, they are not inclined to go to the expense and exertion of building substantial homes. The second, and more important, arises from the fact that the greater part of our laborers do not own the land their houses are placed upon and, being subject to ejection at the will of their landlords, they have no incentive to beautify or improve their homes.

"According to the census of 1910, the urban territory of Porto Rico—that is, the places of 2,500 inhabitants or more—contained 224,620 inhabitants, or 20.1 per cent of the total population, while 893,392 inhabitants, or 79.9 per cent, lived in places of less than 2,500 inhabitants, and of these, 837,725 lived in strictly rural territory. Needless to state, the greater part of the rural inhabitants belong to the laboring classes and live in the types of rural homes described in this section.

"We have divided the habitations of rural laborers, according to their construction, into the following types: (1) Single houses of thatch, (2) single houses of wood and zinc, (3) tenements of wood and zinc.

"Most of the thatched huts in the rural sections have been built by the laborers who live in them. The land upon which these houses are built is, however, usually the property of some plantation or landowner. Only in the more inaccessible sections inland do the laborers who have built these thatched houses also own the land they are placed upon. It is the custom among the landowners to allow laborers who work for them to take the necessary materials—grass, sticks, palm-bark, etc.—from the land and build their huts. This is done, of course, with the consent of the landowner, and the huts so built are legally attached to the land and become the property of the landowner. As a matter of fact, the laborers who have built these huts claim them as their property and are allowed to live in them without charge or molestation so long as they work for the landowner when their services are needed. When a laborer who has built a hut leaves it and moves to another's land, the hut is claimed by the landowner and some other laborer is allowed to move into it. There are also some of these huts that have been built by the landowners at their own expense, but the plantation owners and other landowners who have gone into the business of building houses for their workmen usually construct a better type of house. The thatched hut, therefore, while it is legally a plantation house, is not usually so considered, either by the landowner or the laborer.

"If we judge the importance of a type of house from the number of people who live in it, this thatched hut is far more important than any other rural or urban type. The great mass of the rural laborers live in houses of this type and, as has been shown, fully three-fourths of the total laborers of the Island live in rural sections.