“It is hereby ordered that on and after January 1, 1899, and until otherwise provided, all customs, taxes, public and postal dues in the Island of Cuba shall be paid in United States money, or in foreign gold coin such as the Spanish alfonsinos (centen) and the French louis, which will be accepted in payment of such customs, taxes, public and postal dues at the following rates:
| Alfonsinos (25-peseta piece) | $4.82 |
| Louis (20-franc piece) | 3.86 |
“That all existing contracts for the payments of money shall be payable in the money denominated in such contracts, and where French and Spanish gold shall be the stipulated money of payment they shall be received in their present decreed inflated values, i. e., alfonsinos (25-peseta piece) $5.30; louis (20-franc piece) $4.24, or in United States money at the relative value set forth in the above table, namely, $4.82 for alfonsinos (25-peseta piece) and $3.86 for louis (20-franc piece).
“It is further ordered that on and after January 1, 1899, and until further provided, the following Spanish silver coins now in circulation in the Island of Cuba shall be received for customs, taxes, public and postal dues at the following fixed rates in American money:
| The peso | $0.60 |
| The medio-peso | .30 |
| The peseta | .12 |
| The real | .06 |
| The medio-real | .03 |
“Bronze and copper coins now current in the Island of Cuba will be received at their face value for fractional parts of a dollar in a single payment to an amount not exceeding 12 cents (1 peseta).
“William McKinley.”
In signing and promulgating the above order, the currency question of Cuba has been settled for all time to come on a sound basis. In offering to accept for the present the Cuban peso or silver dollar for sixty cents, American money, the United States Government merely delays the migration of the coin to Spain. At this price it is profitable to ship them to Spain, but at fifty cents they would have disappeared so rapidly that a commercial disturbance might have followed on account of scarcity of silver dollars and fractional currency. It is not probable, nor is it asserted that this adjustment can be accomplished without hardship to some debtors and a slight financial disturbance. It is not, however, apprehended that the trouble will be as great as some have anticipated. In Santiago the first step to absolutely sound finance was taken last summer and six per cent. of the inflation squeezed out. The business interests in that part of the Island were opposed to a continuation of the ten per cent. inflation, and merely asked of the United States Government that the several gold coins in circulation should be left at their face value. As one of the evils arising from disinflation, certain Cuban bankers put forward the fact that it will mean an increase of from four to ten per cent. in the wages of labour, which Cuban industries cannot afford. Such a result, if true, cannot be regarded as an evil, but, on the contrary, a benefit to the poorer classes, whose condition in Cuba is deplorable beyond description.
In the iron mines at Santiago the large American enterprises have already adjusted themselves to the new conditions and are paying their labour seventy-five cents per day American currency instead of a Spanish dollar worth sixty-five cents in Cuba and only sixty cents in exchange for United States currency. The author, when in the mining districts of this province, heard no complaints, either from the proprietors or the labourers. Stress was laid in the arguments before the President and Secretary Gage upon the loss to the debtor who has borrowed on a fictitious value and must pay the premium, and the unfortunate Cuban sugar-planter is especially singled out for sympathy. That the planter will suffer cannot be denied, but the advent of the United States into Cuba will lighten so many of his burdens that his condition is not without hope. All the customs duties on his imported food supplies, as will be seen in the chapter on the tariff, have been reduced, and many important commodities put upon the free list. The duty on his sugar machinery has been reduced to ten per cent. ad valorem; on his locomotives and railway supplies to twenty per cent.; and all along the line the taxes have been cut down. It is not probable that his land taxes will be collected during the present fiscal year, and the return of peace, establishment of law and order, and protection of property will immeasurably improve his lot. If, therefore, the sugar-planter of Cuba will gauge his present outlook by a glance backward and compare it with his condition last year at this time, he may face the new year with less gloomy premonitions as to his future than some of the testimony taken by the United States Government on the effects of disinflation would indicate. The action of the President, by and with the advice of the able financier at the head of the Treasury Department, will give Cuba a sound currency, which must be the foundation of her future fiscal prosperity.